Lumia

Beyond Windows CE in the old days, Microsoft has had very little luck in the mobile market. From Windows Phone to Windows 10 Mobile to even a brief tryst with Android, the company better known for its software has tried and failed to make it big on small devices. It is almost bittersweet, then, for some Microsoft fans to see an abandoned smartphone running a version of Windows that has yet to come and run it well enough to look even usable.

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Lumia owners, both from Nokia and Microsoft, your days are numbered. At least if you're still running Windows Phone 8.1. It might be a shock to some that that version of Microsoft's defunct mobile OS still exists and still runs. It might not be a shock, however, to hear that Microsoft is pulling the plug on it this year. Fortunately, Redmond has a bit of mercy and a path forward for the few still holding on to some of these phones for dear life.

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Microsoft may have abandoned Windows 10 Mobile completely but those who still have a Lumia phone want to hold on to that dream for as long as they can. If they have a Lumia 950 XL or even a Lumia 950, that dream has just become almost a reality, provided they're willing to take the plunge. One of the developers behind making Windows 10 on ARM run on those two Lumia phones has released firmware and instructions that make it easier at least for advanced and adventurous users to easily try out what it feels like to run a "full" Windows desktop experience in their pocket.

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Once upon a time, Microsoft had a dream that many of its fans wanted as well. But just like the Courier dream, Microsoft eventually killed it, leaving its faithful users wondering what could have been. But thanks to the hard work of some developers, they may no longer have to wonder. Efforts to a run a full Windows 10 version on the Lumia 950 XL has reached another milestone now that it has a working driver for the cellular modem.

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Lumia phones are pretty much dead. Windows RT is even more so. But who says you can’t have both? Microsoft probably never imagined, much less wanted, its Windows Phone Internals tool to be used this way, but developers like Ben Wang, a.k.a. imbushuo, aren’t going to take no for an answer. Wang has more or less successfully gotten Windows RT to run on recent Lumia phones, like the Lumia 640 XL, and is now sharing the process so others can join in the fun. That is, if you consider this fun.

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The Android community is filled with mods of all kinds for devices, from customizations to rooting to even installing alternative operating systems. The same can't be said for other mobile platforms, especially iOS. Microsoft's Windows phones, however, was a no man's land until recently. Now thanks to some avid fans, and indirectly thanks to Microsoft, soon some users might be able to dust off their old Lumia phones and find new use for them. Like, for example, installing Windows RT.

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Microsoft has never been great at handheld devices past Windows CE (arguably). From the Zune media player to the Lumia phones, it failed to compete in markets already overrun by giants. As if to add insult to injury, it often doesn’t give abandoned users with ways to move forward, leaving them with practically useless devices. That slightly changed when Microsoft released the Windows Phone Internals tool which, to some extent, allowed some rather patient hackers to install Windows RT or even Windows 10 on older Lumia phones.

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There's no use crying over spilled milk, as the saying goes. There are, however, some milk you really can't help but cry over. Such is the case for Surface Phone hopefuls who are constantly reminded of what could have been. The latest wound to be inflicted on them is a video of an alleged Lumia prototype, codenamed the Lumia Hapanero. Like the elusive Surface Phone, the device showed some crude Surface Pen support, further reinforcing the theory, and the tragedy, of how Microsoft came so close to fulfilling that geek dream.

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Here’s another one for the “things Microsoft should and could have done but didn’t” files. It wasn’t too long ago that there rumors and leaks of abandoned plans for a Windows 10 Mobile Lumia phone that could have become the Surface Phone that Windows fans have been dying to have. Unfortunately, that possibility no longer seems to even be on the table, with Microsoft’s practically backing out of even Windows 10 Mobile. Almost to add insult to injury, a new video of an old prototype has surfaced, showing off working Surface Pen integration on a Lumia phone.

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If Google is the home of throwaway (and sometimes expensive) prototypes, Microsoft is perhaps the home of broken dreams and, to some extent, promises. From the Courier to Continuum to, now, Windows Mobile, Microsoft has us always asking "what if?". Like, what if it put out a nearly bezel-less smartphone? Well, it almost did back in 2014, 2 years before even Xiaomi got the ball rolling. Unfortunately, like many of its actually good ideas, it passed up on the opportunity.

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It is perhaps to no one’s surprise, and maybe to very few shed tears, that Microsoft might soon be putting its Lumia brand as well as its devices to pasture. According to an insider source, it will be sooner rather than later. Before this year ends, Redmond is reportedly stopping the sales of its Windows smartphones. Windows fans, however, might still have something to look forward to, as a Microsoft exec seems to be teasing what most of them are hoping for: a Surface Phone.

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The writing has been on the wall for Microsoft's smartphone ambitions for some time, and now that wall is being demolished altogether. The software giant, unable to coax a viable mobile strategy out of Windows Phone, and now facing uncertainty around Windows 10 on phones, has announced plans to axe 1,850 jobs related to its smartphone business.

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