Hi William,
I have been using Sql Anywhere studio from Sybase for the last 7 years with excellent success. This product comes with everything you need to do exactly what you are trying to do. Your consolidated db can bu MS Sql as well so the only change will be the remote dbs. I have several customers that have been using my program for years including on that has 14 DBs in 4 states that sync to a consolidated db at headquarters. The customers are logging companies that have locations out in the sticks that have poor connectivity. The database can be setup to sync on a regular basis. If the connection is not there then sync will fail but will pick up where it left off when the connection is back. The database will run on windows, wince, palm, Linux and will sync using tcpip, http and more that I can't think of for now.

If you are interested, you can download a developers edition of the db at Sybase.com

>We are in (re)design phase of an application that will be run from both handheld XP boxes that will have internet VPN connection sporadically as well as LAN desktops. SQL Server 2008 will be the LAN data store.
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>The handhelds need to pull data from the LAN data store, edit/add records (including pictures/short videos), and sync that data back to the LAN data store.
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>Due to the intermittant connection, I'm assuming we'll give handheld users the ability to kick off synchronization manually when they know they have a connection.
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>The initial attempt of this app was done using Microsoft Sync Framework, and development dragged on and on w/o reliable synchronization until patience ran out, developer bailed, and development halted.
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>So now it's handed to me to figure out how to make this thing work.
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>I'm deciding whether to continue with Sync Framework (which looks cool but is so far unproven here) or jump to old style SQL merge replication (I worked with that many moons ago - certainly no walk in the park).
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>Anyone have experience with Sync Framework (good or bad)?
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>I'm open to suggestions.