Last November the Orange contract on my old HTC Desire-Z phone came up for renewal. I’ve been intrigued by the new Windows Phone system since its original launch but never really though about switching, at least until a friend lent me his old Samsung Omnia 7.

This phone runs the older Windows Phone 7.5 system, but is good enough to get an idea of what switching to a new Windows Phone would be like. I really liked the new system and just before Christmas I decided to make the switch. I’ve now got a nice new shiny HTC 8X on Three and I love it!

Here’s a quick list of the Windows Phone apps I’ve found essential so far…

• 7Pass – A Keepass password database client. Nicely hooks into Skydrive/Dropbox too.
• Baconit – A great Reddit client app
• CrashPlan – Monitor/restore data from Crashplan cloud backups
• Facebook
• Flickr
• NextGen Reader – A great Google Reader client. Syncs articles for offline reading too.
• Podcatcher – Probably the best Podcast app in the Windows Phone Store. Could do with a couple of extra useful features, but it’s updated on a regular basis…
• Rowi – A fantastic Twitter client, again it’s probably the best available.
• Token2Shell/WP – An SSH client app.
• TV Guide+ – There’s no official Sky TV Guide app yet, so this is the next best thing.
• XBMC Remote – The best XBMC remote control app I’ve seen on any platform.