SPB Diary vs. Pocket Breeze... your thoughts?

[Chairman Clench]

Hello all,

I am looking at either SPB Diary or Pocket Breeze. I am using SPB Pocket Plus and SPB Weather already. I used the trials of both and so far I am finding that Pocket Breeze seems to refresh the Today screen faster. I am using a hx4700. Anyone have any thoughts on these two products? Any reason that one seems to be better than the other?

Thanks for your help.

-Jeffrey

[Darius Wey]

Each have their own pros and cons, but if you're already a heavy user of Spb Weather and Spb Pocket Plus, then you may prefer to stick with Spb Diary for the integration. :)

[coolabah]

Hello all,

I am looking at either SPB Diary or Pocket Breeze. I am using SPB Pocket Plus and SPB Weather already. I used the trials of both and so far I am finding that Pocket Breeze seems to refresh the Today screen faster. I am using a hx4700. Anyone have any thoughts on these two products? Any reason that one seems to be better than the other?

Thanks for your help.

-Jeffrey

Also be aware that SPB Diary HAS to be installed in main memory (the last time I looked, if this is important to you... and it is not a small program ) whereas SBSH PocketBreeze can be installed onto any card etc...
FWIW I think you'll find that Pocket Breeze has excellent developer support and active development.

[phritosan]

ive never come across faster or more thurough tech support than what youll find with sbsh

[Lex]

Ditto Phritosan. If you might like tech support answers in minutes instead of days, it's Pocket Breeze. FWIW, PB is the innovator, the other guys are the copier.

[humayunl]

SBSH products are almost personalized for every user.. thats how good the support is. Their product (in my opinion and experience) is a bit faster in response compared to spb diary (from what i've tried).

Even if spb diary was better (which it cant be cause its a CC of PB, but lets not get into that) i am too used to pocket breeze to ever consider switching. Did I mention their support? Its like you have your best friend making the application for you. Really, its like that.

As a new user, your best bet is to try both products and see what you like better. Thats what trials are for so take advantage of that.

Some of us here have strong emtional ties to sbsh (due to our +ive experiences with them) which may bias our recommendations :) But as fas as support is concerned, i think everyone will agree that sbsh has no match.

[BUMP THAT]

Hello all,

I am looking at either SPB Diary or Pocket Breeze. I am using SPB Pocket Plus and SPB Weather already. I used the trials of both and so far I am finding that Pocket Breeze seems to refresh the Today screen faster. I am using a hx4700. Anyone have any thoughts on these two products? Any reason that one seems to be better than the other?

Thanks for your help.

-Jeffrey

Also be aware that SPB Diary HAS to be installed in main memory (the last time I looked, if this is important to you... and it is not a small program ) whereas SBSH PocketBreeze can be installed onto any card etc...
FWIW I think you'll find that Pocket Breeze has excellent developer support and active development.

Thats exactly why I dont use it!! I try to keep my RAM as clean as posible. Plus as others said the customer care at SBSH is unbeleivable. They are really nice guys.

[Chairman Clench]

Thanks, everyone!

I went ahead and bought Pocket Breeze. I tested both and although I liked the integration with the SPB products, it just seemed like Pocket Breeze was "faster" on the device. One thing that I would really like to see Pocket Breeze add is the notes integration like the new SPB Diary has.

Again, many thanks for your thoughts!

[amitregev]

Hi Chairman :)

I'm glad to say notes have been requested on our forums for a long time now and as most of our forum users already know this is already in design and soon will be released along with more additional surprises. I would have been glad to post a few tease screenshots of what we have, but I guess I've learned by now that we have some people that watch us, so I think I won't be able to do it, but I promise we are working on some great stuff ahead, which will be both innovative and fast.

Currently we are also doing lots of new improvements on our site suppose systems, if you will check our site support section you will notice we are changing this right now; Trying to improve our support to our users as much as possible and bring faster and more automated services, but I guess that you are more interested about the next PB release - so I better get back to work :)

Thanks for the support!

[donc36]

Hi Chairman :)

I'm glad to say notes have been requested on our forums for a long time now and as most of our forum users already know this is already in design and soon will be released along with more additional surprises. I would have been glad to post a few tease screenshots of what we have, but I guess I've learned by now that we have some people that watch us, so I think I won't be able to do it, but I promise we are working on some great stuff ahead, which will be both innovative and fast.

