Crenk » ipod

Next Generation iPod Could Have Sleeves

Steven Finch — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 05:53:24 +0000

Apple has hired “wearable computing” expert Richard DeVaul as a prototype scientist. Devaul invented something called “memory glasses” which display reminders onto glasses lenses. Here’s a suggestion: A pair of Bermuda shorts that can save the magazine industry. [WSJ]

Apple February Mac Sales Were Up 43%

Steven Finch — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 01:22:22 +0000

Apple has continued their growth with iPod and Mac sales in February growing 43% year on year.

Analyst Gene Munster with Piper Jaffray issued a note to investors Monday afternoon detailing the latest retail sales data from the NPD Group. Mac sales in the month of February were up 43 percent for the month, which followed a similarly strong January increase of 36 percent. In all, Mac sales for the first two months of 2010 are up 39 percent year over year.

The latest retail data suggests that Apple will sell between 2.8 million and 2.9 million Macs in the March quarter, which is above Wall Street’s consensus of 2.7 million Macs.

Strong Mac sales were accompanied by better-than-expected iPod sales as well, influencing Munster to call February an “impressive” month for Apple. iPod sales in the first two months of 2010 were up 7 percent, an increase in sales for the first time in over a year.

Album Art to Complete Your Collection

Luis Sandoval — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 06:12:48 +0000

How many of you have created your iTunes playlists and feel like your list is never complete unless you’ve got everything you need for every song including album art? If you’re one of those types, then I’m right there with you. Nothing frustrates me more than playing music on my MP3 player and seeing no album art with a song. Perhaps I’m OCD, perhaps it’s just the huge music fan in me, but Album Art Search has been a holy land of sorts for all the album art I need.

The site offers up the album art of some of the most sought after albums, straight from the homepage, but digging deeper you’re able to find what you’re missing after a search for a specific album. The categories give you a broad based idea of what you’ll find, and by clicking on the image you can go to Amazon if you’d like to buy the physical media. You can also bookmark and save the images for your own use.

So now there’s no reason for any of your playlists to be without album art. Dig in, find what you need and let us know what you think. There are other competitors out that I think do it better, but I like the ease of finding what I need on this platform.

Comics Go Mobile with Panelfly

Luis Sandoval — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 05:51:56 +0000

There’s been several mobile comic readers, some proprietary to particular publishers, others open to various to publishers, but limited in their selections. Recently a new application has been released that might be the comic book application that we’ve been waiting for, Panelfly.

Panelfly is a free comic reading app that will download to your iPhone and iTouch. Is there a possibility of it being on the new iPad? Perhaps. Already hundreds of titles are available including a vast library from Marvel and a bevy of independent publishers that might turn you into a fan of some pretty interesting comics. Exploring the library I’ve already been introduced to some great comics just from the free offerings alone.

Panelfly is has a very fluid design that allows you to read panels close up as individual pages. With a swipe of your finger you change pages. Inside the application you can bookmark where you left off so that you can pick up when it’s time to jump back into the action. You’ve got an entire store to browse, the news blog to stay up to date with updates and new offerings, as well as having a list of comics added to your library as they download on the fly.

If your a comic lover, this is an app you’ve got to check out. If you’re using another comic reader let us know which one and how it stacks up to Panelfly.

Durable MP3 Player for Kids

Luis Sandoval — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 23:00:59 +0000

Sweetpea MP3 Player for kids

Don’t want your little one grabbing your iPod? I don’t blame you. Not looking forward to seeing your state of the art MP3 players dunked in water? Well neither do we. But the kids just can’t help but be interested in what you plug into your ears all the time. If you’ve got an Apple device, maybe they like the games, so it’s easy to see why they would be attracted to it.

Sweetpea has just the device for you, Baby’s First MP3 Player, a combination for durability and ruggedness perfect for little hands. The MP3 player is a safe “non-toxic” device your kids can carry around with its oversized grip ring. The simple buttons make it easy for little fingers to press buttons and listen to the music they want. No longer do you need to worry about them banging it around, dropping it, or losing it. The design is purposely oversized and created with single-piece design of hard rubber that is FDA approved.

