After recently making a call on my Treo 700p, it dawned on me that I had never bothered to install VolumeCare. Developed by mtdn Star Developer Jeff Gibson, this was an application that I couldn’t live without on my Treo 650.

I had been able to go without VolumeCare for a while on the 700p, so naturally I wondered if installing the application would really make that much of a difference. The answer is a very resounding “yes.”

As the download page claims, VolumeCare truly does “break the sound barrier” on your Treo. VolumeCare Basic aims to simply improve the sound quality of your phone calls by allowing you to “boost” the volume of your handset, speakerphone, and even your wired headset (Bluetooth Headsets are not currently supported).

VolumeCare Basic gives you 2 modes of doing this: Automatic and Advanced. Most people use Automatic Mode, as this is the default setting for the program. In Automatic Mode, VolumeCare allows you to fine tune your settings while on a call by pressing the volume button and raising VolumeCare’s “volume setting” (the blue line).

After your volume setting has been maxed out, VolumeCare switches to its boost feature (the green line), which effectively multiplies the sound output by 10. VolumeCare also allows you to save the new volume level while you’re on a call! This way you can fine tune your sound settings while getting constructive feedback from the person you’re speaking with. The user also has the ability to adjust the sensitivity of the Treo’s microphone while on a call by simply holding down the blue option key, then pressing the 5-way navigator up (increase) or down (decrease). This function can be useful if you find yourself in a place with excessive background noise (think train station or airport), as decreasing the microphone’s sensitivity will result in a clearer conversation for the person on the other end.

If you’re more of a power user, you’ll want to delve into VolumeCare’s Advanced Mode, as it allows the user more flexibility with the sound quality, rather than just boosting the volume. If you have the volume maxed out and then start adding boost, sometimes you may not be able to find the optimal sound output for your Treo. However, if you raise the boost level and then raise the volume, you have much greater control over your sound quality, as you are increasing the output in much smaller increments.

And for the explorers that click on the Advanced Configuration tab, there are even more options. If you enable the “Stereo Headphones” option, you can listen to your phone calls in Stereo sound with your hybrid headset, while still being able to speak. Activating the “Stop Alarms During Calls” option makes VolumeCare disable all alarms from the Palm OS attention manager while you’re on a call. All alarms are put in a queue, then displayed in order after the call has ended. Having the “Side Button Toggles Rocker” option checked means that pressing the side button while on a call will switch the behavior of the volume buttons from adjusting the volume (default) to adjusting the boost, and vice versa. The default setting is for the volume buttons to adjust the volume settings, but if you’d rather the default action to affect the boost, just highlight “Boost” on the Advanced Configuration screen.

VolumeCare Pro adds even more functionality, giving the options of “Ringtone Boosting” and an “Application Control” for boosting the volume of individual applications. The “Ringtone Boost” affects not only ringtones, but incoming SMS/MMS tones as well! This is something I was very pleased to see, as my SMS/MMS tones are more on the polite (read: quiet and not obnoxious) side. They are a good volume for a quiet place, but in even a slightly noisy environment, I consistently found myself missing important messages before installing VolumeCare Pro.

The “Application Control” add-on gives the user the ability to boost the overall sound levels of all programs (except the Phone application), or the user may choose specific programs to apply the volume boost. To boost the volume in specific applications, simply check the appropriate box and a list appears. Find the program you’d like to boost then, after selecting the program, simply click Select to add the highlighted program to the “Boosted Applications” list. After you see the key icon next to your program, you’re all set.

Going even further into VolumeCare, there is yet another additional option to be found. If your Treo’s headset jack is broken, you will essentially be unable to use your phone, as the Treo will always think a headset is connected and route sound to the broken jack, rather than the proper speakers. After purchasing the additional license, you can check off the Bypass Headset Jack option under the Advanced Configuration screen. This will trick the Treo into bypassing the headset jack, letting you use your phone as normal until you fix/replace the faulty jack.

After looking back at all of these features, VolumeCare has once again proven itself as a “must have” application for the Treo 700p. The only gripes I had with the program are the lack of volume boost applied to the speakerphone and its inability to boost the volume of Bluetooth headsets. After speaking with the program’s developer, Jeff Gibson, it became very clear that these problems originate with the Palm OS and how the Phone/Bluetooth programs interact with the Treo’s radio. Unfortunately, this means that these problems may be here to stay.

Some interesting features that outweigh these negatives are the many different ways to register VolumeCare. If you’ve bought programs for your Treo, you know that getting the proper registration key isn’t always as easy as it should be. The developer of VolumeCare has found a way around this – SMS Registration. This is an incredibly innovative way to register your purchase of VolumeCare. Simply enter your name and your order number, and then hit Send. Your Treo will then send all the information needed to GoTreoSoftware in a SMS message, and within 24 hours, you will get a SMS back stating that your license has been updated. It’s that easy! Combine this with the lifetime upgrade policy and all you’ll ever need to do to have the most recent version of VolumeCare is download the newest demo and re-register via SMS. You also have the option of standard Manual and Web registrations, but the SMS registration is by far the easiest.

Overall, you really can’t go wrong with this software. The program comes with a lifetime upgrade policy, which really can’t be beat. This means that if you originally bought VolumeCare Basic, you’ll never have to pay for any VolumeCare Basic upgrade. This also applies to VolumeCare Pro. The support team was also very knowledgeable, as they answered every question I had without geekspeak-ing me into befuddlement. The bottom line is, if you’re unhappy with the sound levels on your phone, try VolumeCare; you won’t be disappointed!

Related Links

Download the VolumeCare Demo!

Purchase VolumeCare from mytreo.net/store!

Discuss VolumeCare in the MTDN Forums

View more programs from Jeff Gibson

Filed under: Software reviews