Hardware vendors awaiting “Mango” update before releasing new devices

This week we’re seeing reports of that it’s not only the Windows Phone 7 consumers that are awaiting Microsoft’s big planned update (codename Mango), but  hardware vendors as well.

New in the game – Acer

Acer, not one of the originally mentioned hardware producers are apparently about to get in to play with a Windows Phone device.

A spokesperson from Acer talked to Pocket-lint and divulged that they have plans to release devices around October, about the same time frame that Mango is said to be released in.

Old but new – Nokia

Andy Lee’s have confirmed that Nokia is indeed awaiting the Mango release before showing any hardware.

Pretty smart I reckon as they’ll have a chance to fine tune performance of the devices seeing that the Mango release might require more from the devices. Working so closely with Microsoft as the newly confirmed partnership takes them, they’ll have a golden opportunity to produce some really good devices with good UX for Mango.

Mango – What is it

Mango is the codename given to the large Windows Phone 7 update planned for release around Windows Phone 7’s first anniversary.

The update is of a larger magnitude and will most likely entail a revision upgrade of the OS. Speculations are of Windows Phone 7.5, as it is believed it will align the OS for a later upgrade to Windows Phone 8 with release frame aligning it with the release of Windows 8.

From what is known right now regarding Mango’s functionality, it will contain:

• Integration of the SkyDrive and the Office hub for easier storage of documents in the cloud
• Twitter integration in the people and picture hubs
• New web browser based on IE9, supporting hardware graphics acceleration, HTML5, canvas etc (no mention of Flash though)
• Multitasking of applications, even third party Apps.

But Microsoft has more things in store for this release that they aren’t sharing at the moment, due to fear of being copied by rivaling ecosystems. They have said that they will release more information about the new IE9 browser during MIX11, and that they are looking at how to release further information after that.