There is a menu for parents to adjust volume, so that the player will not drive you mad when it plays the same song over and over and over and over….well you get the picture. For $50 you can give your child the power to control their music while keeping your music player a very safe distance from curious hands. It’s also a great way to get your kids involved in technology, safe for kids 0-6 yrs of age.

Chomp: The App Recommendation and Review App

Dean Sherwin — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 19:10:58 +0000

Sometimes, finding the right tool for the job can be hard. The app store now has millions of apps which can do just about anything. Apple’s slogan – “There’s an app for that” rings true. What’s more, the App Store’s search feature is known to be rubbish and biased. Chomp however, a new app which recommends apps based on user reviews isn’t.

It has just gone live on the App Store itself and with Digg founder Kevin Rose on board they have a good chance of taking off in a competitive market. Here’s how it works.

When you load the app, you’re greeted by a home screen with four option; Live App Reviews, Recommendations, Add People and Bookmarked Apps.

The App review section allows you to see what others think of apps (in the form of a ‘heart’ for good and a ‘broken heart’ for bad) and give your own reviews. Actually reviewing apps yourself is important as it opens up the apps community aspect which allows you to interact with other users and ‘Friend’ them. The recommendations section gives you a list of apps which the system thinks you may like based on your previous downloads. Kind of like TiVo for apps. Finally, you can bookmark apps for later.

Chomp make their money via an affiliate program. So for every app you download via Chomp they get a small percentage at no extra cost to you. This is a promising app and well worth a try for the iPhone power-users among us.

Apple Files Patent for Universal iPod Dock

dashiel — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 05:39:49 +0000

Classics, Nanos, Shuffles, Touches – Apple have made so many different shapes of iPod that you need adaptors for practically every accessory you can buy. Apple likes things to look sleek and neat, so having fiddly bits of plastic to swap over for each of the many iPods they would like you to buy (you couldn’t possibly take your 60GB classic jogging with you!) is not acceptable, and so for all the neat freaks and must-have-it Apple fans, they’re developing a universal dock to accommodate all different shapes and sizes. They’ve filed a patent for, as they phrase it:

A dock for supporting a plurality of differently-shaped electronic devices, the dock comprising: a housing; a connector coupled to the housing; and a compressible support layer positioned at least partially about the connector, wherein at least a portion of the compressible support layer compresses to the shape of at least a portion of an electronic device that is attached to the connector.

Featuring:

A method for supporting a plurality of differently-shaped electronic devices in a dock that includes a compressible support layer positioned at least partially about a connector, the method comprising:attaching an electronic device to the connector of the dock; compressing at least a first portion of the compressible support layer with at least a portion of the bottom of the electronic device when the electronic device is attached to the connector; and supporting at least a portion of a side of the electronic device with at least a second portion of the compressible support layer when the electronic device is attached to the connector.

Which translates to a standard iPod connector in the middle of a squashy or springy surround, which you compress part of by pushing your iPod into, the uncompressed part supporting the sides of the device, perhaps a bit like one of those pin-art pads that were fashionable around when the Lawnmower Man came out.

Easy Video Converter: iWisoft Free and Easy Video Converter Tool

Steven Finch — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 10:18:42 +0000

Here at Crenk we are always look to provide our readers. iWisoft have just developed a free video converter which is very useful for anyone who wants to convert video and audio with easy. Easy Video Converter can convert any video to all popular digital devices, like iPod, iPhone, Gphone, Mobile Phone, Pocket PC, Zune, PSP, PS3, Xbox and so on.

iWisoft Free Video Converter v1.2.0 can work on any Windows machine and they hope to have a Mac version very soon. It supports AVI, MPEG, WMV, DivX, MP4, FLV, H.264/AVC, AVCHD, MKV, RM, MOV, 3GP, MP3, JPG, Animated GIF, etc. It has powerful video editing functions like crop, trim, merge, watermark, specify effect, etc. With its user-friendly interface, you can convert video and audio easily and fast.

Freeware Download Here

iTouch Acting as Gateway Drug to iPhone

Luis Sandoval — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 06:06:54 +0000

There’s no doubt that the skeptics who thought that Apple had no chance in theportable music player department hid when Apple’s iPod hit the market and took the mp3 music players by storm. Very few technological innovations make such an impact on our culture and yet Apple redefined what it is to listen, interact, and engage our music. Their style of minimalist design served them well with the generations of iPods to come down the line, but now times have changed.

