Search Results for: iphone

12 Gizmos for Christmas: #6 MP3 Player

Audio/Video, Home Theater, Holidays / By /

MP3 players are again among the Geek’s top 12 Gadgets of Christmas and Apple’s iPod continues to outsell and rule this market. If you’re looking for our list to include Zune, SanDisk, Archos or Creative… you’ll be disappointed because they simply do not make the best seller list.

The bestselling iPod is the Apple iPod touch 3rd Generation ($179.99 for the 8GB to $359.99 for the 64GB) that comes installed with the iPhone OS 3.1 software and a 3.5″ widescreen Multi-Touch display.

Apple iPod nano 5th Generation with 8GB with a smaller profile 2.2″ color TFT display.

Finally, the Apple iPod classic 7th Generation with 160GB is a great choice for someone who loves to carry all their music with them (roughly 40k songs) but they don’t care about grabbing apps from the iTunes store. Also, this is a hard drive based iPod so don’t exercise or run with this one!

12 Gizmos for Christmas: #9 Mobile Phone

Holidays, Phones / By /

The number nine slot in the Geeks countdown goes to Mobile Phones. Typically we’ll list a few types of mobile phones (conventional mobile phones, smart phones and multimedia phones); however this year we are going to exclusively concentrate on smart phones. Perhaps we hang around with too many geeks, but if someone we know purchases a mobile phone that’s not a smart phone… they are shunned by our geek society!

The top selling consumer mobile phone still is the iPhone. The app store and interface will continue to allow Apple to see strong sales for the iPhone. Next, the Blackberry Bold 9700 has strong sales and is currently number one on Amazon’s bestselling mobile phones with it’s full QWERTY keyboard and touch-sensitive optical trackpad, Wi-Fi networking, camera/camcorder (this phone has great quality) and Bluetooth stereo music. Finally, the Palm Pre deserves at spot at number three with Palm’s new webOS featuring Synergy technology to auto-pull together your contacts and calendars into one screen.

Review: iTech SolarCharger 906 – portable solar charger

3 Comments / Audio/Video, Home Theater, Cameras and Photo, Phones, Portable, Reviews / By /

There are numerous portable battery backup solutions out there that come in various sizes, shapes and function. iTech makes one that falls into the ‘green’ category. How? By being rechargeable via solar energy. The SolarCharger 906 is a compact iPhone-sized (approx 4″ x 2.5″ x 0.6″) solar panel that holds 1,260mAh of power.

You can either charge up the 906 via a USB cable but of course, its star power (pardon the pun) is to be recharged via the sun’s rays. The 906 comes with a clear plastic cradle that is very securely connected and suction cups that you can use to attach it to your car’s windscreen. There’s also a car-kit.

The SolarCharger 906 has 4 blue LED lights on it that shows the degree to which it is charged up. Unfortunately, it takes over 20 hours to get fully charged up via sunlight, but iTech claims that it can keep a full charge for up to a year. So far, we’ve found that it does keep a charge for a week.

It also comes with 10 different power adapter tips including ones for LG, Nokia, Nintendo, Samsung, and Sony phones, Sony PSP and a few different USB tips (supports iPhone, iPods, Motorola and Blackberrys).

You can simultaneously charge a device while the 906 is charging via sunlight. Theoretically, you can keep the 906 running indefinitely if it gets enough sunshine.

We really liked iTech’s SolarCharger 906, but have to say that it is ideal for those folks that have their cars outside for a significant amount of time daily and use their portable devices enough to warrant an emergency backup. People that don’t fit this description may not get their money’s worth from the SolarCharger, although the 1 time you absolutely need your phone recharged, you may think just that!

Palm to restructure application submission and distribution system for webOS apps

1 Comment / Phones / By /

Finally. Palm is starting to get its app submission process for its developers right. Software developers of WebOS Palm apps (for the Pre and Pixi handsets) can now submit their apps to Palm for review and possible inclusion in the Palm App Catalog OR they can distribute them immediately via a 3rd-party site.

