VoiceCentral- Must-Have iPhone App For Google Voice

Posted on 21 July 2009 by


Google Voice - One phone number, online voicemail, and enhanced call features

Now that Google Voice invites are going out at a good clip (heck even DOUG has one now!) the real question is, How do you use it to get maximum benefit? We have a few suggestions and we’ll start off with this one for iPhone users… get VoiceCentral! It is amazing.

Here’s why…

If you have a GV number it makes sense to move everyone to it. Why? Because from there you have total control over which other phones ring, how they ring and what message the caller receives if you don’t pick up. (More on this in another post.) There is a little problem though. If you make a call from your iPhone directly THAT number will show up in the recipient’s caller id rather than you Google Voice number. That completely undermines trying to move everyone to your new GV number since they will likely just hit redial. That’s where an app like VoiceCentral comes in.

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When you first install the application, it asks for your Google Voice credentials.

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It then asks you to input your iPhone number, as well as other relevant numbers it might call, as part of the setup. After that whenever you make a call from within the app Google Voice’s servers will call your iPhone and then, once you answer, it will connect the call. The magic is that by adding this step the recipient of the call will see your Google Voice number. When they return the call it will go to Google’s servers and be routed they way YOU want depending on your setting in GV.

The app does much more than that, however.

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It offers a full, familiar keypad which, unlike the Skype keypad, launches and dials quickly without any lag whatsoever.

It lets you control your Google Voice ring arrangement (which phone rings when you place a calls) right on the handset.

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It let’s you see AND hear your voice mails AND their transcriptions.

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Then, if you want to send a transcription or save it elsewhere you can copy it using iPhone OS 3.0 the way you would copy and paste any other text.

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The app is fully integrated with the iPhone’s address book and makes calling or texting someone simple.

Best of all, the app launches quickly. (The delay in launching and the lack of integration with message transcriptions made other GV dialing apps less useful for me. Neither of those is an issue here!)

We all know Google has released an app for Blackberry and Android devices and is working on one for the iPhone but who knows when and if it gets through. An even bigger concern is, if it does get through will Apple or ATT have crippled it as they have so many others?

Those concerns noted, the $2.99 for VoiceCentral seems well worth the price. I, for one, was happy to purchase it and have now replaced my phone icon on the bottom row of apps. The only thing lacking? A button for favorites. Still, that is a small price to pay for this kind of integration with Google Voice.

Get it HERE for $2.99.

This post was written by:

- who has written 2793 posts on Gear Diary.

Having a father who was heavily involved in early laser and fiber-optical research, Dan grew up surrounded by technology and gadgets. Dan’s father brought home one of the very first video games when he was young and Dan remembers seeing a “pre-release” touchtone phone. (When he asked his father what the “#” and “*” buttons were his dad said, “Some day, far in the future, we’ll have some use for them.”) Technology seemed to be in Dan’s blood but at some point he took a different path and ended up in the clergy. His passion for technology and gadgets never left him. +Dan Cohen

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  • http://www.s-consult.com/index.php Wayne Schulz

    I’ve been using GV Mobile and the lag to make a call is really unbearable. I’ll give this a shot.

  • Dan Cohen

    There is still a lag when initiating the call since the process is now
    1. dial
    2. contact google servers
    3. ring you
    4. ring them
    that is just the price of using GV. but at least here the app loads and dials fast. Plus it lets you see you transcribed calls.

  • http://www.s-consult.com/index.php Wayne Schulz

    I’ve been trying VoiceCentral for the last several days. I have to say that even with lagging on GV Mobile that I prefer GV Mobile.

    The issues with VoiceCentral:

    1. True, you don’t have a lag — but you also don’t have updated data – in order to see an SMS list for example you must refresh (which takes time)

    2. My dialer (and SMS) seems to barf on the first use. I pretty regularly get a rejected call or rejected SMS message. The second time through it usually works.

    As noted in the post — these dialers badly need a favorites listing