The market for mp3 players has widened with lots of entrants, but few are capable of toppling the giant, so instead they offer an alternative to those not willing to give into Apple’s tight restriction to the Apple iTunes store. Nevertheless, iPods have had to redefine how they are interacted with and that’s when the iTouch came out. This unique tactile surface mp3 player gave users a unique experience that was unseen in the market for portable music players. Since then Apple has never looked back, and the iTouch has swelled in huge numbers.

From June to November alone, the market share grew 5%, which in Apple’s world is a huge market. Most of this is attributed to the apps that you can install on the mobile device and the bevy of games that Apple is turning to to keep users entertained and constantly in contact with their device.

But is there a deeper agenda then just the one present? Mac Rumors suggests that Apple is quietly turning the iTouch into the gateway device for future iPhone users. Similar to the concept of a gateway drug, it’s opening doors and increasing familiarity that users will appreciate and then look for something more substantial. That’s where the iPhone comes into play.

It’s not surprising that this agenda may or may not have been planned because in the grand scheme of things it’s almost a natural progression. Users may still be carrying around two devices, interacting with their iTouch much more, but in time, the iTouch user will want to carry only one device but still have the access to the vast library of apps they are familiar with on the iTouch. The iPhone then comes into play, so I’m not quite sure if this was the intended plan or just luck that it’s working out that way, but in either case it’s a moot issue. Apple is still taking this concept all the way to the bank.

Swype: A New Touch Screen Typing Method

Dean Sherwin — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 02:20:14 +0000

When text messaging first got really big around fifteen years ago, people thought it was the definitive way of sending a quick message across the globe. Then the T9 predictive text dictionary came out and it suddenly became ten times better.

Now, from the creators of the T9 prediction dictionary, we have Swype. A new way of inputting text on a touch screen phone. It works by rapidly swiping your finger around on the screen and stopping on relevant letters. This removes the need for tapping and as such reduces the amount of time it takes to write a message or e-mail. The first phone which will have this will be the Samsung Omnia II, which is due for release shortly.

Here is a leaked video which was obtained by TechCrunch. It’s a race between Swype and traditional tapping method – the results are definitive.

Incoming Announcements for iPod/iTunes

Augusto Alvarez — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 18:00:42 +0000

Apple’s has more news for us, and they are going to make it official this Wednesday, September 9 at San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. So, what’s going to be? New versions for iPod Touch with cameras included (maybe including iPod nano) and new features for iTunes.

There are a lot of rumors, which unfortunately are only that, just rumors. Marco Arment made a few guesses around all those and here’s a quick review about what he said:

New iPod touch version with the following features: camera, double the storage capacities, and new pricing: 8 GB for u$s149, 16 GB for u$s199, 32 GB for u$s249, 64 GB for u$s349.
New iPod nano version with camera. But they will offer only one model: 8gb for u$s99
iPod classic out of the market.
New pricing for the iPod shuffle: u$s59.

You want more? iTunes will include new social network features; and this event will possibly have a special guest: Steve Jobs.

Yes, I didn’t mention anything about the Apple Tablet. Seems that there’s not going to be any announce around that, and they could possibly wait until next year to say something official about it.

Apple Recalls First-Generation iPod Nano in South Korea

Will Wilson — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 11:11:55 +0000

The Korea Herald reports that Apple has agreed to recall first-generation iPod nanos sold in South Korea following four reports of the device’s batteries overheating or exploding. The recall comes several weeks after a request from the Korean government after which Apple initially offered to replace only those units found to be defective, but continuing pressure ultimately led to a full recall of the 155,000 units sold between October 2005 and December 2006.

With a series of media reports following the report of The Korea Herald, Apple said it would replace the batteries and shells of its first-generation iPod Nano with new ones.

“Customers who are concerned about possible overheating of the battery can get it exchanged,” Park In-kyu, an official with the Korea Agency for Technology & Standards, told The Korea Herald, citing a document sent by Apple Korea on July 7.

The Korean recall follows similar complaints in Japan that ultimately resulted in Apple offering to replace overheating first-generation iPod nanos there last August.

