Reviews - page 145

AppCleaner is a freeware utility for deleting software from your Mac.

Now that the festive period is out of the way and we begin to settle in to the new year, Apple has returned to reviewing App Store submissions and games and apps are starting to trickle in again. Here’s our pick of the best iOS apps to enter the App Store over the past week.

8mm Vintage Camera is a great new video application that shoots old-fashioned 8mm movies in real-time. It was recently reviewed by the Cult’s own David Martin, who was very impressed with the app’s effects and awarded it 4 out of 5 stars.

Trimensional is a ground-breaking photography app and the world’s first 3D scanner for the iPhone. It cleverly uses both the screen and the front-facing camera on your device, detecting patterns of light reflected off your face to create a true 3D model. The results are extraordinary and you can check out some screenshots after the break.

If you’ve made any New Year’s resolutions for 2011, Zendre for your iPhone is the app you need to keep track of your goals and achievements. Reward yourself progress points every time you do something towards meeting your resolution, and get the motivation you need to keep your resolutions going.

Find out more about the applications above and check out the rest of this week’s must-have iOS apps, including Awesome Files HD and Symphony Pro, after the break!

Now that the festive period is out of the way and we begin to settle in to the new year, Apple has returned to reviewing App Store submissions and games and apps are starting to trickle in again. Here’s our pick of the best iOS games to enter the App Store over the past week.

Grimm is the first I’ve discovered, and probably the first you’ll play, in which your aim is to navigate a lost baby’s carriage and successfully deliver the child home to its mother. This side-scrolling adventure is set in a dark and stylized world and delivers something a little different that iOS gamers are sure to love.

Block Rogue claims to be the biggest mobile puzzle adventure ever made, and the game in which each solution brings you one step closer to the truth. Problem-solvers will love the hundreds of mind-bending puzzles and dark mysteries that Block Rogue has to offer.

The latest highly addictive iPhone game features a big, colorful elephant named Clumsy Bob, who’s about to set off on an adventure around the world. Bounce Bob across the vibrant cartoon environments as far as you can for your highest score, then challenge your friends to beat it.

Find out more about the games above and check out the rest of this week’s must-haves, including Ascendancy and Flying Hamster, after the break!

Fresh to the iOS App Store is Trimensional, which takes real 3D photos on your iPhone, and is this week’s Best Thing Ever, without a doubt. It’s one of those photography apps that stands out against all the rest because it’s so different. And at one dollar, it’s a bargain.

So how does it work?

With the release of AirPrint late last year, Apple finally gave iDevice users what they’d been clamoring for (and quite loudly, since the iPad’s debut): the easy ability to print from a wifi connected printer. Hurrah! Problem is, it only works with printers made by HP — owners of Epsons, Canons and the rest were left out in the cold.

However, for Epson owners willing to shell out $10, Thinxtream‘s PrintJinni app already provided a means to print to select Epson wifi-connected printers. In late December PrintJinni became a free download to put itself on even footing with AirPrint, pricewise  — question is, how good of a solution is it?

Happy new year! Are you interested in learning why you should jailbreak your iDevice in 2011? Or are you just looking for some cool apps and tweaks after recently jailbreaking? Look no further!

In this guide, we’re covering ten of the most popular jailbreak apps and mods you can obtain through Cydia. These usually wouldn’t be possible, but with the help of jailbreaking, they are!

Here we go…

ElementCase specializes in making highly personalized aluminum products for iOS devices. They’ve created some of the best iPhone cases in the past, both in terms of design and functionality, and have recently released the luxurious Joule iPad stand.

The Vapor4 case for iPhone 4 is the latest addition to their catalogue, and for me, it’s love at first sight.

There is an interesting new video photography app called, 8mm Vintage Camera by Nexvio, Inc., that brings your iPhone and iPod Touch back in time to capture the beauty and magic of old school vintage movies.

It accomplishes this by mixing and matching different films and lenses and it does a good job of it. The total number of combinations allow you to get a glimpse into retro filming with 25 old school looks from bygone eras. It even comes complete with retro colors, flickering video, light leaks, dust and scratches (my favorite), and frame jitters. You can add any of these to your video with a flick of your finger.