This new system will start in December. Late, considering when the Pre was first released, but at least it will happen. Unknown is whether Palm can hope to catch up with the Android and iPhone application inventory already in place and growing.

via NYTimes

Trillian Astra – Instant Messenger aggregator

Gizmo of the Day, Software / By /

If you’re an Instant Messenger fiend, then you’ve probably already heard of Trillian, Cerulean’s Studios IM client aggregator. You’ve probably also heard of Trillian Astra which is Cerulean’s latest version that integrates a slew of new and very popular IM platforms such as Facebook, Google (Jabber), Twitter, Skype and much more.

Cerulean touts over 400 features, which we obviously can’t do justice explaining here. But let’s bottom line it for you right now: if you were ever using Trillian before, then you need to do yourself a favor and upgrade to Astra.

Here are but a few of the features that we like: first and foremost is the extensive support of various IM networks. Apart from the ones mentioned above, you can also connect to MySpace, Bonjour, AIM, Yahoo, MSN (Windows Live), ICQ and more.

Astra is better at supporting audio and video chat; it does a great job of showing timestamps in IM windows, and better skins that delineate who said what when. I particularly like that when you pull up an IM window, it shows you as much of the recent chat history as the window can hold. The history management is much better as well.

Astra is available for Windows, there’s a Web version and versions for iPhone and MacOSX are in the works.

Download the free version of Astra from Trillian.IM or get the Pro version for $25.

Buy now!
More info from the manufacturer
Price: $25
(Please note prices are subject to change and the listed price is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of posting)

DriveSafe.ly’s app for your phone reads your text message out aloud

1 Comment / Gizmo of the Day, Phones / By /

It has been proven repeatedly that using a cell phone to talk or text is just as bad as having had a few drinks. With that in mind, not to mention that many states have either outlawed the practice or are about to, new handsfree technology is needed to help drivers to respond without taking their eyes off the road.

DriveSafe.ly is one such company providing an application to read text messages out aloud and send an automatic response saying that you will respond later. You can get the DriveSafe.ly application for your Blackberry or Android phone with versions for iPhone and Windows Mobile on the way. You can get either a free ad-supported version or a premium version for a flat lifetime price or on a monthly subscription basis.

PS> If you’re a Federal employee, then you should also know that President Obama has banned federal employees from text messaging when they are behind the wheel of government vehicles and from texting in their own cars if they use government-issued phones or are on official business.

Buy now!

More info from the manufacturer
Price: $13.95 1-time cost or $3.95/mo
(Please note prices are subject to change and the listed price is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of posting)

Latest Apple Rumour – iTablet?

Computers, Portable / By /

iTablet Rumour

Rumours from Apple are common, but a few of them do seem to come true – perhaps this is one of them! I am a bit skeptical about Apple releasing the ‘iCar’ that I heard about last year though! However, the latest offering in the rumor scene is some sort of Apple Tablet (could it be called the iTablet?) to compete within the ultra-portable computing market to provide something a little bigger and more powerful than an iPhone, yet not as big as their MacBooks.

There have been reports of the tablet featuring a 9.7inch screen and costing around $800. With the netbook and tablet market growing at such a fast rate at the moment I personally think that this device will be made, as Apple will want a piece of this market. As for the picture, I hope this is just a satirical piece of Photoshopping.

Get non-Apple sanctioned apps on Cydia

Phones / By /

Jay Freeman founded the Cydia app store for iPhones and iPod Touches about 5 months ago, specifically for all those applications that Apple has decided not to accept into their app store. Just one caveat, you need to jailbreak your iPhone/Touch.

One estimate says that 4 million iPhone users have jailbroken their phones so that it works with more than just the Apple App Store (among other things). Now, you know what to do if you want that Google Voice application!

I just wonder when Apple is going to bring the collective legal hammer to bear…

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