The Windows Phone 7 mobile OS is getting closer to its launch and at last devices using the prototype have started to be supplied to developers. It does seem to have been like an awfully long time coming, almost two years since development started to replace Windows Mobile 6.5. At one time Microsoft’s reputation alone would have been enough to sell Windows Phone 7 but in today’s cell phone world and the iPhone advances, Windows Phone 7 had better be good.

An article over on Engadget by Joshua Topolsky gives an in-depth preview of Windows Phone 7 and when I say in-depth, if there’s something that’s been missed I haven’t spotted it. There are a few months to go before Windows Phone 7-based devices will be rolled out but Engadget has been provided with reference hardware to get some idea of how it’s coming along, used on a not-for-retail Samsung device.

The article starts by looking at the overall look and feel which is mostly favourable but notices two omissions, one of which is not supporting copy and paste and the other is the lack of third-party multitasking of apps. It then looks at the keyboard, contact management and social networking, Email and messaging, SMS, browser, Zune, camera and photo management, Marketplace, Office, Xbox Live, Maps, and search before coming to its conclusions.

The point is made that Windows Phone 7 actually feels like an incomplete operating system in many ways, almost as though at the moment it’s scaffolding ready to build the complete article. As the launch is now only months away a note of caution is given about how ready it will be, with serious issues still to be put right.

Microsoft is undoubtedly in a hurry to get Windows Phone 7 out to get back into the race with the rest of the market, but if it issues it too soon we fear the only response it will get will be a negative one. For more on this go to engadget.com. What do you think of Windows Phone 7? We’d like to hear what you have to say about it.

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