Microsoft has massively expanded the list of smartphones which will support the Windows 10 Technical Preview for phones. The first build of this preview software, unleashed in February, left some a little disappointed with just a handful of mid-range devices being possible test platforms.
The initial limited smartphone support was down to a smartphone characteristic called 'system partition size'. Only the initial range supported had enough such capacity to complete an in place phone upgrade. Some thought it odd that the list included just six Lumia smartphones, mainly from the 6XX series. However Microsoft has now implemented a 'partition stitching' technique which allows them to dynamically resize the system partition. This means a much larger set of smartphones is upgradeable with the latest Windows 10 Technical Preview for phones.
Lumia 1020 Lumia 1320 Lumia 1520 Lumia 520 Lumia 525 Lumia 526 Lumia 530 Lumia 530 Dual Sim Lumia 535
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Lumia 620 Lumia 625 Lumia 630 Lumia 630 Dual Sim Lumia 635 Lumia 636 Lumia 638 Lumia 720 Lumia 730 Lumia 730 Dual SIM Lumia 735 |
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Microsoft Lumia 430 Microsoft Lumia 435 Microsoft Lumia 435 Dual SIM Microsoft Lumia 435 Dual SIM DTV Microsoft Lumia 532 Microsoft Lumia 532 Dual SIM Microsoft Lumia 640 Dual SIM Microsoft Lumia 535 Dual SIM |
Microsoft's Gabe Aul wrote that he gets "a ton of questions every day on Twitter about when your favourite phones will be usable". Now he says, the vast majority of Lumias will be able to install the upcoming preview. The public participation in testing will now be a lot more useful for getting Windows 10 ready for the majority of Windows Phone devices on the market.
As eagle eyed readers will have spotted, one notable absence from the list, published above, is the flagship Lumia 930. Gabe Aul noted on his Twitter account that this smartphone is suffering from a unique bug that is being investigated right now. It's difficult to gauge Windows 10 support for all the third party Windows phones out there from the likes of Samsung, HTC etc.
Are any readers excited to see that their Lumia smartphone will shortly be able to preview Windows 10?