Tech Blog - Page 2

The griping about the iPhone 4S—which the more I think of it is a great update to the iPhone 4—has overshadowed the real stuff that is going to make us love our iOS devices more—iOS 5, iCloud, and the Lion updates to support them. By all accounts, iOS 5 fixes how freakin’ annoying notifications are on iOS devices as well as being able to do more without your machine. Yeah, automatic backups to the cloud is going to save a lot of bacon, let me tell you. Access to Camera on the lock screen? Finally! Volume button to take a picture? About time. These incremental—and arguably overdue—features are the what in some ways brings iOS closer to Android devices but in others what pushes beyond them.

In the midst of Apple’s event yesterday to unveil the iPhone 4S, there was time to talk about a new line of iPods, except the details were all too familiar. The iPod line has reached a point where it exists, but won’t be part of any serious upgrades for the foreseeable future. The current line is almost exactly in line with what was offered last year.

The headline is what everyone wants to know first, isn’t it? Okay the ever-important “Yeah, how much?” is next, but I’ll get to that in a moment. Today Apple announced the a bump to the iPhone 4 dubbed the 4S which has a faster processor, faster graphics, better camera, HD video recording, and Siri your personal assistant. Ballpark prices are going to be $199 for 16 GB, $299 for 32 GB, and $399 for 64 GB. Those are the US prices given during the event and assumedly with a contract. Fear not, the iPhone 4 isn’t going away, it’s down to $99 for the base model (on a plan) and the venerable 3GS (yep, still alive and kicking) free with a plan.

Now for some details…

Before you wonder “Who would need to charge and sync 30 iPads at once?”, remember more and more schools and businesses are deploying iPads en masse. Can you imagine keeping all those iPads charged andsynced (i.e. updated and backed up) if you had to do them one at a time? A nightmare. True tech nightmare. Actually, I’m scared just thinking about it, hold me.

Oh, wait, Griffin has it covered with their new Multidock. I feel better now.

If you’re familiar with the magicJack, then you already know that it’s a VoIP device and service giving you free calls throughout Canada and the U.S. The iPhone app that I originally saw at CES in Las Vegas in January has finally come to life, and it offers free calls in both countries without having to own a magicJack or pay anything.

If you’ve become totally accustomed to using the “iPod” app on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, you might want to think about trying something new. The only reason I say that is because there’s an app that pretty much does everything the iPod app does, but manages to actually make the music you listen to sound even better.

Some iOS reviews for you, including one of something that isn't actually a game but will help you access potentially hundreds.



The lack of Flash is probably the one feature that everyone points to when talking about the shortcomings of Apple’s iOS devices. That’s why it’s hardly surprising that all the other competitors push that out in the open when marketing their tablets. Those of you who have an iPad, iPhone or iPod touch might really like Skyfire’s VideoQ app to bring those Flash videos to life.

One of my frustrations with iPod is not being able to delete things on the go.

You know, that rogue Christmas track that somehow gets shuffled in to your music list when you sync before going off on a run. Maybe it’s a bizarre album track you can’t stand, or a song you used to love but just now can’t stand?



Well there is a way to delete some of the stuff while you're away from iTunes.

Free music is always a good thing, especially when it’s live and it comes in droves. The iTunes Festival London 2011 will be featuring performances from 62 bands and musicians over the course of the 31 nights of July. All of it is free to stream and watch throughout the month.

Now that Apple’s recent announcement over its iCloud service has sunk in, there still seems to be some cloudiness (pardon the pun) over how the new service works in relation to the existing MobileMe paid sync service. Despite the fact some of iCloud won’t be made available to Canadians, at least there is a clearer picture of what the phasing out of MobileMe will mean.

The idea of the “office in your” pocket is something that we bandy about, but an iPad—or even one of the smaller tablets—aren’t really pocket sized per se. On the other hand, an iPhone certainly is and with Apple releasing iWork for iPhone and iPod Touch that ideal is getting pretty darn close.

Exclamation title heavy this week in the iOS games round-up, with a couple of dungeon-related titles looked at too: DungeonCore and Dungeoned. Though before we go any further, I'd just like to note that for the next few weeks anyone who purchases tracks in WINtA--NanaOn-Sha's rather excellent rhythm action title for iOS--will be directly donating money to Save the Children teams active in Japan, helping and rebuilding the lives of children affected by the devastating earthquake and tsunami in the country. You can find out about that here, and please consider it.

It’s not a surprise, given that Steve Jobs already mentioned it at last week’s iPad 2 launch event, but the latest iOS 4.3 update is been pushed up by two days and is now here and ready to download onto your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch.

More iOS game reviews! This time, some darlings of the format, such as Game Dev Story and 100 Rogues, which (perhaps inevitably) I don't really like quite as much as everyone else does.