Nike+, Running in the Right Direction

Luis Sandoval — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 14:19:42 +0000

: Image by booyaa via Flickr

I’ve just recently started running for fitness and I had my eye on the Nike+ system to pair with my iTouch. Running is something a lot of us fear, perhaps some of you out there MIGHT enjoy it, but far more prefer other methods of exercise. Still, the Nike+ system is the device that is supposed to have revolutionized running as a sport and as a frequent user of this device, I have to say it’s upped my game, and helped me train harder.

This small device, running $30USD for the sensor, and approx. $75USD for the USB bracelet, sends information to your iPod and tracks your progress monitoring information like pace, distance, time, and calories burned. All the while you are able to run to your own music track and when you’re feeling run down, activate your own power song to push you those extra miles.

To add even more functionality to the device you are able to connect your device to your computer (both MAC and PC compatible) and upload your data to the Nike+ website, adding you to the mix of already thousands upon thousands of runners out there at all levels. You can monitor your progress, join challenges, track milestones, and join in a social network of sorts with other runners out there. It’s useful on so many levels, and allows you to buy Nike specific music tracks that they’ve put together for you, training modules that go further than what comes pre-loaded, accessories and gear, and even create a Nike+ animated character for a badge that can be placed on your own site or your Facebook account.

All in all, I highly recommend this device if you’ve not gotten it yet, and you’re running. Even if you don’t like running with music, that’s fine, leave it off, but keep the stats, once you calibrate it, it’s priceless.

Sony’s Walkman 30 Years

Augusto Alvarez — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:47:25 +0000

Yes, I know, you probably didn’t even think about a walkman in a long time; and most likely it’s been a real while since you’ve seen one, but Sony’s is -NOT- celebrating the release of their first Walkman 30 years ago.

Sony is still trying to make a revolutionary product release that they didn’t have particulary since the first portable audio player hit the market. They are having a rough year (first annual loss balance in 14 years) and they don’t have so great expectations for next year either. Most of the hopes are placed in PlayStation 3 (mainly based on two things, the release of the slim version and waiting for the blu-ray to become a real home standard), and also the portable new console PSP Go!

Getting back to the walkman’s story, here’s a quick and funny image that a friend of mine sent me today:

iCascade: Rotating Addictive Puzzle Game for iPhone / iPod Touch

Steven Finch — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 09:24:10 +0000

Everyday we get some interesting emails from iPhone application developers who are looking for a bit of extra press and insight into their apps. Today I thought I would run through iCascade a new game for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

iCascade is a puzzle game that comes with a new addictive gameplay. Try to find the right place for your blocks, but think ahead because the playing field rotates! Get points for 3 or more contiguous blocks. iCascade is a very addictive game that really promotes a huge amount of thought process (well for me anyways).

Download from iTunes here.

Organise Your iPhone and iPod Touch Apps into Folders

Steven Finch — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 09:23:44 +0000

No I know what most of you are thinking, why the hell isn’t this an iPhone app or why hasn’t Apple done this already, well they should have! The Next Web is reporting on a new app that is really going to help.

It’s an awesome app in Cydia called “Categories” which lets you organise your apps into folders. The app provides an array of different icons you can use, you can easily rename folders via the app and adding/removing apps is relatively easy. However, this is not available in the app store and you need to have your iPhone jailbroken.

Currently, on my iPod touch I have over 5 pages worth of applications that I use on a monthly basis. At the moment I’m having so much trouble keep track of the apps and actually arranging them so they can be easily used and organised. Apple needs to come up with an app like this, either that or they need to be able to arrange your apps directly in iTunes.

One limitation: the app doesn’t recognise iPhone web apps only genuinely local apps.

As I noted above, this is only for Jailbroken iPhones. Other features which Cydia (jailbroken app database) brings is copy & paste, 5 apps in the dock amongst hundreds of others.

iPhone App Reviews for Social Media News

Jordan Kasteler — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 09:16:14 +0000

There aren’t very many social media applications yet on the iPhones that are based around social news or social bookmarking. Digg has a an unofficial app which is much improved than the last unofficial app that was in the iTunes App Store which is no longer available. Delicious has quite a few apps that are decent but lack a few important features. Disappointingly, StumbleUpon doesn’t have any applications and neither does Mixx or Yahoo! Buzz.

