The WP7 TIPS and TRICK'S' Thread

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evilangelic

Senior Member
Jan 19, 2010
70
5
Birmingham
Pinning Webpage Tip

When pinning a page to your start screen in Internet Explorer:

Make sure you are zoomed in on a recognisable part of the page. The current zoom level of the page becomes the Tile snapshot image.

Tip is then: Zoom in on the page logo etc!



e.g. XDA:
KMDtD.jpg
 
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evilangelic

Senior Member
Jan 19, 2010
70
5
Birmingham
Something else to note is the Alarm 'app' is extremely limited. :mad:

There are no options to ring the alarm whilst phone is on silent (but does on vibrate) etc.
The alarms rings at whatever volume you leave the phone at... :(

Obvious Tip:
Before bed put phone into Flight Mode in Settings to stop notifications and emails waking you up.
(Since you have to leave it on high volume to hear the alarm...)

Vibrate silences speaker noises, but it still vibrates which is loud on a table lol :p
 
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evilangelic

Senior Member
Jan 19, 2010
70
5
Birmingham
Ok one more everyone should do...

Phone music & calls to PC Speakers

For me the headset & AV service work perfectly, straight away.

Turn on bluetooth, pair with your PC, and touch again to connect.


Apparently my old HTC Desire had these services (AV Source and Headset) but it always paired but didn't maintain a connection... no obvious reason, didn't bother to look up why lol.
I was just excited when as soon as I connected with my PC with WP7, the Headset service asked for permission and after that all phone audio came through!

Old news to some but it is really cool having your phone blast music through your PC speakers wirelessly ;) absolutely no effort or hassle at all!

Edit: Even before the phone has fully booted it connects to the PC :D you even hear the keypresses to unlock the phone... simple things lol.
 
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Spybreak

Senior Member
Nov 6, 2006
171
38
Valencia
Something else to note is the Alarm 'app' is extremely limited. :mad:

There are no options to ring the alarm whilst phone is on silent etc.
The alarms rings at whatever volume you leave the phone at... :(

Obvious Tip:
Before bed put phone into Flight Mode in Settings to stop notifications and emails waking you up.
(Since you have to leave it on high volume to hear the alarm...)

Not exactly true. I leave my phone on silent every night and the alarm still sounds fine in the morning. To put it on silent click the volume up/down button and press on the bell icon. It'll change to vibrate, but the alarm will still sound.
 

DaWolfey

Member
Jun 7, 2004
14
0
A few things i've discovered:

1. If you're using Exchange Server and you are using a self signed certificate on it for SSL on WM6 you could copy the .cer to the phone and tap to add it to the certificate store. In WP7 you have to email the .cer file to yourself (setup a hotmail or gmail address temporarily if you need to) and tap on it, it will then install the certificate and Exchange syncing will now work.

2. When you turn the device off, it also turns off WiFi - the upshot of this is if you have disabled the data connection via the mobile network (in settings / mobile network) you will NOT get any new email!
 

evilangelic

Senior Member
Jan 19, 2010
70
5
Birmingham
2. When you turn the device off, it also turns off WiFi - the upshot of this is if you have disabled the data connection via the mobile network (in settings / mobile network) you will NOT get any new email!


Hmm i'm trying to figure that out too... although my WiFi is connected, it doesn't sync with my google account if mobile network data is off.

So I can browse the internet and marketplace as the WiFi is on, but it isn't recognised as a sync-eable data connection?

If I then go to Mobile Network (data) and turn it on, and then back to off (after letting an email come in), emails start to come through again using the WiFi as a data connection.

Code:
Google error
Last update about an hour ago
We're having a problem connection to m.google.com. Try again later.
This may be because your data connections are turned off.
Last tried 6 minutes ago
Error code: 80072FA8
 

Seven_PRX

Senior Member
Feb 9, 2009
206
6
2nd, create an extra live account with false location settings, i set mine on beverly hills, california, so you can acces marketplace, xbox live etc.
(you can add an other account for your e-mail settings etc)

You sure this works? Somewhere else I read it's vital your Primary Live account is a foreign one (let's say US), and then the other important thing there is that your billing address on that account is also in the US.

You write that you can use a non-US (let's say Dutch) Live account as primary, and add another US as secondary. That sounds better for me personally, just want to make sure you can browse and mostly importantly install (free) Apps from the US Martketplace?

=7
 

becknise

Senior Member
Dec 30, 2009
82
6
72 Windows Phone 7 tips and tricks here http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/36413/72-windows-phone-7-tips Top 10 are
1. Using the Windows Phone 7 voice controls
Press and hold the Windows key at the bottom of your screen and you can start talking to your phone. Try saying "Open Calendar", to see what we mean.

