WIndows Phone 7: Top Tips
Microsoft's updated mobile operating system, Windows Phone 7, has enjoyed a hugely popular first few months of life. Hardware from HTC, Samsung and LG helped smooth matters along at launch, showing the world what the cutting edge software was capable of and now we're looking forward to a banner year for Windows Phone 7 devices. If you already have your WP7 device, you might be looking for ways to get that little bit more out of it, and with that task we will be happy to assist you, with our Top 10 Tips and Tricks for Windows Phone 7.
Keep your eyes peeled for the three 'more' spots - Scattered throughout the OS you'll notice three little spots, sitting minding their own business in the bottom right hand corner of your screen. Give them a tap and you'll gain access to context menus that can be used to customise your user interface, change settings and generally get things done.
Add web pages to your Home screen - To speed up your browsing you can add your favourite web pages to your Home screen. Simply open the page that you want, wait until it's loaded then tap on the three spots in the bottom right of the screen to bring up your options, from there simply select 'pin to start' to add a tile to your Home screen.
Save your battery, turn off 3G - When you're in a Wi-Fi area you don't need 3G and by simply turning it off for a few minutes you can save your battery a lot of hard work. Go into Settings>Mobile Network and turn Data Connection to off.
Enable 'Find My Phone' - Windows Phone 7 has a great feature that will enable you to locate your device should it become lost or stolen. To switch it on choose Settings>Find My Phone and sleep a little easier knowing that your beloved gadget can 'phone home' should the worst happen.
Merge that contact info - If you're like us, you'll probably have a whole mess of contacts ranging from Facebook to Gmail to good old' fashioned e-mail, and it's more than likely that you'll have different contact information for the same individual. You can merge all this data together, however, under one roof by making use of the small link icon at the bottom of the person's page. Select it and point it to all of that person’s other contact information for one, single comprehensive address book entry.
Make use of SkyDrive - Windows Phone 7 allows you to utilise Microsoft's SkyDrive cloud service, which allows you to upload your precious data to your online account for safe keeping/sharing. You can also set the device to automatically upload images to SkyDrive periodically. You can do this by tapping the Start button and flicking left into the Apps menu then choose Settings>Applications>Pictures Camera and choosing Auto Upload to SkyDrive.
Organise your calendars - Sort your synced calendars with a spot of colour coding by opening the calendar, choosing day view and then selecting the perennially useful more (...) key in the bottom right and choosing calendars, from there you can colour them according to service, allowing you to stay on top of the right engagements and meetings at the right times.
Reset your device - This one may be a no-brainer but it might just stop you from sweating if something goes awry with your shiny, expensive smartphone. To reset the device choose Settings>About>Reset Phone and when it starts-up everything should be peachy again.
Switch between mobile and desktop-view browsing - If you want to view the full version of your favourite web page, rather than the scaled down, data friendly mobile version you can turn on Desktop browsing by opening Internet Explorer and tapping on the more (...) key and selecting settings, from there you can choose mobile version or desktop version.
Take pictures on the fly, even when your phone's locked - If you see a camera opportunity and want to snap it without having to go through the rigmarole of unlocking your device and opening the camera app, you can hold down the camera button on your device for 3 seconds, which will allow you to take a photo without having to unlock or enter your password.
With any luck this list should save you a few seconds here allowing you to fully utilise the ethos of Windows Phone 7, which is to accomplish what you have to and get back to living your life without having your nose buried in a smartphone, however fun and powerful said smartphone might be!
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