Samsung ATIV SE review: A great Windows phone that's really hard to find

I've waited a long time for Samsung to release a smartphone that runs Microsoft’s Windows Phone 8 operating system. I found WP8 appealing, but the Nokia hardware where it's most commonly available failed to impress. The Nokia Lumia 920 in particular was heavy, it ran hot, and you couldn’t swap out its battery, which drained at a ridiculous pace.

There was a Samsung ATIV S—a Galaxy S3 running Windows Phone 7—which saw wide release everywhere but in the U.S. And in late 2013 Sprint and AT&T got the ATIV S Neo, which was a step down in hardware from what Nokia was offering at the time. Now Samsung is shipping the ATIV SE. It’s not a Galaxy S4 running WP8, but it’s close. This is the phone I’ve wanted for a very long time.

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