Search Results for: iphone

BMW Support iPod Out on iOS 4

When Apple [AAPL] announced iOS 4 they said a large number of enhancements had been included. These of course include multitasking as well as many other popular features that have been publicly known. Another one of the new features is called iPod Out which appears to have been overlooked somewhat. Thankfully, BMW has an all seeing eye and spotted the new feature allowing them to create quite a decent interface for their cars.

iPod Out is a function that enables an external screen to display and control music playback. Docking an iPhone running iOS 4 for example, could allow a car to have a screen installed and all the iPod controls appear on screen within the car.

BMW will be doing this with their BMW and Mini entertainment systems. The iPod Out function works on any iOS 4 device which includes the iPhone 3G, 3GS, 4 and iPod touch second and third generation. [Read more…]

Windows Phone Live offers Remote Wipe and Location Tracking

The Windows Steam Blog is pushing out some content today. We have heard a few things from them today including the Windows Phone Developer Tools beta launch.

What we hear now in their latest post is that Windows Phone Live will offer remote wipe capabilities as well as the ability to track the location of the phone. The Windows Phone Live website will allow two sets of functions to be performed. The first set handles the syncing of data with the cloud such as pictures, contracts and any other data that you store on the device. The second function handles the phone hardware whereby you can activate the GPS if the device is lost, perform remote wipes as well as lock it, ring it and interact with the phone in a way to help it be returned to it’s owner. [Read more…]

EpicWin RPG To-Do List

EpicWin is an app launching soon that spruces up your To-Do list a little by making it in to an RPG game. Most to-do lists are just lists of items stored on paper, in Outlook or wherever that show a list of things you need to do. Often the reminder gets delayed 5 minutes and another 5 minutes and another day etc… until nothing really gets done.

What EpicWin attempts to do is make completing tasks more rewarding. You enter your to-do list on to the EpicWin iPhone app and it becomes part of an RPG. When you mark off your to-do list one at a time, ie – you accomplish tasks rather than postponing them, you get rewarded in the game. As you complete more tasks you jump up levels, get more stamina and other bonuses. [Read more…]

Skype now Blocks Fring

This one is getting a little complicated. Here is what has happened so far. Last week, the Fring iPhone app was updated allowing iOS 4 users to multitask the app, leaving it running in the background to receive calls and messages. For those using an iPhone 4, it allowed you to make video calls over WiFi and 3G to users on other devices. This was a big step forwards making the front facing camera on the phone be useful for things other than iPhone 4 to iPhone 4 FaceTime calls over WiFi which it was previously restricted to.

Shortly after the updated app went live, Skype support was “temporarily removed” due to an overload of users making use of video calling services. This, according to Fring, was done because they wanted to make Fring more reliable until the infrastructure could be updated. [Read more…]

T-Mobile Garminfone Price Slashed

T-Mobile has dropped the Garminfone down $70 which takes the price on contract down to $129.99. To get the satnav phone at that price you still need to sign up for a two year agreement with T-Mobile though.

Yair Reiner, an analyst, recently calculated that only 20,000 Garminfones had been sold which isn’t a lot compared to the success of various Android handsets and the iPhone 4.

Hopefully the price drop will get a few more people interested in the device as so far, it hasn’t done well at all. We first tested a Garminfone back in April 2009 and it suffered a lot of delays which turned a good phone in to something not realy wanted by the time it came out it seems. [Read more…]

Apple Touchscreen Spotted

Earlier today we wrote about a concept iPod shuffle that showed an iPhone 4 inspired glass front and back with a metal band around the edges. A small screen has been spotted that shows that the concept might be not that far off the mark.

The Apple [AAPL] touchscreen measures just 3cm by 3cm making it quite small. The information apparently comes from someone who deals with manufacturing Apple products and could indicate a small screen device is going to be launched soon.

‘Imagine, the author writes, ‘The black frame outside the screen plus a aluminum or add a Home button (or may not increase the Home key).