Reddit is currently leading with three apps to make the mobile experience much more enjoyable. One of theirs is an official app from the Reddit creators themselves. Will Digg be releasing an official app soon?

I’ve taken the liberty to do a review of the three Reddit apps and Digg app that are in the iTune App Store. I am in no way associated with any of these apps, know any of the owners, or am promoting any of them in any fashion. This is merely a review from an avid Reddit and Digg user with a love for social news and social media.

Shovel – Digg App

Author: Scott Fitzhugh

Price: Free

Ratings: 147 Reviews – (at the time of writing)

iTunes Download Link: http://tinyurl.com/d5yqhu

iTunes Description:

Shovel is an app that provides top stories from the social news website Digg.com in a native application. Browse the front page stories, or delve deeper into an array of topics and subtopics of interest.

Personal Review:

Shovel is a great application for viewing Digg.com content easily on the iPhone. Overall, the design and interface is pretty clean and simple. It gives you a variety of topics and listings to select to view so you can access all of the content on Digg.com. You can view:

Popular Stories
Top Stories
Movers & Shakers
Brand New Stories

All listings are applicable to any category or sub-category in Digg.com. If you select a Digg story you can then scroll down the commentary to see what people are saying, who’s replied, how many votes each comment has received, etc. After that, you can click further to view the story live on the Web. Which is nice about it is that it doesn’t load Safari as a separate app to view the content so there’s no back-and-forth between the apps.

Unfortunately, what you cannot participate in digging, burying, or commenting through this application. The developer disclaims, “Now we’ve gotten the message loud and clear that the one thing that would turn this 3.5 star app (currently 3 stars) into a 5 star one is the interactivity of the original Digg site. You guys (and gals) want to be able to Digg, comment, and bury, and who can blame you? Right now, however, there is no way to do this using the legitimate Digg APIs, and quite frankly, it makes us sad. I’ve been trying to court the help of Digg in making this app all that it can be, and if you want to help that along, you should drop them a line yourselves requesting the same!”

Another drawback is that you cannot personalize this application because there is no way to login. Therefore you can’t weed out content you don’t want to see, view your account profile, see your friend’s submissions, etc.

In doing some research the Shovel app used to be named “Diggerific”. Apparently, they have changed the name of it and redid the UI just a bit as you can tell from the video review of Diggerific below:

Overview

Pros

Easy to use
Clean interface
Ability to access all Digg content

Cons

Free of charge
Can’t Digg, comment, or bury content
No Digg account profile/community features or functionality

iReddit

Author: CondeNet

Price: $1.99

Ratings: 41 Reviews (at the time of writing)

Feedback Contact: http://getsatisfaction.com/reddit/products/reddit_ireddit

iTunes Download Link: http://tinyurl.com/ce6tt2

iTunes Description:

The official Reddit iPhone app. Never be bored again. With this app, you’ll only be a tap (or shake) away from the most interesting stuff on the web.

All of your favorite Reddit functionality is here: view the hottest, newest, top, and most controversial stories of the moment, explore, individual subreddits, vote, comment, share, and save links for later. The entire commenting system has been optimized for the iPhone app so you won’t have any trouble contributing to an epic pun thread.

Save time by never having to reload the Reddit homepage. You can even use handy next/previous navigation to move between websites without going back to the main list. And those sites work in portrait and widescreen modes too.

It’s never been easier to be entertained. Just shake your iPhone to enter “serendipity mode” where you’ll be served a random, interesting site. Pro-tip: Turn on “play sound on shake” for a special treat with every jostle — the iPhone is an elegant phone for a more sophisticated age.

And if you’re feeling the economic downturn (what are you doing with an iPhone?) there’s a tree, ad-supported version to come.

Personal Review:

The Official Reddit application is pretty cool. You can input your username and password so that you can vote and comment on stories. Initially, you come to the Reddit homepage. Along the top you can choose between “Hot”, “New”, “Top”, and “Controversial” stories. When selecting a story, there is an overlay on the footer that allows you to upvote/downvote the story, go to the comments section of the story, save the story, and email the link.

