[General Topics] Menneisyys:
How does it compare to Pocket Controller Pro?

Pros

First, it’s way less expensive, particularly if you have more than one Windows Mobile devices. In the latter case, you would need to purchase a license to each of these devices from SOTi.

It has way less CPU usage, resulting in a far snappier client. This is especially useful on (W)VGA Pocket PC’s, where the CPU usage of SOTi can easily become an issue.

It allows for controlling more than one Windows Mobile client at a time. This is only available in the significantly more expensive version of SOTi’s app.

It not only supports (remote) TCP/IP connections, but also LAN discovery (for example, Wi-Fi connected handsets on the same local area network). An example of this:

This frees you from having to enter the client IP. However, this also makes initiating the connection a bit slower as you’ll always end up having to select the LAN-connected device you’d like to control from a list whenever you try to connect a LAN-autodiscovered device.

It doesn’t display a connection message when you start the connection. In SOTi’s app, this can’t be suppressed, which means you can’t start the control session in several games / other, mostly full-screen programs without, say, the top taskbar being imposed over the image displayed by the controlled application. (BTW, in this regard, My Mobiler is also better than SOTi’s app.)

Cons

While, particularly on (W)VGA devices, VirtualCE clearly beats SOTi’s app in capturing and transferring changes restricted to a very small screen area, the latter is much faster when there are (nearly) full screen changes. This means you may want to prefer SOTi’s app when, say, you want to take screenshots of a game.

There are no built-in video recording features. While with an external, desktop-side application capable of recording any screen area into a video (like SnagIt or Fraps), you can easily record what the controller shows, built-in video recording capabilities would be even better. This regard, SOTi’s app is way better / more convenient.

Note that, as far as other controller apps are concerned, the non-recommended dotPocket and the free and, now (as of version 0.91b), WM5-compliant VH PocketPC Capture are both capable of video recording. They, however, are significantly inferior to the most recommended “Holy Trinity” of handheld controllers (SOTi Pocket Controller Pro, VirtualCE and MyMobiler). Should you still want to give the latter two apps a try (I wouldn’t bother with dotPocket; VH PocketPC Capture is a tad better), see THIS for more info. (Note that the article still discusses the previous, 0.9b version of VH PocketPC Capture; it wasn’t, back then, WM5-compliant. Now, it is.)

How does it compare to My Mobiler?

Pros

Lower CPU usage

Ability to control several devices at the same time in wildly different networking topologies (again, in these two respects, it’s better than even SOTi’s Pocket Controller Pro).

Definitely faster in every scenario

Ability to custom rotate the screen

Doesn’t display an icon on the Today screen on Pocket PC’s / on the taskbar on Smartphones

Cons

It isn’t free (albeit $10 is REALLY cheap if you take into account its capabilities)

No PDA -> PPC clipboard synchronization

Impossible to reduce the zoom factor to 0.5 (when, for example, you’d like to take a QVGA-sized, low-res screenshot of a VGA devices without manual resizing in another program like ImageMagick.)

Comparison / feature chart

As usual, I’ve created a comparison / feature chart. Because of the size and the useful links inside, I can’t include it in here. IT IS HERE – CLICK THE LINK!.

Verdict

Now that there is another, highly recommended remote controller application, it’s even harder to choose from the “Holy Trinity”: SOTi Pocket Controller Pro, VirtualCE and MyMobiler. There are tasks one of them is best and there are tasks when the others.

Just some cases / examples showing you which of the three controllers you choose, depending on your particular needs:

for example, if you need to take a video / animation of a screen, particularly if it’s a VGA; then, your best choice will be SOTi’s app (or, probably, VirtualCE, if there aren’t frequent full-screen changes or animations and you can put up with using an external, generic video recorder like SnagIt).

(Note that, in this case, absolutely the best and fastest solution is using a PDA with a VGA (an example: Dell Axim x50v/ x51v (see THIS); you’ll also need an external VGA-to-analogue converter) or an analogue (non-VGA) output like that of the HTC x7500 / Advantage / Athena. If you plan to make a video of, say, a fast-paced action game where the quality degradation introduced by the double digital -> analogue -> digital conversion isn’t a problem, this might be the best solution. If, on the other hand, you can’t introduce analogue artifacts (blurred screen), you will still need to stick with a PDA controller app to take your videos. Unless, of course, you use so high a video compression rate in the final output file that effectively hides the artifacts introduced by the dual D/A and A/D conversion.

Note that some of the PDA’s with a built-in VGA output are pretty slow; an example of them is the (old) e800/e830. Also note that the old(ish) CF / SD-based video output cards or Bluetooth-based video output solutions like the Mobility Electronics Pitch Duo Presentation Device, Colorgraphics Voyager CF, Video Output SDIO Card From Spectec, Pretec VGA CF, or the discontinued Margi Presenter-to-Go and Presenter-to-Go SD for Select (see THIS for more info & links on all these) are, in general, pretty slow too and can’t match the speed of the video output speed of the Dell Axim x50v/ x51v or the HTC x7500.)

if you need absolutely the least CPU usage (because you don’t want the app / game you control / take screenshots of to be executed with a snail’s speed), your best choice might be VirtualCE

if you need to paste a LOT of text from the handset’s screen to your desktop (and you don’t want to use a file-based, very awkward transfer method), go for anything else than VirtualCE

should you need an easy way of editing / accessing the Registry, running keyboard macros etc. on your handset, get SOTi’s app

if you have more than one handset you’d like to control, but don’t have much money, you won’t want to go for SOTi because of the increased price (need a license for each and every client)

if you need to make screenshots of a WM game well into the game, but running it under a remote controller would really slow it down to a crawl, you will want to go for a controller that doesn’t mess up the game screen when activated – well into the game. SOTi’s app, in this respect, might turn out to be the worst solution because the dialog it displays on the handset may fully mess up the screen of the currently running application – or, at least, alter it to some degree. In this case, you may want to go for either VirtualCE or My Mobiler.

should you need PNG or JPG output with selectable (!) quality, either go for anything non- VirtualCE or, if you stick with the latter, make sure you install a third-party app to convert the output images (I recommend BMP) to PNG’s or JPG’s; now, with the needed quality.

Albeit I’ve already elaborated on this issue in some of my articles, let me quickly recite what you’ll need. First, get and install ImageMagick. Then, copy all the files you’d like to convert to a directory and put one of the following commands in a batch file (change http://www.winmobiletech.com/012008Controllers/Program Files\ImageMagick-6.3.1-Q16\convert.exe to the path of your version):

FOR /R %%X IN (*.bmp) DO "C:\Program Files\ImageMagick-6.3.1-Q16\convert.exe" "%%X" "%%X.png"

(this converts from BMP to PNG)

FOR /R %%X IN (*.bmp) DO "C:\Program Files\ImageMagick-6.3.1-Q16\convert.exe" -quality 50 "%%X" "%%X.jpg"

(this converts from BMP to JPG, with settable output quality – here, it’s 50%).

By just running the batch file(s) in the directory you’ve collected your VirtualCE screenshots to, you can easily fix the complete lack of PNG / settable-quality JPG files.

Finally, note that VirtualCE excels in that it allows for one-click screenshots with auto-numbering. This can prove to be extremely useful in some cases.

etc. – the list continues