Adobe Acrobat Connect Professional is a scalable solution, offering a large number of online personal meeting rooms and Web conferencing for up to 1,500 participants. This version was designed primarily for large enterprises. We have, however, included Adobe Acrobat Connect (i.e. without ‘Professional’) in our comparison. This is suitable for small and medium-sized companies – and is also more affordable.

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in June 2007

BeamYourScreen is a Web conferencing solution which is best suited for ad-hoc online meetings. The tool can be intuitively used – but the solution falls short in the areas as follows:  

(1) Invitation handling: Invitation emails containing a unique meeting ID and audio information can only be send if the online meeting has been launched. But meeting attendees should hurry – if there isn’t at least one meeting attendee connected within 15 minutes, the meeting session will automatically end.

(2) Pricing and licensing options: BeamYourScreen can either be leased or purchased. If you want to lease the solution, you can choose between different license types (a single user licenses and a shared user license) and different product types (related to the maximum number of participants per meeting). In addition, customers will be charged an initial set-up fee for each license. Compared with other solutions, the pricing is complex and furthermore a minimum contract period (12 months) applies. 

Click here for more details

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in May 2007

Convenos is positioned as an affordable alternative to established Web conferencing solutions. For example, users can utilize free VoIP with the Skype add-on for audio conferencing. Up to 20 participants can attend a Convenos online meeting – but this is reduced to a maximum of five when using Skype.

The solution was only rated “poor” in our test, as it lacks some important functions or these did not work correctly. For example, the role of presenter cannot be passed to other attendees to enable their desktop or documents to be shared. What’s more, keyboard/mouse control was not always transferred to other participants correctly. And some participants experienced problems when logging in for private meetings, i.e. when they had to enter a password. A further important point – the Convenos solution only runs under Windows.

The bottom line: This solution is suitable for one-way communication, such as presentations. However, we cannot recommend Convenos for situations where geographically-dispersed participants wish to interact.

Click here for more details

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in May 2007

Elluminate vRoom – offered for free - is a Web conferencing solution, which allows web collaboration with up to three participants. The solution provides users with a single online meeting room.

Using VoIP, meeting attendees don’t have to dial into a telephone conference, but only need a sound card with speakers and microphone. What’s more, to invite participants, the organiser can send invitation emails through the Elluminate Website or uses his local email client.

Bottom line: The solution is appropriate for interactive web meetings with a limited number of participants. However, the solution has two major shortcomings: firstly, meeting attendees can log on to the meeting room - anytime they want and secondly, only up to three people are allowed to participate in an online meeting at a time.

Click here for more information on Elluminate vRoom

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in August 2007

FastViewer has a confusing portfolio of Web conferencing solutions. The following is an overview of the products:

In our experience, online meetings generally involve three or more participants. As a result, we do not recommend the Presentation Edition and Standard Edition solutions from FastViewer.

However, the security provided by the solutions is of note – data is transmitted via 256-bit AES encryption, a standard supported by only a few other vendors.

Nevertheless, Fastviewer Professional Edition, one of the tested solutions, was only rated “poor” in our test, primarily for the following reasons: 

• Essential features and functions are not implemented (e.g. integrated audio conference, Witeboard or annotation tools)
• FastViewer is only appropriate for ad-hoc meetings, since the unique meeting ID will only be generated if the solution has been launched. Therefore, the meeting host won’t be able to invite participants to any web meetings well in advance.
• The meeting host can only run web meetings on the PC on which the solution is installed.

Click here for more information on FastViewer

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in August 2007

LogMeIn offers a large number of solutions for remote access to and desktop control of the user’s own home or office PC.

With LogMeIn Pro, users gain remote access to a specific PC – and can also share their desktop with invited guests. The solution does not include several functions that are key to interactive online collaboration – e.g. passing on the role of presenter, transferring control of the keyboard/mouse, and integrated teleconferencing.

We did not test the LogMeIn product family, as the solutions are not primarily for Web conferences.

Click here for more information on the free version of LogMeIn

Click here for more information on LogMeIn Pro

Microsoft’s Web conferencing solution, NetMeeting, is included free with Windows operating systems (Windows XP or earlier). In contrast to other Web-conferencing solutions, this tool must be installed locally on the user’s PC.

Microsoft recommends Microsoft Office Live Meeting – tested fully by us and included in our comparison for small and medium-sized companies. Individuals are advised to use Windows Meeting Space.

NetMeeting is unsuitable for interactive online meetings, primarily for the following reasons:

• The role of presenter cannot be passed on to other attendees
• Control of keyboard/mouse cannot be transferred to all participants
• There is no integrated invitation mechanism
• It lacks mark-up tools (for highlighting information in documents during a presentation)

Microsoft has discontinued development of this solution. It is not included with Vista, the latest Windows operating system. As a result, we have not included NetMeeting in our comparison.

