Microsoft has teased us with the next major update to its smartphone operating system, Windows Phone 8.
One major graphical change is a new homescreen. The tiles are still there, but they are more customisable. You'll be able to size and colour them to your choice as well as having more control on the information they display.
Windows Phone 8, due to be released in the autumn along with Windows 8 OS for tablets and PCs, will be designed to run on more powerful dual-core processors, which seems to mean current WP7 devices won't be fully upgradable.
And Microsoft is abandoning Bing Maps on smartphones, replacing it with Nokia Maps, currently loaded on the Finnish company's Lumia series of WP7 devices. This shows an even tighter tie-in between Nokia and Microsoft.
UPDATE: Microsoft has confirmed that current Windows Phone devices won't be upgradable to WP8, even though most are less than two years old. Instead, they'll be getting an update to WP7.8, which will give them the new homescreen, but little else including the ability to run apps designed for WP8.
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