A hot item that has been around for a little while and has made quite a few gift guides for 2010 are the Ceramic Speakers by Joey Roth; a standalone speaker system made from “simple” materials for use with iPod/other portable media players, laptops, and turntables with phono pre-amps.

Everything about these speakers is interesting, starting with the ceramic materials they’re made of. I can’t help but wonder where Joey’s inspiration came from. Could it have been a flash of genius like when Doc Brown in Back to the Future slipped off the toilet hitting his head on the bathroom sink while attempting to hang a clock in his bathroom, conceiving the idea for the Flux Capacitor?!? Now I like to think I have my most brilliant thoughts and inspirations stimulated by ceramic bathroom fixtures, but the pairing of ceramic in use with speakers seems as unlikely as a Time Machine made from a DeLorean.

Here’s our 2010 Year in Review of the best 10 hardware peripherals for your iPhone or iPad that we’ve come across in the last twelve months.

If you missed any of these or didn’t get a chance to check them out for some reason or another, don’t fret — all of them are still available and worth a look.

10. AR Drone Parrot

It’s going to be one lucky kid who gets this iDevice-controllable wonder

The AR Drone Parrot is a quadricopter that’s controlled by the iPhone, iPod touch or the iPad. It can be flown indoors or outside and features many sensors, including a front camera ,vertical camera and an ultrasound altimeter. High-tech sensors make it simple for kids to pilot. The AR Drone can also be used in video games, such as AR FlyingAce, a dogfight between two AR Drones.

The AR Drone Parrot is available from Amazon for $299.99

Here’s our 2010 Year in Review of the best 10 hardware peripherals for your Mac that we’ve come across in the last twelve months.

If you missed any of these or didn’t get a chance to check them out for some reason or another, don’t fret — all of them are still available and worth a look.

10. Mac Edition eGo Desktop Hard Drive 2TB

Leander Kahney: Iomega’s new Mac Edition eGo Desktop Hard Drive packs a whopping 2-Terabytes in a compact, stylish package.

The Mac Edition eGo drive is a good-looking complement to Apple’s new glass-and-aluminum Macs. It’s styled to match Apple’s Mac Pro with a sleek, silver case and a grill front.

It’s available in 1TB and 2TB configurations ($159.99 and $249, respectively), and offers several connectivity options: there are two FireWire 800 ports and one USB 2.0 port. It ships with a FireWire 400-to-800 conversion cable, which makes it compatible with Macs without a FireWire 800 port.

With the holidays now only days away, we are all starting to think about the true meaning of the holidays – food and drink, and copious amounts of the stuff! Whether you are in charge of the full roast on Christmas day, or just the cranberries, having a helping hand is always appreciated.

Being the lovely people we are, we have put together a list of the best apps and accessories for both iPhone and iPad that can help your holiday season be as full flavoured and stress free as possible!

The run up to the festive holiday is great news for iOS gamers – with the App Store closed for submissions over Christmas, developers are working hard to ensure that their applications are approved and ready for purchase before Apple closes the doors. This means that a torrent of games have been surging in to the App Store over the past week, and to help you separate the good from the bad, here’s our list of must-have games released over the past week.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 has been a huge hit on games consoles for many months now, and thanks to EA, first-person shooter fans can now enjoy this awesome title on their iPhones. It features classic Battlefield warfare with intense single-player missions and online multiplayer that’s guaranteed to keep you entertained this Christmas.

Teaser trailers and screenshots for Real Racing 2 have been popping up all over the place in the past few weeks, and Real Racing fans have been very much looking forward to the game’s release. Firemint’s second Real Racing title features officially licensed cars for the first time, multiple exciting game modes, and claims to be the most exhilarating racing experience on a handheld device.

N.O.V.A. 2 is the highly anticipated sequel to one of Gameloft’s most exciting games for iOS. The ultimate sci-fi first-person shooter returns, boasting improved A.I., better online multiplayer, a larger range of weapons, and a whole lot more. If you’re a fan of the first N.O.V.A., you won’t be disappointed.

Find out more about the applications above and check out the rest of this week’s must-have iOS games – including Sega’s Altered Beast and EA’s Ultimate Mortal Kombat – after the break!

In the immortal spirit of Nigel Tufnel, our 2010 Year in Review of the best in Audio gear and apps for Mac and iOS devices goes to 11.