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in May 2007

Spreed Web 2.0 for online meetings is available in two editions – free and for a fee. Up to three participants can hold a free-of-charge online meeting, whereby the meeting time is restricted to 90 minutes.  The solution can be deployed across multiple platforms (Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X).

In order to conduct an interactive online meeting, all participants must be assigned to the „presenter“-role when setting up the meeting. If not, the organizer cannot pass the role of presenter to another participant. This means that only the organizer’s desktop/documents can be shared with attendees. In addition, the organizer can only request remote control for any of the participant’s PC – but this does not work the other way round.  

During our tests of spreed Web 2.0, all participants have been given the “presenter” role as user rights. The following shortcomings have been identified:

• Meeting scheduling: The meeting-planning tool is not integrated with the Outlook e-mail client. As a result, the organizer has to create and update a separate address book just for invitations.
• In screen-sharing mode, participants can view the organizer’s open applications. A negative aspect is that participants cannot see the whole of a shared application. If the attendees adjust the resolution, the image becomes so small that text is illegible.
• In remote-control mode, mouse clicks or changes made by the organizer on a participant’s PC are only displayed on the organizer’s spreed.com console after a lengthy delay.
  
• During the remote-control mode, we experienced a high processor load in both environments – Windows XP SP2 and Windows Vista.

However, the integrated Whiteboard functionality is of note – meeting attendees can easily work together using Whiteboards.

The bottom line: We cannot recommend the free-of-charge solution for interactive communication, e.g. for virtual teamwork due to the constraints on the number of participants and time.  

Click here for more information on spreed.com

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in July 2007

TeamViewer enables online meetings with two attendees – meetings for three or more participants are not possible. Although the pricing model seems attractive at first sight, the solution has some major weaknesses. Furthermore, Team Viewer lacks basic functions, does not feature integrated teleconferencing, and the procedure for setting up a meeting is too complicated.

Bottom line: TeamViewer is not suitable for interactive web collaboration with more than two participants. Its solution scope is more appropriate for remote support.

Click here for more information on TeamViewer

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in May 2007

Vyew offers a free Web conferencing solution for up to 20 participants. With this free version, advertising banners are shown on the user console.

During our test, we were unable to share applications on the desktop – an essential basic function. According to Vyew’s specifications, the frame rate is between one and three seconds. This results in substantial delays before data is transmitted to participants.

Vyew is not integrated with Outlook and therefore requires e-mail contact addresses to be added manually when inviting participants to a meeting.

Online collaboration on documents is only possible once the documents have been uploaded. However, changes made by the presenter were not displayed on participants’ screens during our tests.

The bottom line: This solution is not to be recommended.

Click here for more information on Vyew

WebEx Meeting Center enables concurrent users to hold multiple interactive meetings – with more than 10 participants each. The solution has a wider range of functions than WebEx MeetMeNow. However, we chose to include WebEx MeetMeNow in our comparison, as it is the more affordable version.

Click here for more information on WebEx Meeting Center.

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in January 2007

Windows Meeting Space – the successor to NetMeeting – is included free with Window’s new operating system, Vista (Home Premium, Business, and Ultimate). A maximum of ten users can participate in online meetings via Windows Meeting Space.

This Web conferencing solution is peer-to-peer software, i.e. attendees’ PCs are directly linked up, without an intermediate “meeting” server. Windows Meeting Space must therefore be installed locally on the user’s PC and is not available as a hosted service.

The organizer can utilize the following features with Windows Meeting Space:

• Share specific documents/applications or the entire desktop and enable participants to see the same view
• Share keyboard/mouse controls with participants
• Distribute virtual handouts (i.e. files) to attendees – where files can be changed by participants during or after the meeting

Essentially, the solution does not have the functions required for interactive online collaboration/virtual teamwork.

Click here for more information on Windows Meeting Space

The product family comprises Yugma Free, Premium 10, Premium 30 and Premium 100. 

The free version lacks key functionality for interactive Web conferences – such as sharing keyboard/mouse controls and planning online meetings. As a result, we do not recommend it.

Yugma Premium 10 represents good value-for-money and is suitable for up to ten participants.

The most noticeable difference between the Yugma products and solutions such as Adobe Connect, GoToMeeting and WebEx MeetMeNow is that both the organizer and participants must register with Yugma before they can use the Web conferencing solution. Registration is free, however.

Click here for more information on Yugma.

Score key:
***** (= very good); **** (= good); *** (= satisfactory); ** (= poor); * (= very poor)
Prices valid in June 2007