App review: PocketCloud

Wyse, a company better known for offering remote desktop solutions to enterprise companies than for its consumer offerings, is now bringing PocketCloud Explore, its app for easily managing files across multiple desktops, operating systems and mobile devices, to the iPhone (it was already available on Android). I got a demo of the app at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week and it’s quite an impressive service that indeed works as seamlessly as the company promises.

What makes Wyse’s solution so interesting and different from what, at first glance seem like similar offerings from Box.net or Dropbox, is that the company is combining remote desktop access and easy mobile and web access to files that are running on your computer at home (and that are only accessible while that computer is on and connected to the internet) with its own cloud-based file-storage service. Wyse also offers a cloud-storage service with 2GB of free storage, the PocketCloud Web Cloubin, which allows users to easily upload documents into the cloud and then share them with their friends and colleagues.

The mobile Explore app for iOS doesn’t feature any built-in editing capabilities, but it does integrate with the editing apps that are already on your devices (think QuickOffice or DocumentsToGo, for example).

To get started with the service, users have to register and install a small piece of software on the desktops they want to use.

Pricing
The service uses a freemium model. The paid version, which will only code US$1 per month for now, will allow you to access data from more computers (up to 10) and share files up to 500MB in size (up from 25MB in the free version). The free version also restricts the length of audio and video clips you can stream from your computer to your phone to 30 seconds in length. The paid version doesn’t have this limitation.