[Read more…]

SNES for iPad Install Tutorial

If you own an iPad it is possible to play SNES games on the device. Lifehacker has created a four-step tutorial that shows you exactly how to get playing SNES games on your iPad along with the steps to pair up a Bluetooth Wii Remote to play the games with. If you don’t have a wiimote and prefer to use an iPhone or iPod touch as a controller then an alternative SNES emulator is available.

The first app looked at in the video is called SNES4iPhone which costs $5.99 and requires you jailbreak the iPad. Jailbreaking an iPad is quite simple thanks to apps like SpiritJB that allow a simple app to run on your Mac or Windows PC and push a button while the iPad is connected.

The full tutorial which can be found here, goes through each of the steps which show you how to jailbreak the iPad, install the SNES for iPhone software and sync up your Wii remote control. Once done, the video then shows you how to add games to your iPad so you can play them. [Read more…]

Fring Skype Broken? It’s a Temporary Removal Due to Network Stress

Yesterday Fring launched an update to it’s iPhone app for those using iOS 4 and in particular, the iPhone 4 it’s self. The new update allows users to make video calls to other devices such as Android, Nokia and anything else running or connecting through Fring. Video calls were enabled via 3G or WiFi.

Thanks to a huge amount of people uploading and testing video calling from their iPhone 4, Fring has had to take down support for Skype temporarily. When logging on to Fring today you may have noticed that Skype contacts are gone as well as the small square login box for Skype found on the Add-Ons menu. [Read more…]

Android Gaining Popularity

The OS from Google [GOOG] called Android is making quite an impact in the smartphone arena.

Numbers indicated that the Android platform grew 44 percent between February and May. The three months prior to that saw Android taking about 9 percent share of the US smartphone market. With the Android OS growing 44 percent the three months after that, the market share jumped up to 13 percent.

Thirteen percent isn’t a huge number, but at the same time the four percent increase over a quarter shows the rate at which Android is moving. If the growth rate keeps up, which it can due to the sheer number of high end handsets being launched, then this time next year will show Android with a larger market share. [Read more…]

Apple TV Could offer 99 cents Show Rentals

Apple [AAPL] is rumoured to be moving a few key people around to work on Apple TV. It seems like the project is getting a big push from the company to make it more main-stream than previous attempts.

We have heard previously that iOS might be running on the Apple TV which could indicate an app store could be involved as well as an easy to use iTunes service. Mix that in with iTunes Cloud and potentially the Apple TV will be able to receive streaming content for the TV.

A rumour is also saying that Apple are in talks with bringing TV show rentals to Apple TV which could see a 99 cents cost for a 24 hour rental with a 30 day expiry date. [Read more…]

Sony Creating new PSP and Playstation Hardware?

The people at Sony are working on a new Playstation concept according to the Worldwide Studios boss Shuhei Yoshida.

It isn’t clear at the moment if the new concepts being created are for a new Sony PSP 2 or perhaps even a PS4 although the PSP 2 is the more likely off the two considering the PS3 has a number of years of life left in it yet.

Sony has filed a trademark called Playview that reveal a few features that could be included in the new update…

”Portable electronic device for receiving and reading text and images and sound through wireless Internet access and for displaying electronically published materials, namely, books, journals, newspapers, magazines, multimedia presentations. with an added ‘Computer game software recorded on optical discs.

[Read more…]

Next Gen iPod Touch could get Front Facing Camera

When Apple [AAPL] launch the next-gen iPod touch, it is likely to follow the same design as the iPhone 4. We also expect that features from the iPhone 4 will also be added to the new touch such as a front facing camera, perhaps a retina display and a faster CPU.

The front facing camera rumour has been further strengthened by some leaked shots that show a glass iPhone 4 style front with what looks to be a camera hole in the middle at the front.

Two pictures were captured with one showing the glass and the LCD and the other just showing the glass, both with a small hole in the middle top of the unit. On the iPhone 4 the middle top section is where the speaker sits with a camera just to the left. The iPod touch of course doesn’t need a speaker at that point, so shifting the camera to the middle does make sense. [Read more…]