windows 10 phone applicaiton for surface 3 4g lte

Hi @guy.nash!

Thank you for reaching out and asking your question! What a great question, I’m glad we have an answer!

Since the Surface 3 is a tablet, it offers only a data connection. If you are wanting to make phone calls, you can look into third party applications such as Skype for phone calls. With sending text messages, you have the option of using AT&T Messages.

AT&T Messages is an app that is offered for free. It allows you to send and receive text and picture messages from your tablet or computer, so you’ll get all your messages no matter which device you’re using. If you are interested in learning more about it, you can access the AT&T Messages Overview and FAQ.

AT&T doesn’t offer an SDK. Microsoft does have development applications. Directly on the Microsoft page, you can look into the article Get Started with Windows apps. Another great article is the Microsoft Surface Development Overview.

Let us know if this works out for you! We would love to hear back from you! Take care and have an awesome weekend!

Tim, AT&T Community Specialist

There doesn't appear to be an AT&% messaging app for windows 10, only an android application. Thanks to your directions my account password has been changed and I can't recieve the message with the temporary password on my tablet. I only get a message that says my password was changed, not what it was changed to.

The cellular service appears no different than a phones cellular service.  My understanding from talking to Verizon is that the only thing missing on the windows 10 surface 3 4g lte is a phone application that uses it.  Skype doesn't fit that bill.  The libraries need to talk to the modem are included in the windows 10 mobile edition, I'm just not sure why the tablet was left as an orphan.

This seems to me to be an extremely poor marketing decision and will eventually drive me away from at&t.  Microsoft does not seem inclined to integrate Skype as a real phone application and there appears not to be a SDK to create a real phone application.  The android and iOS platforms are too insecure and inmature to develope for, this is extremly shortsighted and disappointing.

There is a website that works on Windows, and it's pretty good, but it doesn't stay in perfect-sync with your phone messages, sometimes you can get/send message in one or the other, and they don't show up in vice-versa. 

HTTP://messages.att.net

When the Anniversary update starts to rollout (Redstone) for Windows 10, on/about 8/2, it has built-in messaging.  It will allow you to have direct linkage to your texts, without having to mess around with the AT&T app.

The built-in Win10 app has worked almost flawless for me, so far, maybe one of two of the above missed messages, if that, and I'm running a pre-release.

*If this (or another post in this thread) fixes your problem/issue, please mark it as solved, and I'll tag it, to make it easier for others to find the answer(s). Thanks.

That's the problem though.. I don't have a phone.  I have a surface 3 4g lte. I don't just want a data connection on it.   I'm currently looking into windows 10 mobile to see if will run on the surface 3 and what else that would impact.   I haven't seen any phone, smart or otherwise that fits my needs.  The tablet does, with the exception of phone service.  If Lync was still available that might take care of things but Skype definitely does not.  a windows 10 voip application connected to AT&T would be wonderful but I've never seen that offered.  if the win10 app is that Skype UWA you must have seen something other than what I did.  I purged all of the messaging apps pieces within minutes after installing because the interfered with my skype service.  They didn't have the ability to place a skype to ptsn call, use the people contact list and the settings were not only hard to find but didn't make and real changes.   Skype is a four letter word.   Lync, at least, was a production ready full function tool. (not the UWA, the lync 2013 desktop client).

So far I'm still not seeing any solution to my problem.  I'll review the windows app after 8/2 and see what that brings to the table but right now I don't think a solution exists out of running windows 10 mobile on the tablet.

You could use Google Voice or VIber (or one of many other VOIP solutions) if you don't like Skype, it would also serve the purpose you're after, being able to have phone/messaging, on your Surface.

Your Surface will never be able to run Win10 Mobile (at least not without a really crazy ARM processor emulator), since it's an x64 architecture, and W10m relies on the ARM architecture. The core code and all is compiled into a machine langauge that that laptop cannot understand.

If you truly want phone-like functionality, on the laptop only, you should look at the array of VOIP out there...

*If this (or another post in this thread) fixes your problem/issue, please mark it as solved, and I'll tag it, to make it easier for others to find the answer(s). Thanks.