Soonr brings Mac desktop to your phone

Ryan Merket - June 30th, 2006 at 1:24 pm PDT

Link seems to be dead.

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martin frid-nielsen - June 30th, 2006 at 1:40 pm PDT

The correct link is http://www.soonr.com, we are also on apple:

http://www.apple.com/downloads....._security/

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grant - June 30th, 2006 at 1:45 pm PDT

My questions is: Would it take air time off my call plan while connecting to PC through Soonr software onto Skype bridge, or just data service. Since Skype opens up free domestic US call, I have been using Skypeout for most of my calls from home office, the only thing I am looking is to free me from my desk so I can roam freely in my house and backyard. Is there any range constraints for cell calling to skype on PC?

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martin frid-nielsen - June 30th, 2006 at 2:33 pm PDT

When you use SoonR Talk from your mobile phone, SoonR will interface to Skype back on your PC (Mac or Windows) , and Skype will be instructed to setup a conference call back to you (via SkypeOut) on the mobile phone, and the person on the other end. With SkypeOut currently being free in the US, you can now for instance call internationally on your mobile phone for the cost of a local call (which typically is also free as it comes out of the calling plan) with same calling quality as regular Skype. In addition you can also now use Skype IM from any mobile phone that have a data-plan. As also pointed out in the article, in addition to Skype, SoonR also interfaces to Spotlight and deliver your Mac-content/files in optimized for your mobile phone.

I should disclose that I am with SoonR. Please let us know if there are any other questions or suggestions.

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Alan Lewis - June 30th, 2006 at 2:33 pm PDT

Grant - Skype over Soonr is done through your cell air time. When you call someone over Skype, Soonr uses Skype running on your computer to instigate a conference call. Skype then calls you, and after you answer it conferences in the person you are calling - either directly through Skype or through SkypeOut.

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grant - June 30th, 2006 at 2:54 pm PDT

Thanks Martin, Alan: it does clear some questions. I have not installed the soonr so if my questions seem to be naive, please bear with me. I would argue that, regarding the calling feature only, soonr may be particular useful to International calls. For domestic call, I can just simply call recipient’s cell, instead of through skype, because it will take my air time anyway, cell phone can easily conference more than 2 people. Regarding IM, I see the value. Although user can also just txt msg their buddy’s cell phone, instead of IM them, unless their buddy is online which would be easier to receive IM, if they forgot to bring their cell phone.

Nice job.

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Shirish - June 30th, 2006 at 6:29 pm PDT

What is the point of the calling service beyond somewhat cool technology (which is not very hard to replicate)? I can use my cell to call anywhere I want. Why do I need to go through skype?

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Ravneet - June 30th, 2006 at 7:08 pm PDT

Shirish: Idea is mainly to get access to your corporate files and exchange server from your phone.

Martin: I wuold really love if SoonR interfaces with the Pocket Outlook model and installs a mailbox on the phone, which talks over POP/IMAP to SoonR servers, instead of me requiring to open pocketIE and browsing to my SoonR account to access my e-mails.

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StarDogg Champion - June 30th, 2006 at 11:43 pm PDT

How is this different from LogMeIn.com? It allows me to do remote control and file transfer for my XDA Universal mobile phone. This phone runs Windows Mobile 2005.

Why don’t more people use true smartphones (or PDA phones) such as the Treo or the XDA? They are EXTREMELY powerful.

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martin frid-nielsen - July 1st, 2006 at 12:10 am PDT

Ravneet: We are certainly considering these kinds of optimizations for the various devices like the SmartPhones, however its also an important point with SoonR that it works with a variety of devices - we have currently been run succesfully on over 450 different phones, ranging from the simplest phones that you get for free with a data-plan in the US to the end high phones that cost $500 or more without requiring end-users to install software on the phones.
Shirish: The point with the ability to use Skype from any data-capable hand-set with SoonR Talk, is that you can continue have the power of Skype, incl. IM as you become un-ethered from the PC/Mac. You can also now make intl. calls at the cost of local calls (while SkypeOut is free in the US).
StarDogg Champion: SoonR is different from LogMeIn in the sense that SoonR is optimized for mobile devices for instance your 1MB+ size images on your PC/Mac can be shown on your phone in seconds because SoonR delivers then scaled down for the mobile device, or you can only see the changes made to documents rather than having to download the entire document, finally SoonR also brings your computer applications in an integrated environment on the phone, for instance we let mobile users interface to Spotlight back on the Mac to do searches. SoonR does not do ’screen-scraping’ like many other remote access applications.

Thanks for all the comments!

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Sam - July 1st, 2006 at 1:29 pm PDT

Can’t find an address to contact you guys by but…

Please align the new sponsors in the grid. In Firefox, Sonos is out of place.

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Peter - July 1st, 2006 at 2:02 pm PDT

lol I see that too, but thats marginal

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Aner Ravon - July 2nd, 2006 at 3:18 am PDT

We covered SoonR at http://www.degardener.com among other intersting companies in the Pc–>Mobile environment (Avvenu and Eqo among others).

I personally love the approach SoonR took, simply because they dont try to solve what they can’t solve. However, it does leave the user with a lot of problems on the mobile side - transcoding, speed, quality of service and navigation, things that are very hard to overcome with WAP alone.

Check out the rest of our reviews at:
http://www.degardener.com/2006.....on-wheels/

and at:
http://www.degardener.com/go/fusion/

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Skeptic - July 2nd, 2006 at 9:14 pm PDT

So let me get this straight - while using my CELL PHONE (a device perfectly capable for making phone calls), I can get online, and connect to my Mac back home (assuming I had a Mac for some silly reason), which is running Skype. Now, with Soonr, I can use that connection so that my CELL PHONE can make… PHONE CALLS??? This is AWESOME!

Sooner or later (heh, get it?) I might be able to use my PC to connect to another PC, and then on that PC do something killer like open a spreadsheet, or maybe even use that second PC to surf the Web!

Please note that everything from the word ‘awesome’ onwards was sarcastic. I explain this because, based on the excitement displayed here, it seems necessary. Ugh.

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marat - July 3rd, 2006 at 2:18 am PDT

Isn’t this field threatened by Google? They have a great product with a bigger take-up - Google Desktop. Nothing prevents them from offering access to your desktop’s cache even off-line. The latest version includes caching of your computer on their servers and they’d just offer mobile access to it just like to Gmail and Google Search, and most likely for free!

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