I came across this article on the SmartphoneThoughts web site (http://www.smartphonethoughts.com): Microsoft India have announced the beta release of a new application that provides synchronisation support for Symbian devices. The application can be downloaded here:

http://specials.msn.co.in/sp08/msphonedatamanager/willmy_phone.asp

Once installed, the application adds an icon on the Windows desktop:

Double clicking the icon launches the phone detection process immediately, if the phone isn't connected the following window will be displayed:

The phone should be connected at this point.

It is important to note that the Microsoft software contains no drivers at all, therefore if you just connect the phone at this point Windows will detect the new hardware and install it as an 'Unknown Device'. In order to install the phone you will need the manufacturer's drivers - which will mean installing the synchronisation software for the phone - which begs the question, why bother using the Microsoft software at all?

Once the drivers are installed and the phone detected correctly, it will be available within the Microsoft application:

Double click the icon of the phone to specify the synchronisation options:

Depending on which type of connection you select, the options vary. Selecting a trusted computer enables all of the options:

Contacts can be synhronised with your Windows Live / Hotmail account. Music and Photos can be synced with the local PC.

Once complete the files will have been synced with the folders specified during the wizard:

The beta release of the software worked first time with my Nokia E71 - but seeing as I had to first install the Nokia PC Suite software to get the PC to recognise the phone, I really don't see why I'd use this application.

The ability to synchronise Contacts with Windows Live is perhaps intended to compete with Apple's MobileMe service, and Nokia's Ovi platform and seems to work. If this is a precursor to offering device management support for Symbian devices from the Exchange platform, then that WOULD be interesting. Watch this space for more information.