Two software updates are being pushed out to owners of the Nokia Lumia 800. First, there’s a battery related software update that fixes issues that several Lumia 800 units have been experiencing. It’s the second part of a two part software update that Nokia promised they’d roll out back in late November. We’re impressed that Nokia actually managed to stick to their word and release these updates on time. As for the second software update, it’s related to Windows Phone. Microsoft recently announced Windows Phone 7.5 Mango build 8107 and it fixes some issues relating to syncing with Google’s email service, issues with the on screen keyboard disappearing at seemingly random times, and something to do with voicemail … people still use voicemail? To get both of these updates you’ll have to connect your Lumia 800 to either your Mac or your PC and have the appropriate desktop client installed. This writer is currently reviewing the Lumia 800 and updated his Lumia 800 to Windows Phone build 8107 with no issues.
While we’re on the topic of updates, we’d like to point out that even though Windows Phone has been pretty good regarding regular software updates, it somehow remains the last mobile operating system on the planet to require a connection to a computer to do the dirty deed of upgrading to the latest bits. To be fair iOS needed to be tethered to be updated for quite a long time. It was only with the release of iOS 5 back in October of last year that things changed. Meanwhile Android has been getting over the air updates since the platform’s inception, though Symbian has been getting over the air updates before Android even launched.
Anyway, that’s just a minor niggle. We’ll likely see this be addressed by the end of the year with either Tango or Apollo, the next two versions of Windows Phone.