Do you want to access your (or, any) Pocket PC from another (desktop) computer?

Pocket PC remote controller applications can be really great – they offer a really easy way to access the Pocket PC from a desktop computer, which, in cases, can even be a remote one. You can use your Pocket PC far easier this way, using the keyboard and mouse of the desktop PC and being able to see the screen of the Pocket PC, with some clients, even zoomed in (magnified).

Over than half a year ago, I've already published an article on this subject. It can be found here (alternatives: MobilitySite, AximSite, PPC Magazine, FirstLoox, BrightHand). In addition, I recommend this blog entry on the latest Pocket Controller version.

Before reading on, reading these two articles is highly recommended.

As I not only discuss the "local" (you use the desktop keyboard/mouse to access your Pocket PC to make it much easier to enter for example text on it and also see its screen on the desktop computer) but also the "remote" way of accessing Pocket PC's, I've also included in the current article a detailed discussion of the current Virtual Network Computing (VNC) servers for the Pocket PC.

In this blog entry, I only elaborate on subjects that haven't or have just superficially been discussed in the previous articles:

1. Windows Mobile 5 (WM5) compliance
2. TCP/IP-based remote access through any kind of network connection
3. image capturing-related capabilities

A slightly more detailed of the three bullets follows.

It doesn't need to be stressed why WM5 compliance is important: WM5 is the hottest buzzword today and I can state WM5 is cool (no, I'm really not saying this because I'm a Microsoft MVP!) – if the particular WM5 implemenation is (sufficiently) bugfree, that is. I just love WM5 on my Dell Axim x51v and my HTC Wizard, while I do know some other WM5 implementations (particularly that of the Dell Axim x50 series) are pretty close to useless, even with heavy hacking and tweaking.

As far as WM5 compliance is concerned, I've tested all applications with my two new WM5 devices: a Dell Axim x51v (ROM A06) and a HTC Wizard (a.k.a. i-mate K-jam, Qtek 9100, MDA Vario, T-Mobile MDA Vario; ROM version 1.5.x WWE). The latter has a Texas Instruments CPU and Pocket Controller, the best remote controller application, hadn't supported it before the end of 2005; therefore, I really wanted to know whether older applications, which aren't updated any more, can use it. (I was surprised by the results.)

TCP/IP-based remote access is also very important. An example of its use: I always receive help requests from a lot of users (I'm active on several Pocket PC boards and also hold the Microsoft MVP status in the Windows – Mobile Devices category and, therefore, a lot of people ask me for help – I wish I had enough time to answer all those private e-mails!), from all around the world. For some bugfixes or settings, I can just connect to their Pocket PC's that happen to have some application that allow for remote controlling in order to remotely administer their PDA. It's a working solution even over tens of thousands of miles.

Finally, I've already (pretty superficially) discussed image capturing capabilities of the applications. In this review, I added a lot of information on whether the built-in image capture capabilities are compatible with "official" landscape orientations and manual rotation. I've also scrutinized their GAPI (Game API) compliance; that is, the ability to display (and, consequently, capture) game screens.

The new applications in the test

VNC

VNC is an industry-standard remote access protocol. This is why there're no less than two VNC server applications for the Pocket PC:

Pocket VNC Server 1.0 (released 02.09.2005)

This commercial server didn't work on my Pocket PC's/configuration, however much I've tried to make it work. All the other TCP/IP-based applications worked under exactly the same circumstances: accessing a Pocket PC that is connected to the Internet over a non-proxied, direct EDGE connection; the client, a Windows XP, isn't behind any kind of (soft/hardware) firewall either.

Others seem to have exactly the same problems; see for example this thread.

You may have better luck though – give the demo version a try. Hope it'll work in your configuration.

PocketVncServ v0.8

This free server does work and passed all tests. Too bad it's really slow if you don't have a really fast connection. You may want to give it a try though.

Note that there is a similarly named SourceForge project for WindowsCE devices; it is long abandoned (last touched four years ago). Don't be afraid of this: PocketVncServ is much newer (albeit its official homepage has been offline for quite long).

As a VNC client, I used the latest version of TightVNC to connect to these servers.

Traditional local (USB ActiveSync) access method

VH PocketPC Capture by Hmelyoff labs

(Current, tested version: 0.9 beta)

This is a free video capture driver (showing up as a standard DirectShow filter usable from most video capturer applications) and remote controller application for WM2003 and WM2003SE (including VGA) Pocket PC’s. It, unfortunately, doesn’t have copy/paste and doesn’t support pre-WM2003 and WM5 operating systems. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have clipboard synchronization capabilities and built-in still image capture capabilities either.