Three subreddits will fit on the bottom bar overlay that you can quickly navigate to. You can edit the subreddits with the ones you want to use the most, but you only have a small selection of subreddit’s to swap out with. Those subreddits are:

Programming
Funny
Science
Tech
World News
Entertainment
Business
Comics
Gaming
Best Of
Economics
Cappuccino

It is the most expensive application but I feel it’s the cleanest and easiest to use. Unfortunately, you can’t browse all subreddits and there’s no search function. Nor is there a function to view your account’s saves, karma points, submissions, comments, etc.

I would recommend this app to anyone looking to quickly and easily view Reddit news, vote, and participate in the more popular subreddits. The free Reddit app doesn’t allow for this.

Overview

Pros

Easily vote on stories from the actual story page
Save links to view/read later
Comment participation
Customization of footer subreddits

Cons

Most expensive Reddit app
Not a wide-range of subreddits to customize on your footer
Can’t browse all subreddits
No search functionality
No personal account status functionality

Open Source Reddit

Author: Joseph Pintozzi

Price: Free

Ratings: 10 Reviews (at the time of writing)

Feedback Contact: reddit@pintozzi.com

iTunes Download Link: http://tinyurl.com/cpjzvj

iTunes Description:

The Reddit application allows users to view the stories from www.reddit.com without having to deal with loading massive webpages. It displays the stories in a nice table view, providing details about each submission, and allows the user to easily view the submitted content. The ability to vote on a submission is currently being added.

Personal Review:

This app is very bare bones with very limited functionality. If you’re looking to vote on stories or participate in the comments this app isn’t for you. If you’re just looking to read “Hot” news from a select few subreddits then this is a good app for the cost of nothing. The included subreddits to choose from are:

reddit.com
bacon
politics
pics
WTF
funny
technology
programming

The nice thing about it is that it’s open source and the developer leaves it open for people to add on what they want to it. Hopefully, in the future, this will be a great application for Reddit.

Overview

Pros

Open Source
Free

Cons

No commenting
No voting
Can’t browse all subreddits
No search functionality
No personal account status functionality

Satellite Reddit

Author: 3Cube Technologies

Price: $0.99

Ratings: 8 Reviews – (at the time of writing)

Feedback Contact: satellite@3cubetechnologies.com or http://twitter.com/3cube

iTunes Download Link: http://tinyurl.com/cx8eec

iTunes Description:

Satellite 2.0 is now available and brings a host of improvement to the mobile Reddit experience.

Change in this version includes:

Greatly improved performance
New, Controversial, and Top views are available for all subreddits
An overlay displaying the full article title and comments count shows while loading an article
The subreddit list is reorderable
A beautiful new icon and splash screen have been added
New lower pricing.

Satellite is a full-featured client for Reddit.com, a social link aggregation site. With Satellite, you can browse links appearing on the front page or drill down into the Subreddits you are subscribed to. When viewing an article you can vote the link up or down, save it to your Reddit account, or share the link with others. With the click of a button, you can shift into commenting mode to browse comments or post your own back to the Reddit page about the link. The interface provides a substantially more streamlined experience over the mobile Reddit site and incorprates the unique capabilities of the iPhone to make your day to day Reddit’ing much more fun.

Additional Satellite features include:

Shake the app at any time to explore random content from Reddit
Next/previous buttons are available at the screen edges to move through content without returning to list view
Full portrait/landscape modes, including upside down. Great for handing the phone across the dinner table to share your discoveries!
Returns to the content you were browsing at start-up. Pick up right where you left off when that call came in.
Highly addictive content discovery available anywhere, at any time!

Personal Review:

This app is definitely worth the 99 cents. After entering in your login information you can view ALL of your subscribed subreddits. It also gives you an option to edit your subreddits for your account. After selecting a subreddit you can choose between “Hot”, “New”, “Controversial”, and “Top” categories in the footer bar. Once selecting a story, it takes you to the story and overlays the story title, submitter, and point count. At the bottom footer you can choose to vote, go to comments, save the link, or email the link. Again though, there’s no search feature with this app either.

This app is a lot like the official iReddit app except it’s more personalized. You can also view your saved Reddits on your account to follow up on how your saves and submissions are doing.

Overview

Pros

Personalized
Nice User-Interface
Good functionality for voting and commenting
All Reddit content accessible through this app

Cons

Isn’t free
Can’t see your karma points
No search functionality

HAPPY BROWSING WITH THESE SOCIAL MEDIA APPS!