2. Adding apps to the Start screen
When you are in the long applications list on your phone pressing on an icon and holding brings up a contextual menu that gives you a series of options, one of which is "pin to start". Press on this option and the app will be shown on the Start screen.

3. Add people to the start page
No it's not just about adding apps to the start page, but people too. Find them in your contacts book, click on the "pin" icon, and they'll be added to your Start page so you can speed dial them whenever you need.

4. Moving your tiles around
Adding a new app or tile to the Start screen will place it right at the bottom. If you want it to be elsewhere, press and hold on the tile in question and then you are free to move it up and down and rearrange your tiles to best suit your needs.

5. Removing apps from the Start screen
You like the app, but you don't really want it on your Start screen anymore. No worries. Hold your finger on the tile in question for a couple of seconds and when it highlights press the no pin icon in the top right-hand corner.

6. Uninstalling apps
You've tried it and you don't like it. No problem. Head over to the menu list and press down on the app in question until you get the contextual menu. Select uninstall and you're done.



7. Rating and reviewing apps
You really love the new app you've downloaded, so much so that you want to rate and review it so anyone else interested knows whether it's any good or not. With Windows Phone 7 you don't have to wait until you delete it to rate it, you can rate and review it at any time. Press and hold down on the app in question until that contextual menu appears and then choose "Rate and review". It will bring up another page allowing you to have your say and give it a rating out of five. Easy peasy.

8. How to change the theme
If you've got your Windows Phone 7 phone from Vodafone the theme is going to be all red, O2 is dishing out blue themes and Orange, orange ones. An all red themed phone might be a bit much (we hear you), but fret not as you can change the colour of the tiles and other features in the Setting area. Zip on over to the menu list, select Settings, and then Theme. Here you can choose the colour of the background and the accent colour. Background options are "Black" or "White" while you'll get nine accent colours to pick from. Lime, anyone?

9. Swipe to the left
Windows Phone 7 is built around the idea of panoramic tiles that you swipe to reveal more content off screen. It's always worth seeing if you can swipe to the left as there might be more stuff waiting to be revealed.

10. What are the dots?
Whenever you see three dots at the bottom of the screen, that's a menu for more options. In photo playback for example, it will give you the options to delete the image or perform a quick upload.
 

Sir. Haxalot

Senior Member
Sep 28, 2010
152
3
Linköping
www.wp7board.com
1st, when you link your live account to the phone, you'll automaticly get an e-mail from microsoft phone 7 in your inbox.
this had some usefull links in it. for exemple, I didn't download the full zune package, but another version wich works as well and is quite a bit smaller.

2nd, create an extra live account with false location settings, i set mine on beverly hills, california, so you can acces marketplace, xbox live etc.
(you can add an other account for your e-mail settings etc)

tested it out today, and it works :D

So, if I add my Swedish Live account as a primary, and a secondary UK account, will I be able to access Xbox Live with my Swedish account, or only the UK one? And which account will "own" the Apps I buy?
 

risq

Senior Member
Oct 25, 2010
309
83
Basingstoke
So, if I add my Swedish Live account as a primary, and a secondary UK account, will I be able to access Xbox Live with my Swedish account, or only the UK one? And which account will "own" the Apps I buy?

Your Xbox LIVE account has to be the primary....what screwed me was the fact that my Xbox LIVE was not a @live.com or @hotmail.com - instead it was a passport of a @Gmail.com, so setting that as a primary caused all sorts of problems. I've now gotta wait 30 days to change my associated XBL Live ID on the Xbox itself, transferring the points.

To be honest, it's annoying. They should of added a seperate option for Xbox LIVE, like for facebook etc.
 

ruscik

Senior Member
Jun 16, 2007
625
17
London
Contact linking:

I noticed today you can link multiple contacts in to one.

If you have the same contact on sim, facebook, phone memory and what ever else. Select the one you want to display and click on it. Middle icon that looks like chain, click it. If there is enough similarities you will have suggestions which contacts to link if not click browse.

If two contacts are identical WP7 has probably already linked them for you.

What is good is it does not make any changes to original contacts so you can always unlink them if needed.
 

dougp.me

Senior Member
Jul 9, 2010
89
5
Texas
Your Xbox LIVE account has to be the primary....what screwed me was the fact that my Xbox LIVE was not a @live.com or @hotmail.com - instead it was a passport of a @Gmail.com, so setting that as a primary caused all sorts of problems. I've now gotta wait 30 days to change my associated XBL Live ID on the Xbox itself, transferring the points.