Currently we are also doing lots of new improvements on our site suppose systems, if you will check our site support section you will notice we are changing this right now; Trying to improve our support to our users as much as possible and bring faster and more automated services, but I guess that you are more interested about the next PB release - so I better get back to work :)

Thanks for the support!

Change your support to improve it????? Amit, you're the model of support. I monitor your forums, and post there occasionally, and the support you provide to the users is outstanding. Alex et al from Webis (Pocket Informant) and Chris from Lakeridgesoftware (Wisbar Advanced) also provide outstanding support as well. Other than cloning yourself, I can't see how you can improve.

I've had experiences with other companies (PPC and Desktop), where my inquires are ignored, or worse, replied to by boilerplate that has absolutely nothing to do with the issue. The quality product you release, and the support behind it are great.

Don

[amitregev]

Change your support to improve it????? Amit, you're the model of support. I monitor your forums, and post there occasionally, and the support you provide to the users is outstanding. Alex et al from Webis (Pocket Informant) and Chris from Lakeridgesoftware (Wisbar Advanced) also provide outstanding support as well. Other than cloning yourself, I can't see how you can improve.

I've had experiences with other companies (PPC and Desktop), where my inquires are ignored, or worse, replied to by boilerplate that has absolutely nothing to do with the issue. The quality product you release, and the support behind it are great.

Don

Thanks Don for the support :)

Maybe the word 'Support' was not exactly the right one in this case; We've been working hard in the past two days to offer better user experience for our users.

For example, until today, each user that purchased our software was automatically subscribed to our newsletter for the same platform he purchased software for, so for example, if you purchased PocketBreeze you will receive notifications from us when a new PocketBreeze version will be released. With this email you also had the option to unsubscribe your self from our newsletter of course.

Since we understand there are users that prefer not to receive the notification emails even for the first time, or, other users that prefer to receive our newsletter which usually also include discounts for our software, or to receive the newsletter for other platforms like Smartphone and Symbian, we added a new subscription manager page on our site (We've activated it on our site just an hour ago :) ) which will allow users to subscribe and unsubscribe from our newsletter, both registered users and non-registered users.

This is already online at:
http://www.sbsh.net/support/index.php?page=newsletter

Apart from this, we did a major work behind the scenes on our site databases that will allow us in the near future to introduce lots of additional plans for our users (for those that are interested of course :) ), and we hope to have it all ready and working pretty soon.

[kushaaal]

Greetings!
If this post is all about Poket Breeze die-hard fans, I may be excused by considering these facts to be my views.
1) Today plug-in is supposed to do only what it is required to do, it should not transgress it's real utility. So the matter of the fact is, I am registered user for both Breeze and Diary, but lately took a dynamic decision to switch to Diary after been part of Breeze for such a long time. Well! primary reason: Pocket Breeze is much advanced that it overwhelms my Pocket Informant, and as things stand I get more confused what to use- PI or PB! When I used trial version of Diary, I knew they have really worked on what was just right. It gave me that much functionality that was actually required at Today and nothing more. It gave me interface where in I had less of clutter with options. And with-in 15 min I was through with purchase of Diary.
2) Sideways bars is really a great feature, which improved my Today space, as I use some 37 third party software, adn putting them at Today is real tough task
3) Well, as PB is big it does need more support. :lol:
4) When I switched from program to today screen the PB area will take some time to refresh than the other portion. So Diary solved it.
5) Offcourse, getting back from the search from contact was tough in Diary, but new ver solved it.
6) I had to buy contact breeze as seperate pack, rather than a comprehensive pack in SPB Diary.
7) Listning to .wav is a great feature in SPB Diary, without actually opening the note.
8) Offcourse it's interation with other great product of SPB, like plus, weather is a boon.
Finally, I love Pocket Informant, and especially after SPN Diary, coz it really demarcated Today plug-in with Pocket Informant. Pocket breeze being really big blurred the difference between today plug-in to PIM software.
Regards,

[donc36]