V-Mode Vibe ii Sports Ear Hooks

Steven Finch — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 09:16:43 +0000

I was lucky enough today to receive some ear buds from v-mode. v-mode are a bit of a strange company in that they make headphones and also clothing under the same umbrella. The earphones that I received were the new vibe ii sports ear hooks.

First impressions from the packaging were good, but there simply just seemed to be a lot of packaging for a simply pair of ear buds.The little piece of novelty was that the box itself has two compartments that were had magnets build in to they stayed together.

Once inside after getting through the packaging (20 min) the speakers themselves seemed to be quite heavy, a lot heavier than a normal pair of ear buds. The Vibe ii is made especially for smartphones and the iPhone because they have included a built in microphone. The design of the microphone and overall look of the product is great, but the ear buds themselves are quite flat towards the end and if you listen to music for long periods on end then you might get a bit of a sore ear.

Obviously the key to a good set of ear buds is the quality of sound and the Vibe ii seems to give off a much better quality to the average ear bud on the market today. Unfortunately for me the quality of depth within the sounds in slightly lacking and the volume of the sounds also seems to be low.

Overall the Vibe ii is a great set of ear buds that I’m sure will last you a long time. Vibe ii is ahead of the average ear buds simply because of the sounds quality but for the price (USD $119.99) it seems to be just not good enough.

Increase The Sound Volume on your 3G iPhone with SoundClip

Steven Finch — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 13:02:19 +0000

Ten One Design has created a way to boost the sound for your iPhone 3G. The product is called SoundClip and it increases the sound by about 10dB with signal between 6kHz and 20kHz.

This would be useful to people that especially love to listen to music through the built-in speaker, but the device just gets in the way of iPhone gamers in landscape mode.

Storing the SounClip is simple. There is a cord-gripping feature that keeps it fastened to your iPhone charge cable during syncing and charging. To buy the device, visit Ten One’s website here.

Apple Hits The 500 Million Download Mark for Apps Store

Steven Finch — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 17:24:36 +0000

Apple has announced today that they have reached the 500 million download mark for iPhone / iPod Touch applications from their appstore.

It has been reported by Mashable and TheNextWeb that the 300 million download happened on December 5th, thus more than 200 million downloads have happened in the last 5 weeks. For Apple these are some very impressive stats and it just shows their push just within iTunes. Currently their are approximately 15,000 apps available in the Apple App Store, and im sure this will rise very quickly. Compare the App Store success to iTunes when it first began, because iTunes took almost two years to hit the 500 million download mark.

iPod Shuffle In New Vibrant Colours

Steven Finch — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 10:44:03 +0000

Apple has announced this morning that the Apple iPod shuffle is getting some new colours, and here they are. The shuffle has been transformed into the same colours are the new iPod Nano’s. However, they still come with a very attractive price tag, $49 USD.

iTunes Avoids Shutting Down

Luis Sandoval — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 20:09:38 +0000

In recent weeks there has been a lot said regarding the possible rate hike for distributed music. Sites like iTunes, Amazon, and Napster to name a few, are all music distribution sites with business models that would have been greatly affected by this possible increase.

The Copyright Royalty Board was to meet to discuss a rate increase of almost 60%, which would hit deep into the profits that distribution sites make. Apple, so angered by this possibility threatened to shut down iTunes if the board passed the rate increase. Apple, who currently owns the largest margin of mp3 players on the market, the iPods, would have shut down their site? A part of me says no, perhaps an idle threat. All in all, the board has decided to keep rates the same, 9 cents per song. You can read more about the decision here.

Still, Apple may not have come out of this situation without egg on their face. The reality of one of the largest music distribution markets completely shutting down, with an mp3 player that is connected to propriety software, iTunes, may scare people into moving towards a more functional player that is not directly tied to any one site. Could Apple have shown it’s own weakness? Or is Apple relying on its millions of dedicated fans to stick with the “in” platform of choice?

For now iTunes is safe.

Apple Makes iPhone & iTunes Announcements

Luis Sandoval — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 03:10:15 +0000

Apple fans generally sit on the edge of their seats days before Apple makes announcements regarding new products, new updates, or a new direction. More often than not Apple never fails to wow the crowds in taking the lead with innovation and design, but for some reason a large number of reports are saying that today’s announcements at the “Let’s Rock” event were nothing more than a yawner.

