Videoconferencing conjures the same image in most minds. Someone is speaking into a camera at one location, mapping out strategy on a whiteboard, and lots of other people are gathered in front of a monitor at another location, wishing they could actually see what's being written.

What if you could sync a whiteboard at the speaker's location with a PC at the distant location? And what if that whiteboard could record and save, in an integrated file, every word spoken by the speaker and written on the board?

Then add another step: What if you could stream the whiteboard presentation in real time over the Internet? You could also save it online, burn CD-ROMs, or e-mail it to interested parties.

A new whiteboard product called PoinTech does all this and more.

“Most meetings you go away from with some action items and you don't look back,” says Jim Hurst, director of sales for PLUS Corp. of America (www.plus-america.com), Annendale, N.J. With PoinTech, he says attendees can take away copies of the multimedia program and review the elements of most interest to them.

The PoinTech whiteboard, which retails for $2,199, captures what is written and sends it “in real time to your PC or network,” explains Hurst. “That's good for [online] meetings. One instruction can be written on the board and others can join and be part of the presentation live.”

PowerPoint presentations can also be controlled from the board, putting power over the PC's mouse in the hands of the speaker. “You're extending your presentation skills without relying on 10 people,” says marketing coordinator Brian Waite. “Once you get it going, you can control everything from data to drop-down screens from the whiteboard. The board is in sync with the computer display.”