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Review : Windows Mobile Device Center for Windows Vista December 26, 2006 [General] | By Edward J. R. Whether you want it or not, starting February 2007 (i.e. in one month roughly speaking), most PC computers that will be sold, will have Windows Vista pre-installed. Furthermore many current users of Windows XP will be switching to Windows Vista. Together with introduction of Windows Vista, Microsoft decided to abandon ActiveSync and to introduce Windows Mobile Device Center instead. In this article we review the Center to help you decide whether an upgrade to Windows Vista would be beneficial for you from the point of view of Windows Mobile and to prepare you for unavoidable: Windows Vista! 
As you can see in the image above if Windows Mobile Device Center has been installed in your Windows Vista (it is not working in Windows XP or older Windows) then you can see the icon of this program: 
... in the "Control Panel" folder and you can see an icon of your Windows Mobile device in "Computer" folder! However let us explain it all step by step... * * * * * The very first step that each user of Windows Vista must take is to actually download and install the Windows Mobile Device Center itself: 
After consideration Microsoft decided not to include this Center in the operating system itself! - probably to avoid anti-monopoly lawsuits... Anyway users have to download it separately manually or fetch (semi)automatically through Windows Update process - it is not pre-installed with Windows Vista. Once installed Windows Mobile Device Center appears in the "Control Panel" folder (see right-bottom corner): 
After installation of the Center, in the folder "Administration Tools" in "Control Panel" folder you can find "Services" configuration program, where you can see list of Windows services (programs running in the background - whether user is logged-in or not) and among them also 2 services especially designed for Windows Mobile - one for Windows Mobile 2003 and one for Windows Mobile 5.0: 
Now, when you connect your Windows Mobile device through USB (you can also use Bluetooth, but synchronization over Wi-Fi still is not possible) to a PC computer with Windows Vista and the Center installed, you can notice this pop-up: 
... and also an auto-play window appears for this device: 
The main window for configuration of Windows Mobile device looks like this for MS Smartphone (Windows Mobile Smartphone): 
... or like this for Pocket PC (Windows Mobile Pocket PC Edition): 
Please note that icons in Windows Vista are much more scalable than in Windows XP, and icons for smartphone and Pocket PC look like this (when scaled): 
Interestingly users can see battery status of connected Windows Mobile device - without the need to look at the display, just by looking at the properties of the device: 
If you selected "Set up your device" in the main window (mentioned above) then you can select what kind of information you wish to synchronize: 
For some reason users cannot synchronize "Windows Calendar" and "Windows Contacts" that are pre-installed in Windows Vista, but only information from Microsoft Outlook. Since Microsoft Outlook is included with every Windows Mobile device - on the CD-ROM / DVD - this is not a problem. If you selected "Connect without setting up your device" from the main window of the Center, then you have 4 following options: 
In "Programs and Services" you can not only get updates and downloads for your Windows Mobile device but also install/deinstall programs on the device: 
In the position "Pictures, Music and Video" users can configure bi-directional synchronization of media files between PC and Windows Mobile: 
"File Management" position gives possibility to browse files inside of your device (and also copy/delete files): 
Finally in "Mobile Device Settings" position users can remotely, from PC, change settings of given Windows Mobile device: 
Unfortunately despite extensive tests we have failed to have more devices than one connected and copying files / synchronizing! Shortly speaking: only the device that is connected first can be synchronized - the other devices are not visible from Windows Mobile Device Center although visible in the device manager. Microsoft has promised that one of new features of Windows Vista will be ability to handle more than one Windows Mobile device at once, but it simply is not working! The reason could be that Windows Mobile Device Center is still in Beta, but clearly this feature is not working. Fortunately users can see battery status of the device on the PC, so there are some advantages of having Windows Vista after all... Conclusion: to put it very bluntly we must admit that Windows Vista doesn't bring any major improvements from the point of view of Windows Mobile. Simultaneous mutliple-device connectivity is not working at all, but also Microsoft still is not providing support for podcasting (automatic transmission of media files over RSS fees). The visual design of the "Windows Mobile Device Center" is however very nice and it may convince users to use synchronization with PC more often. The bottom line is: with release of a totally new operating system - Windows Vista - Microsoft has not forgotten about Windows Mobile phones and you can safely upgrade your old PC to Vista or purchase new PC with Vista...  Post your comment (free registration is required to post, but if you register you can edit your posts later) [ 17 Comments ]
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