Personally I feel that fans have become accustomed to drastic announcements, or for lack of a better word, world changing technology, but sometimes its the little things that make what we already have just that much better. Here’s a run down of the announcements from today:

For starters the iTunes application received a nice upgrade. The biggest is the addition of the Apple Genius. No, not the guy at the Apple store, but rather back end programming that serves as a personal DJ for your iPod. Genius uses data loaded on the Apple server and in turn working with the iTunes on your computer to find great matches to your already expanding playlist. Let Genius do the audio matching and see how accurate to your taste it really is.
Apple has also made up with NBC, and now the two are best friends…for now. NBC is re-releasing their material for now with hits like The Office and 30 Rock available in HD for only $2.99 per episode. Other shows and networks will soon follow, but having HD quality on the iPod is an interesting addition, better get those lines ready for downloading overload!
The iPod Touch got a much needed update along with a decent price drop. Sleek, new design, similar to the iPhone 3G now makes the iPod Touch more curvy and easier to handle. It’s new thinner design makes it easy to carry and comes with built in Nike+ software for the runner in you. The pricing for the new iPod Touch is as follows, $229 (8GB), $299 (16GB), and $399 (32GB)
Finally the Nano got a new design. I admit when the Nano went short and squat I did not think I would be a fan of that version, and when I got my wife one I found myself using it more than her. The design grew on me and I became accustomed to it. I’m not sure what happened behind the scenes, but apparently there was enough of an uprising that the Nano has gone back to it’s long narrower design, but kept the same screen real estate. Like it’s larger counterpart, the new Nano comes with it’s own built-in accelerometer. They also come in much more bolder colors which reminds me of a pack of Now or Laters.

According to reports stock fell just over 3% after the announcements were over providing support that investors as a whole were underwhelmed by Apple’s announcements. Sad really, while expecting ground breaking news, Apple delivered some solid additions to iTunes, and price drops and re-designs for other products. I think this holiday season will see an increase in iPod Touch sales, and don’t be surprised when you see those brightly colored Nanos flying around either.

Photo Credit, Apple, Inc.

How to Update iPod Touch to Firmware 2.0 for Free

Steven Finch — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 09:43:27 +0000

Apple has pushed the new iPod Touch Firmware 2.0 to iTunes. All iPod Touch users can upgrade to this latest firmware by paying a one-time fee of $9.25.

iPhone users, however, get to upgrade to firmware 2.0 absolutely free of cost. As I find this kind of unfair on part of Apple to charge only iPod Touch users, so I am going to help you upgrade iPod Touch to firmware 2.0 absolutely for free.

If you want to have an updated iPod Touch 2.0 for free, then just follow the steps below:

Download iTunes 7.7 from Here.
Hold Shift and click Restore.
Select iPod1,1_2.0_5A347_Restore.ipsw
Enjoy!

The iPod1,1_2.0_5A347_Restore.ipsw firmware can be downloaded from any of the mirrors below. It is the complete stable and final iPod Touch Firmware 2.0 (5A347) and has been checked and tested.

Rapidshare mirror (Join parts using this software)

http://tinyurl.com/ipodtouch-firmware-2-part1


http://tinyurl.com/ipodtouch-firmware-2-part2

http://tinyurl.com/ipodtouch-firmware-2-part3

Uploaded.to mirror

http://uploaded.to/file/ih0z65/iPod1,1_2.0_5A347_Restore.ipsw

Freakshare mirror

http://freakshare.net/files/30208/iPod11_2.0_5A347_Restore.ipsw

Once you download the firmware locally on your PC, follow the steps above to update iPod Touch to Firmware 2.0.

Add Crenk WebClip To Your iPhone or iPod Touch

Steven Finch — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 17:01:52 +0000

After yesterdays big announcements at MacWorld, Crenk can now be added to your iPhone or iPod Touch Home Page.

If you head to crenk.com in your Safari browser and then bookmark the site, a few options will appear and one is to add Crenk to you Home Page. This will bring up a confirmation page and then it will be amazingly added to your Home Page, with a nice little icon that looks like this: