Q: Is there call answering machine software for the Pocket PC? A: Nope.

UPDATE (01/09/2008): the first real answering machine software has been released; see THIS.
(end of update)

Many would really welcome a local answering machine on their Pocket PC’s to, for example, avoid the (often costly) need to call in remote voicemail boxes and/or to keep / archive the recordings of their, say, girlfriend.

Unfortunately, I have bad news for all these people: there is NO way one can implement such software on the current (mostly HTC-manufactured) crop of Pocket PC Phone Edition devices because of the hardware limitations I’ve explained in my article on recording conversations. That is, it’s pretty futile to look for any answering machine software for your Pocket PC phone – unless you have the GIGABYTE G-Smart (see below).

Note that

1. there are SMS notifiers (Aali Alikoski’s free SMS Notifier and BOO! Interactive’s commercial SMS Answering Machine) but they only answer with an SMS message and aren’t able to directly record the speech (the message) of the caller
2. other smart phone platforms (see for example Smart Answer on the Nokia S60 platform) do have call recorders. They, however, have hardware that does allow recording calls. (HTC, hear this?! It has been stated many times and we’ll tell you many MORE times that you SHOULD produce phone models that are able to record phone calls because that feature would also make it possible to use the phone as an answering machine!)
3. there is only one Pocket PC Phone Edition model, GIGABYTE’s excellent G-Smart, which contains built-in software to do this. The software, however, can NOT be “hacked” to other devices – this GIGABYTE PDA has special hardware that, unlike HTC models, does allow for recording the voice of the other party (incidentally, this is why it also contains a call recorder software, not just a call answering machine.)

I highly recommend this thread for more info.

Some related threads:

Answering machine

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UPDATE (11:43 PM CET): MobileRead frontpage