Screenshot of the main screen

The installation process is pretty simple: just copy \PocketPC\VHPPCCap.dll to \Windows on your Pocket PC and start \DesktopPC\install.bat (you will only need to run it once).

After this, using VH PocketPC Capture as a remote controller app is very simple: just start desktop client GUI, \DesktopPC\VHPocketCapDemo.exe. Note that if you rotate the screen using the format button and, after that, the desktop client wouldn’t start (it just crashes upon start), just put 0 (zero) to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\VH\ VHPocketCap\Rotate using Regedit on your desktop PC.

Its video capturing capabilities should be used the following way. (For this, you don’t need to start VHPocketCapDemo.exe!). For example, in VirtualDub, you will need to go to File/Capture AVI… , then, go to Device and choose “VH PocketPC Captureâ€, set the capture file (F2 or File/Set Capture File) and, finally, you can start capturing by Capture/ Capture Video (F5/F6). Note that you won’t get very good frame-per-second results (with VGA devices, between 1 and 2 only); for much better results, use SOTi Pocket Controller. Note that you can set the capture format/quality after clicking the “Capture†button in the desktop GUI (VHPocketCapDemo.exe), which will, then, store this information in the Registry.

PDA Controller 2.0 by PDA Controller

This application is really weak: it's just overpriced for what it's capable of. Pocket Controller, while it costs $20 more (more than twice the price of this application), is incomparably better: it's much faster, has no keyboard problems and is Landscape-, fully WM5- and VGA-compliant, unlike this application.

1. While it's compatible with WM2003, not even there does it have advanced key functionality. For example, you can't use the Control / Shift + D-pad arrow keys on the desktop keyboard to quickly move around in the text / highlight it.
2. No Landscape / VGA support at all (tested the latter on all my VGA devices; an x51v example is here. On my Pocket Loox 720, the screen went immediately blank when the app connected.
3. While it supports both static image (BMP / JPG) and video capturing, in it, it's in no way as efficient as Pocket Controller (for example, the latter can use any system-level video encoder)
4. Under WM5, it only supports the arrow keys / Enter, not traditional alphanumeric keys
5. While it has clipboard copy functionality, it's really awkward to use. Pocket Controller's approach is MUCH better.
6. It's SLOW!
7. It definitely shows the developer hasn't paid sufficient attention to it: for example, the Preferences screen is full of English spelling mistakes

Tips:

1. To see the current state of the RAM memory, you must explicitly click the Refresh button. Fortunately, it works (at last something that does work...); example screenshots: WM2003 WM5
2. By default, it’s optimized for slow connections, which also means it’ll only deliver 8-bit images to the desktop, which is not necessarily what you want when taking screenshots of, say, games, anything containing non-simple images and the like. In these cases, make sure you switch the connection speed to “fast†as can be seen in here. Of course, this’ll also mean additional slowdown.

Verdict: forget it, even if you only have a WM2003 (or former) device and you don't plan to upgrade to anything else where the lack of landscape / VGA / keyboard support would be a showstopper. Get something else instead. It's only if you (also) have Symbian UIQ devices you'd like to control that it may be worth checking out.

rCE 0.06

I've also included a freeware application, rCE, in the test. It's definitely slower than even the, price-wise, comparable Windows Mobile Developer PowerToys 2.03 but, at least, it supports desktop-to-PPC text sending. It doesn't support the HTC Wizard though.

To install and use it, just unpack the contents of the downloaded rce006.zip on your desktop (make sure you also extract the subdirectories; otherwise, you'll get "Failed transmission of 'rCE.dll'" error messages) and start rCE.exe.

Some screenshots (more of them in the comparison chart): the main menu and the options dialog.

Some important notes on the WM5 compliance of MS Windows Mobile Developer PowerToys 2.03

It'll only run on WM5 devices (all of them) if you copy c:\Program Files\Windows Mobile Developer Power Toys\ActiveSync_Remote_Display\devices\wce400\armv4\cerdisp2.exe to the \Windows directory on your PDA and, then, start it there. Then, you will need to manually start c:\Program Files\Windows Mobile Developer Power Toys\ActiveSync_Remote_Display\ASRDisp.exe (NOT cerdisp2.exe as described in c:\Program Files\Windows Mobile Developer Power Toys\ActiveSync_Remote_Display\readme.txt!) on your desktop.

The comparison chart can be found here (it was far too wide to be included in here.)

UPDATE (09/05/2006): PPCT frontpage

UPDATE (05/22/2007): New version of VNC Server released