Windows Phone 7.8

[Mitlov]

It's out...at least, if you plug your phone into Zune PC software.

Initial impressions:

The homescreen is more customizable. There are more color options, and you can choose the size of each tile. You can have 24 small tiles (with no live tile functionality), six medium-size tiles, or three double-width tiles, or any combination thereof. Most all apps can be set to any of the three tile sizes, whereas before all were medium except for a couple that were automatically double-width.

The interface seems faster. I can't prove this, but it does.

Several issues that I blamed on HTC (not Microsoft) have been resolved. The picture seems to take more natural-color photos, and is less prone to motion blur, particularly when using the physical shutter button. Also, the bug where music playback would pause when I slid out the keyboard has been fixed. I don't know why the update from 7.5 to 7.8 would fix these, but it did.

There are a few new features buried throughout the OS. For example, you can now use the Bing picture of the day (whereas Google has a daily "doodle," Bing has a daily gorgeous-quality photo) as your lock screen, and it updates daily automatically. I'm not going to pretend I've found all the new features yet, but there are some besides just the homescreen changes.

[Mitlov]

Just realized this is in the wrong forum...could a mod please move the thread to the Windows Phone forum? Thank you!