Ovolab Phlink

Have you ever wanted a "smarter" answering machine for your phone? Do you use a Mac? If so, you might want to try Phlink, from Ovolab.

Phlink is a combination of hardware/software that is very easy to use, and quite practical as well. Why buy this product, you get a little box that plugs into your USB port on one end, and a phone line in the other end.

When the phone rings, and the software is running, you will get a small window telling you the caller id, if available. There is only one preferences dialog to configure the software, where you can set how many rings before voicemail, what the voicemail should say, what format to record the call, etc. The software can also deal with faxes, touchtone commands, and applescript -- but I haven’t used these particular features yet.

My favorite feature is to send the recording in an e-mail attachment. This way, when I am home or out of town, I can simply read my e-mail and receive any recordings as well as caller id numbers. This is the real reason that I bought this package and it works quite well!

Phlink sells for about $150, for one adaptor, and I think it’s well worth it. Other products have a few more features, but are more complex as well. This worked so easy that I thought I was missing something.

Ovolab has a couple of other Mac products, called AAChoo and RemoteTunes, both related to the iTunes/iPod products from Apple. I haven’t used them, but take a look and see what you think!