Aside from the official Microsoft announcement in February and the steady stream of leaks and rumors that followed, it’s been fairly quiet on the Windows Phone 7 front of late. And other than the HD2 and the LG Fathom, 2010 hasn’t exactly been a banner year for Windows Mobile 6.5 either.

But this week marks a milestone in the Windows Phone 7 journey.  Now, for the first time, reviewers and developers have prototype Samsung smartphones running a near-final version of Windows Phone 7 in their hands.  And that means, among other things, that Windows Phone 7 will quickly shift from chatter and conjecture to any-week-now reality.

Engadget, Boy Genius Report and SuperSite for Windows have each posted first impressions of the Windows Phone 7 OS based on experiences with the prototype devices.  The response is mixed, as you’d expect, and each source highlights aspects of the OS that delight, confound and disappoint. 

If you’re interested in Windows Phone 7 – and if you’re reading this, you very likely are –take a look at the posts and judge for yourself what you think of Microsoft’s upcoming mobile reboot. 

The first smartphones based on the operating system are scheduled for release in Q4 of 2010, so it’s crunch time. 

UPDATE: TechCrunch, ZDNet and Gizmodo have also posted preview pieces.

Microsoft doesn’t intend to launch Windows Phone 7 without a large selection of useful software to run on the new devices.  Today at MIX10, the company announced a list of software and Web companies who are currently onboard and busily working on Windows Phone 7 apps.

The list is fairly long and available at Engadget Mobile, but some of the companies that caught our eye include EA Mobile, Photobucket, Pandora, Shazam, Sling Media, Fandango, Citrix, the AP, and IMDB.

Between now and Windows Phone 7’s launch near the end of the year, this list of software partners will continue to grow.  And before long we should begin seeing some of this software demoed.

As reported earlier in the month, Windows Phone Starter Edition will be a budget option for smartphone makers still looking to run a Windows-powered mobile OS.

Based on Windows Mobile 6 rather than Windows Phone 7, the point of this Starter Edition will be to make a Windows OS for smartphones available to a wider user base, including those “in new and emerging markets.”

Two versions of Windows Phone Starter will be made available to OEMs: one with Office Mobile included and one without.  Starter will not include 3G HSDPA data support, according to reports, but will support EV-DO.

This move essentially allows Windows Mobile 6.5 to live on as a budget OS option.  Mary-Jo Foley of ZDNet also reports that companies will be launching devices with Windows Phone Starter Edition later this year.  We’ve also seen references to Windows Mobile 6 living on as Windows Phone Classic, but have yet to get word from Microsoft on this point.

Microsoft has been losing ground in the smartphone market for some time.  Faced with game-changing advancements from Apple and Google in the last two years, the software giant has needed to do something entirely different with their mobile OS to become competitive again. 

To that end, today Microsoft announced Windows Phone 7 Series, a redesign and rebranding of Windows Mobile.

The Windows Mobile 7 UI has been radically altered throughout the OS.  The new interface is Zune inspired and filled with high-contrast, customizable tiles (seen left) that slide and move around the screen.  The tiles can represent alerts (new email, text messages), applications, feeds from social networks, contacts, etc. 

There are no more tiny drop-down menus that are frustratingly difficult to tap.  Everything has been enlarged for easy finger selection.

Multi-touch is now part of the OS out of the box, offering better views and control of maps, photos, web pages, etc.    The web browser has been replaced with a new, IE-based application, and includes a new font-rendering technology known as “pixel positioning”.

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HTC has posted an info page for the upcoming T-Mobile version of the HD2 Windows Phone.  Aside from giving us our first look at the T-Mobile branded handset, it also reveals updated memory capacities beyond those of the non-U.S. versions of the HD2.

The RAM, system memory, and the flash ROM, file storage, have each received a capacity boost.  The RAM has been increased from 448MB to 576MB.  More interestingly, the ROM has been doubled to 1GB.

Why make these changes?  Most likely to accommodate the version of Windows Mobile 7 expected to be made available for the T-Mobile HD2 later this year.

In addition to its internal memory, the T-Mobile HD2 will also ship with a 16GB microSDHC flash memory card.