To be honest, it's annoying. They should of added a seperate option for Xbox LIVE, like for facebook etc.

What do you mean it caused problems? I didn't think a passport account would be that big of a deal.
 

ruscik

Senior Member
Jun 16, 2007
625
17
London
What do you mean it caused problems? I didn't think a passport account would be that big of a deal.

when you are setting your live account for first time it will tell you it has to be the main account as it will be the one used for zune and xbox live. If you have all your contacts on hotmail but your xbox live account was registered via gmail or other you will get a new account rather then linking your old one.

If you registered to zune pass using gmail you will have the same issiue.

I understand integration with your own services but as it stands now it is live or nothing. I do not use hotmail account at all and now I am forced to.
 

pikacz

Senior Member
Jun 12, 2009
87
6
guys, one very important question: i know it's possible to pin settings as a tile to the home screen, but can you also pin a specific setting? i'd love to pin wi-fi and cellular as 2 spearate tiles to the home screen to quickly toggle those features on/off
 

rlatarche

Senior Member
Dec 13, 2007
165
0
Cambridge
guys, one very important question: i know it's possible to pin settings as a tile to the home screen, but can you also pin a specific setting? i'd love to pin wi-fi and cellular as 2 spearate tiles to the home screen to quickly toggle those features on/off


Yes and No, yes you can pin settings to the home screen, but nothing any deeper down the menus
 

pikacz

Senior Member
Jun 12, 2009
87
6
that's disappointing :( well, hopefully there're gonna be some 3rd party widgets/tiles to do that
 
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arturobandini

Senior Member
Sep 23, 2008
1,366
37
Paris
Hi,

I have some few questions:

- How to quickly switch the phone to Silent mode/Vibrate, etc?

- How to quickly stop the audioplayer playing when you are somewhere else in the menu ?

- Why some album cover arts are wrong, or black in Zune?

- Is there a way to change the music/audio settings (equalizer, bass, treble ?)

thanks
 

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    In the next view day's I will get a hd7 to , and I think there is a need for a good tips and tricks thread.
    I will be harvesting tips and tricks on xda for this new operating system .

    I need you all to make this an useful thread , if you have some tips or tricks please post them here and I will update the first view posts .


    1) general

    2) we need tips on using ZUNE

    3) Syncing Outlook , (email,contacts)

    4) Multimedia

    5) Mod's


    oh and please don't start a flame war here , this is only for tips and tricks.

    this first post will be used for general tips and tricks



    72 Windows Phone 7 tips and tricks here:
    http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/36413/72-windows-phone-7-tips

    Top 10 are:


    1. Using the Windows Phone 7 voice controls
    Press and hold the Windows key at the bottom of your screen and you can start talking to your phone. Try saying "Open Calendar", to see what we mean.

    2. Adding apps to the Start screen
    When you are in the long applications list on your phone pressing on an icon and holding brings up a contextual menu that gives you a series of options, one of which is "pin to start". Press on this option and the app will be shown on the Start screen.

    3. Add people to the start page
    No it's not just about adding apps to the start page, but people too. Find them in your contacts book, click on the "pin" icon, and they'll be added to your Start page so you can speed dial them whenever you need.

    4. Moving your tiles around
    Adding a new app or tile to the Start screen will place it right at the bottom. If you want it to be elsewhere, press and hold on the tile in question and then you are free to move it up and down and rearrange your tiles to best suit your needs.

    5. Removing apps from the Start screen
    You like the app, but you don't really want it on your Start screen anymore. No worries. Hold your finger on the tile in question for a couple of seconds and when it highlights press the no pin icon in the top right-hand corner.

    6. Uninstalling apps
    You've tried it and you don't like it. No problem. Head over to the menu list and press down on the app in question until you get the contextual menu. Select uninstall and you're done.

    7. Rating and reviewing apps
    You really love the new app you've downloaded, so much so that you want to rate and review it so anyone else interested knows whether it's any good or not. With Windows Phone 7 you don't have to wait until you delete it to rate it, you can rate and review it at any time. Press and hold down on the app in question until that contextual menu appears and then choose "Rate and review". It will bring up another page allowing you to have your say and give it a rating out of five. Easy peasy.

