Windows Mobile PDAs and smartphones are a great way to enjoy music, movies, and audio books on the go. Many users carry their media content with them on storage cards. Unfortunately, they have to go to the trouble of copying music and video files to the card—and deleting them to make room for new content when they eventually run out of storage space. Wouldn't it be nice if Windows Mobile devices were more like desktop PCs, with near-unlimited storage capacity and the ability to play DVD movies and even TV shows?

Adding a 40 GB hard drive or a DVD player to a mobile device isn't practical yet. But you can access your PC's media content and "stream" it to your PDA or smartphone as long as both are connected to the Internet. I love to watch videos that way, and when I do, I'll find people looking over my shoulder. They ask me what I'm doing, I tell them, and they want it!

Streaming your own content

You could set up an encoding engine on your home PC to encode and stream your PC's content via the Internet to a connected mobile device. Unfortunately, this approach is fairly complicated and the quality of the stream will vary depending on the type of connection you have back to your computer. Werner Ruotsalainen has published a very detailed article on how to do this, titled "Radio Stream Transcoding Bible." It as well as several other detailed guides are available on the Smartphone & Pocket PC magazine blogs (smartphonemag.com/blogs). If you are looking for an easier solution, there are several options to choose from.

Orb

orb.com

This Web-based service allows you to stream content from your PC to virtually any Internet-connected device, including notebook PCs, PDAs, or smartphones. Orb uses Windows Encoder 9 (and other formats) to optimize your PC's content based on the mobile device's screen size and connection speed. All this is done through Orb's Web servers, and all your mobile device needs is a connection to the Web—broadband is best, but even a GPRS connection will work. Orb can stream audio, video, digital photos and other files, and live TV from your PC (your PC must have a TV tuner card). You can stream TiVo-recorded content from your PC with the help of an add-on called DVR Everywhere. You can send voice messages to any e-mail or Skype account with a new, free Web voice messaging service from Orb. You can get TV listings and links to other streaming Internet video and radio content.

I like the fact that all the podcasts and Audible books (audible.com) I have stored on my Media Center PC are available to me wherever I am—and no longer take up space on my storage card! (Note: Audible also has a program for Windows Mobile called Audible Player that allows you to download and listen to Audible books directly on your device.) Also, we have Webcams that look out over our front and back yard. It's great being able to monitor how things are going at home from wherever I am.

The Orb service is great for sharing photos, videos, and pictures with family, friends, and business associates. You can give each person a unique log-on and specify which media files they will be able to access. A co-worker of mine shares the content on his Orb-enabled Media Center PC with his son stationed in Iraq. When his son has a little free time, he goes online with his laptop or Pocket PC and watches his favorite TV shows, listens to music, and views recent family pictures.

WebGuide

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