Greetings!
If this post is all about Poket Breeze die-hard fans, I may be excused by considering these facts to be my views.
1) Today plug-in is supposed to do only what it is required to do, it should not transgress it's real utility. So the matter of the fact is, I am registered user for both Breeze and Diary, but lately took a dynamic decision to switch to Diary after been part of Breeze for such a long time. Well! primary reason: Pocket Breeze is much advanced that it overwhelms my Pocket Informant, and as things stand I get more confused what to use- PI or PB! When I used trial version of Diary, I knew they have really worked on what was just right. It gave me that much functionality that was actually required at Today and nothing more. It gave me interface where in I had less of clutter with options. And with-in 15 min I was through with purchase of Diary.
2) Sideways bars is really a great feature, which improved my Today space, as I use some 37 third party software, adn putting them at Today is real tough task
3) Well, as PB is big it does need more support. :lol:
4) When I switched from program to today screen the PB area will take some time to refresh than the other portion. So Diary solved it.
5) Offcourse, getting back from the search from contact was tough in Diary, but new ver solved it.
6) I had to buy contact breeze as seperate pack, rather than a comprehensive pack in SPB Diary.
7) Listning to .wav is a great feature in SPB Diary, without actually opening the note.
8) Offcourse it's interation with other great product of SPB, like plus, weather is a boon.
Finally, I love Pocket Informant, and especially after SPN Diary, coz it really demarcated Today plug-in with Pocket Informant. Pocket breeze being really big blurred the difference between today plug-in to PIM software.
Regards,

Well Put - I think your reply sums up this thread quite nicely - althought on the face, they are similar, there are features in PB and Diary that do seperate them. It boils down to which plugin gives you the features you're looking for. This is much like the PI vs. AF debate - I personally prefer PB and Pocket Informant, but that's not to say AF or Diary are inferior apps - they are simply not as good as a fit to what I need / want. They work fine for others.

Don

[Phillip Dyson]

Greetings!
If this post is all about Poket Breeze die-hard fans, I may be excused by considering these facts to be my views.
1) Today plug-in is supposed to do only what it is required to do, it should not transgress it's real utility. So the matter of the fact is, I am registered user for both Breeze and Diary, but lately took a dynamic decision to switch to Diary after been part of Breeze for such a long time. Well! primary reason: Pocket Breeze is much advanced that it overwhelms my Pocket Informant, and as things stand I get more confused what to use- PI or PB! When I used trial version of Diary, I knew they have really worked on what was just right. It gave me that much functionality that was actually required at Today and nothing more. It gave me interface where in I had less of clutter with options. And with-in 15 min I was through with purchase of Diary.
2) Sideways bars is really a great feature, which improved my Today space, as I use some 37 third party software, adn putting them at Today is real tough task
3) Well, as PB is big it does need more support. :lol:
4) When I switched from program to today screen the PB area will take some time to refresh than the other portion. So Diary solved it.
5) Offcourse, getting back from the search from contact was tough in Diary, but new ver solved it.
6) I had to buy contact breeze as seperate pack, rather than a comprehensive pack in SPB Diary.
7) Listning to .wav is a great feature in SPB Diary, without actually opening the note.
8) Offcourse it's interation with other great product of SPB, like plus, weather is a boon.
Finally, I love Pocket Informant, and especially after SPN Diary, coz it really demarcated Today plug-in with Pocket Informant. Pocket breeze being really big blurred the difference between today plug-in to PIM software.
Regards,

Excellent input. I have also been concerned with the possibility that as PB becomes more feature rich, it would render PI obsolete. Its not there yet, but it could in the future. Matter of fact after reading your post I decided to install the trial version of Diary.

I'm amazed at how similar they are. I mean with the exception of the vertical vs horizontal tabs, Diary is like PB with fewer settings.

On not sure how Diary remedied your concern over PI though. On the surface they seem provide the same basic functions. The context menu is almost exactly the same. I couldn't comment on how many resources one takes up versus the other.

Perhaps our repaint issue can be helped by changing some of the refresh options in PB. Not sure.

PB is a bit more polished though, which can be expected since Diary is younger.

There is one thing that I went looking for in PB though. I did like the 2 line appointments in Diary. I'm sure its in PB somewhere. Just couldn't find it.

To make a long story short... I think my preference is still PocketBreeze.

[Phillip Dyson]

There is one thing that I went looking for in PB though. I did like the 2 line appointments in Diary. I'm sure its in PB somewhere. Just couldn't find it.


Found it. Calendar Settings >> Layout >> (layout-11/12).

Oh and Diary doesn't seem to have the one-handed navigation that PB has.