AT&T will be the first wireless carrier to offer the Microsoft Lumia 950 smartphone when it begins taking orders this week. But if you want the larger, more powerful Lumia 950 XL you can pre-order an unlocked model today.

Microsoft is taking orders for the Lumia 950 XL for $649. That price gets you a 5.7 inch phone with a Snapdragon 810 processor, Windows 10 software, and (while supplies last) a free Microsoft Display Dock which lets you connect the phone to a monitor, keyboard, and mouse so you can run some apps on a big screen.

lumia 950 xl_02

The Lumia 950 XL is one of the first phones to support Microsoft’s new Continuum for phone software. When it’s connected to an external display you’ll see a Start Menu instead of a Start Screen and a desktop and taskbar will appear. You can use the extra screen real estate to run apps like Office and Outlook in desktop-sized windows with multi-panel views.

There are some limitations to Continuum for phone. Apps run in full-screen windows and can’t currently be resized and tiled the same way regular desktop Windows apps can. And you’re limited to running Universal Windows apps available from the Windows Store.

But it’s still a pretty neat trick that allows you to kind of carry a desktop PC in your pocket. And while you’re interacting with apps on your monitor you can still take phone calls or run other apps on the phone itself.

As for the Lumia 950 XL, it’s a phone with a 5.7 inch, 2560 x 1440 pixel display, 3GB of RAM, 32GB of storage, a microSD card slot, a 20MP rear camera, a 5MP front camera, a removable 3340 mAh battery and support for wireless charging and fast charging.

The Microsoft Display Dock is a small box that connects to the phone via a USB-C cable and adds DisplayPort, HDMI, and USB ports.

 

 

Support Liliputing

Liliputing's primary sources of revenue are advertising and affiliate links (if you click the "Shop" button at the top of the page and buy something on Amazon, for example, we'll get a small commission).

But there are several ways you can support the site directly even if you're using an ad blocker* and hate online shopping.

Contribute to our Patreon campaign

or...

Contribute via PayPal

* If you are using an ad blocker like uBlock Origin and seeing a pop-up message at the bottom of the screen, we have a guide that may help you disable it.

Subscribe to Liliputing via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 9,543 other subscribers

13 replies on “Pre-order Microsoft Lumia 950 XL for $649, get a free display dock”

  1. Too late, I already bought an iPhone 6s 64gb unlocked SIM-free model for $749. My new iPhone will work ANYWHERE in the world without a contract. Even better, my new iPhone does NOT run the lame Metro Tiles “Modern UI” interface with limited apps at the Microsoft store.

    1. Not dying, market share has fluctuated but has mostly gone up the last couple of years… It’s just a small market share but phone costs are phone costs regardless of market share…

  4. I am thinking that Microsoft makes they most profit from monetizing low and mid end phone users. I would be surprised if they even turned a profit on their high end phones. It’s hard looking at a product that is not expected to turn a profit.

  5. SIX HUNDRED FIFTY BUCKS for this Micro$oft POS? Did the pay you to make this post?

  6. I thought Windows Continuum would allow use your mobile as a normal desktop, but there are some significant constraints: not all apps can be run, no window resizing. I hope that Linux/Ubuntu developments will let run any existing app that runs on desktop also run it from the mobile on monitor.

    1. It’s still very much a beta right now, much of the functionality won’t be fully enabled until next year…

      While presently, no… Ubuntu Touch doesn’t let you just run any desktop app… Like this solution the desktop apps have to be specifically developed to support the platform.

      This is the trouble with early adoption, the potential is there but it’s usually not realized right away…

  8. $ 650 they got to be Joking,,,a Lumia at Apple prices…good luck on that..

    1. Nope, just a flagship phone at flagship pricing… You’d pay upwards to $900 for the latest Flagship Samsung Galaxy phone, for example…

      Lot’s of people just seem totally clueless on how much phones actually cost because they’re too used to the subsidized pricing and hidden price games that carriers play that make users end up paying even more but just spread it over a long period of time…

      1. I think the recent rise of capable mid-range phones also has something to do with it, along with previous, still very capable flagship, phones, like LG’s G2 & G3 being available for under $300. There just isn’t the same performance gap between these phones and the new flagships that there used to be.

        Dumb comments aside, it’s not a bad thing that more people are balking at the sticker-shock prices of new the flagships. Now, if only we can get more people to understand they don’t need to buy a new phone every year…

        1. Problem with the mid-range phones is people don’t understand what they’re not including in those models… A flagship is more than just its basic specs and it doesn’t help that many times the specs are misleading because a SoC model can have multiple variants and only the OEM may know exactly which one they used and that’s not even factoring what the OEM could have done to optimize performance.

          But yeah, it would be better if people understood they didn’t need to buy a new phone every year but the whole industry is pretty much confusing to the average consumer…

Comments are closed.