    8. How to change the theme
    If you've got your Windows Phone 7 phone from Vodafone the theme is going to be all red, O2 is dishing out blue themes and Orange, orange ones. An all red themed phone might be a bit much (we hear you), but fret not as you can change the colour of the tiles and other features in the Setting area. Zip on over to the menu list, select Settings, and then Theme. Here you can choose the colour of the background and the accent colour. Background options are "Black" or "White" while you'll get nine accent colours to pick from. Lime, anyone?

    9. Swipe to the left
    Windows Phone 7 is built around the idea of panoramic tiles that you swipe to reveal more content off screen. It's always worth seeing if you can swipe to the left as there might be more stuff waiting to be revealed.

    10. What are the dots?
    Whenever you see three dots at the bottom of the screen, that's a menu for more options. In photo playback for example, it will give you the options to delete the image or perform a quick upload.

    I have some few questions:

    - How to quickly switch the phone to Silent mode/Vibrate, etc?
    Press the volume button on the side and change from Ring to Vibrate and vicer versa
    - How to quickly stop the audioplayer playing when you are somewhere else in the menu ?
    Press volume button and audioplayer should show in a bar at the top and you can pause the song
    - Why some album cover arts are wrong, or black in Zune?
    Don't know, haven't noticed that yet
    - Is there a way to change the music/audio settings (equalizer, bass, treble ?)
    Download HTC App Sound Enhancer, allows some changes to be made.
    thanks

    A couple of tips from me.

    Firstly - More for O2 members here regarding call waiting, call divert etc. All from the O2 website as their help desk aren't up to speed on the device yet:-

    If you're not reachable, you can:
    • Activate diverts by pressing * * 62 * 901 # [send]
    • Cancel diverts by pressing # # 62 # [send]
    • Check the status of your divert by pressing * # 62 # [send]
    To divert calls when your phone is busy:

    • Press * * 67 * 901 # [send] to activate
    • Press # # 67 # [send] to cancel
    • Check status by pressing * # 67 # [send]
    To divert calls when there's no reply:

    • Press * *61 * 901 * 11 * number of seconds # [send]
    • Cancel by Pressing # # 61 # [send]
    • Check status by pressing * # 61 # [send]
    Note: You only need to press * 11 * if you want to change the length of time your phone rings before it goes to Voicemail. It's normally set to 30 seconds, but if you prefer, you can amend this to 5 - 25 seconds in increments of five seconds.
    To divert all calls:

    • Key * * 21 * 901 # [send]
    • Cancel by keying # # 21 # [send]
    • Check status by keying * # 21 # [send]
    To cancel all your diverts:

    • Key # # 002 # [send]

    Call waiting
    Call waiting lets you take another call when you're already on the phone. Just dial *43# [send] and you'll be able to see if someone's trying to get through when you're already on a call. It's free to all O2 customers.


    Have set but not fully tested any of this yet. The device confirms the settings when you send so I'm assuming it has worked.



    Next set of tips is for those of you wanting to use Exchange (whether business or personal) rather than Live for your contacts and calendar.

    1. Outlook in Office 2010 will enable you to have 2 Exchange accounts on the same profile!! This means that if you have a business and personal exchange account you can have them both open on one Outlook at the same time and it means ..... you can do the same drag and drop as if you had used the Outlook connector to link to Live!
    2. When setting up the Exchange accounts on the phone, remember - the Server is the OWA address not the actual server address.
    More later

    How to have multi-language dictionaries [WP7 autocorrects my English words]

    Select multiple keyboard languages in the settings. When done so, your virtual keyboard will show a regional button right of the spacebar. Changing keyboard layout will change the dictionary.
    3
    Marketplace Search

    I don't know if this has been covered or not, but if you suffix your search in marketplace with the content type it filters everything else out

    Example:

    Google app - Apps only
    Google Song - Songs Only
    Google Album - Albums/Songs Only

    This is useful for searches that have common names in them.
    3
    Thought I'd post a link to a list I made of some tips: http://www.creepinjesus.net/10-of-my-favourite-windows-phone-7-tips. I consider these the "not-so-obvious" tips - ones you wouldn't know about unless someone told you.

    Hope they're helpful :)
    3
    Pinning Webpage Tip

    When pinning a page to your start screen in Internet Explorer:

    Make sure you are zoomed in on a recognisable part of the page. The current zoom level of the page becomes the Tile snapshot image.

    Tip is then: Zoom in on the page logo etc!



    e.g. XDA:
    KMDtD.jpg
    2
    Winter gloves

    If you live in one of the colder climates, and wear regulation winter gloves, you will have to take off your gloves to answer the phone (or do anything else).

    For things like answering the phone, or reading emails & sms, here is a tip: Use your nose. Do not use your tongue - that's gross.