In a nutshell

Take control of your mobile using your PC. Well, sort of. It might not be the most practical solution, but it will make you look the don!

What’s it good for?

Tapping into your phone, without touching your phone.

Judgement time…

Mobiola’s remote control software is clever. Very clever. It shifts your mobile’s screen onto your computer’s screen, either using USB or Bluetooth. That’s no mean feat in programming terms, and it’s pretty impressive.

Tap away on your keyboard, or click on on-screen buttons, and your phone will react. It feels a little like running a mobile phone emulator, except the handset is real, and next to you as well as on screen.

At times it’s slightly sluggish though, and even with the settings tweaked to favour speed over quality, and while using USB rather than Bluetooth, it’s hardly practical for more than showing off for a few seconds.

And that’s the real question here: What is Remote Control actually useful for?

At first we thought it’d be great to use our laptops to make hands-free calls. But then it turns out Mobiola’s software doesn’t transfer a handset’s audio to your computer, just images.

So while it’s initially impressive, it’s little use beyond a proof-of-concept.

That’s a shame, as we’d quite like to use our computers to access our phone’s internet connection, phone line and even camera without fishing it out of our bag or running lots of separate applications.

Back to the drawing board Mobiola, this one’s far from finished yet.