PicoPhone 1.65

Although this free Net phone's feature set appears to be up to par, its nonintuitive design and questionable performance prevent it from trumping its more capable competitors. Upon launching PicoPhone, many users may find themselves baffled as to where to begin, because the program doesn't automatically prompt you to register and lacks built-in help files. To create an account, you'll need to visit the developer's site, select a username and password, then connect to the server via the Preferences icon. Before we figured this out, we received periodic error pop-ups with vague, unhelpful messages. Once we finally began placing calls to other PicoPhone users, we weren't impressed with the muddy sound quality, although we were pleased with the feature set. The utility boasts its own basic chat client, supports conference calling, and lets you adjust your microphone and speaker volume via two prominently displayed sliders. Although this free program has potential, it needs some work before we can give it our kudos.