Here's why Microsoft's Lumia 650 does not feature Continuum

The recently announced Lumia 650 that is aimed at small businesses as a smart tool, indeed misses out on the very feature that would make it really worthwhile, Continuum. The ability to turn a Windows smartphone into a (partial) desktop seems like a feature that would attract the attention of any small business indeed, but Microsoft seems to think otherwise. So when Microsoft announced the Lumia 650 without the much sought after feature, it indeed disappointed many who would have been prospective buyers of the same. After a short period of silence, the company has finally given out the details as to why Continuum did not make it to the Lumia 650. According to SlashGear who managed to get some answers from a spokesperson, it now seems clear that Microsoft simply wanted to deliver a quality smartphone that works well with its Office services. “We are aiming to deliver the most productive Windows 10 Mobile devices at all price points. With the Microsoft Lumia 650, our goal was to create a beautiful device that’s affordable for businesses to buy and deploy.” Talking about why Continuum was missing, “In this price range we are giving customers smart business tools, including seamless Office and OneDrive integration and Cortana, so users can stay productive and synced across all Windows 10 devices. We encourage users looking for Continuum productivity features to explore the Lumia 950 and Lumia 950 XL." Indeed, hardware is the biggest problem with Contiuum as can be seen from the fact that the smartphones that run it so far, do utilize premium chipsets with liquid cooling systems to keep them cool. Microsoft’s webpage on Continuum also explains the same by citing the minimum requirements for phones to include Qualcomm Snapdragon 617 (MS8952), Snapdragon 808 (MSM8992), and Snapdragon 810 (MS8994) processors with 2GB RAM for phones with minimum display resolution support for HD (720x1280 pixels) and 16GB of non-removable storage. The minimum requirements for connectivity include Bluetooth 4.0, supports for Wi-Fi 802.11n dual band and support for Windows 10 Miracast extensions along with USB 2.0. Simply put, Continuum heavily depends on premium hardware meaning that we will never see it on a budget to mid-range device.