ActiveSync is history - Synchronise your PocketPC using Windows Mobile Device Center

As the dust from the Windows Vista launch parties around the globe settles and thousands of eager early adopters tap in their new product keys, it seems that everything is pretty much ready to go. Unless, of course, you’re one of the many thousands of people who own a Pocket PC. In which case, you may well be slumped, head in hands in front of your monitor, wondering why Windows Vista has decided your device is only good for synchronising music and pictures to. You’ll also undoubtedly have discovered that ActiveSync, that important little application required for any kind of syncing in Windows XP, refuses to install.

The reason for this is simple; Microsoft isn’t quite ready to release the final version of its new Windows Mobile Device Center. You can grab the pre-release version here; it’s currently in Beta 3 stage, though what’s exactly wrong with this version I’m struggling to work out. After installing the package, your drivers will update, enabling full synchronisation with Windows Mail, Windows Calendar and the new Office suite, if you’ve forked out for that, too. The new application is also massively more user friendly than ActiveSync, and looks the part, too.

UPDATE: As Becky has pointed out in her blog, the day after I wrote the above, Microsoft got its act together and released the final version. Make sure you uninstall the Beta first when upgrading....