If you missed any of these or didn’t get a chance to check them out for some reason or another, don’t fret — they each should be around to help you discover dulcet tones and make sound memories for a long time to come.

11. iDJ – iPad Music App ($9.99)

iDJ’s music management system is a simple, streamlined way to quickly build club-quality playlists using the music in your iTunes library. With patented BPM detection technology, iDJ fuses your music together with the finesse of a professional mixmaster. As you add songs, iDJ analyzes their sonic-waveforms, calculates tempos, and then automatically performs optimal transitions throughout the playlist. Playlists can contain an unlimited number of songs and iDJ supports audio in WAV, MP3, and AAC formats. Plus, your iDJ library can be managed through iTunes. iDJ is the first true music-mixing application for iPad that both beginners and professionals can enjoy.

With the CultofMac so chock full of bike geeks, it’s no wonder we pretty excited to see the arrival a few months back of one of the first gadgets that fall into the app-enhanced category — a gadget/app mashup that manufacturer New Potato Tech cleverly calls an “appcessory.” In this case, the $99 LiveRider combo of an iPhone bicycle mount and sensor/receiver package with its own dedicated app turns the iPhone into a flexible, jumbo-screened bike computer.

It’s not the only sensor/app combo on the market; Enki Sports offers a more complete and expensive solution, and newcomer Wahoo Fitness recently arrived with a flexible, modular approach (with sensors that look remarkably similar to Enki’s). But we figured New Potato’s kit would provide a simple, relatively inexpensive setup for intermediate-ish cyclists wanting their data fix. We were mistaken.

Hazel is software genius. It’s one of those tools that looks so simple to start with, but after a while, you realise just how powerful and flexible it could be.

Chinon’s AVi is a combination iPod dock, Digital TV and MP3 player that’s good for kids.

It’s portable, easy to use, and the picture and sound quality are OK. It has big, easy-to-use buttons that are great for kids. It’s not for the living room, but it does do a ton of things, which makes it good for a kids’ room or RV.

Remember that old Mac you had? That beautiful iMac. It was lovely. Still works, but these days it doesn’t get used much.

It was a G5. One of the 17 inch models. You think. Wait. Or was it 20 inch? Damn, have to get it out and measure it now. It had a 1.83GHz Intel. Or was it a 2.33GHz? Dammit. You really can’t be bothered to boot the thing up just to check. But now you want to know.

Chair and Epic Games’ Infinity Blade ($5.99) may disappoint those who looked for a direct iOS analogue to the Unreal 3 Engine’s console offerings (where first-person combat by beefcakey “Tom of Finland” style space marines often spills over into rocket-turret-mounted monster truck driving sequences) but gamers who would so miss the point are a rare breed easily descried by the government-mandated “DERP” tattoos branded into their foreheads. For the rest of us, Infinity Blade is a perfect crystallization of the iPhone’s capabilities as a cutting-edge gaming device, a paradigm shift in the way AAA developers approach multitouch interfaces, and… lest we forget… the most visually impressive and polished game on the App Store.

When a company with as fabled a name as Bowers & Wilkins proffers up an iPod dock, one expects nothing less than enough oomph to satisfy even the most discerning audiophile, and enough svelteness to elicit a smile from even the most ardent aesthete. B&W’s first shot at a dock, the Zeppelin, certainly turned heads when it debuted in 2007 (at least, once word got out about it). But its sprawling, bulbous shape — and sprawling, bulbous, $600 pricetag — limited its appeal. Two years later the company followed with the Zeppelin Mini, a much smaller, less expensive dock that nevertheless tried to maintain the aesthetic and sonic reputation the company was known for.

But at $400, the Mini was still significantly pricier than almost any other dock sitting on, say, an Apple Store’s dock table. Then earlier this year B&W brought the price down to $300, placing it on a level field with other upper-mid-end docks — a league that seems to be gaining players at an almost alarming rate — and allowing it to stand out among its peers as the compact, high-performance star it is.

One of our must-have iOS apps this week is the free OnLive Viewer that gives you a window in to on-demand, instant-play video games through the OnLive game service. Become a spectator and watch hundreds on games being played live throughout the world.

Facebook Browser for iPhone also makes our must-have list this week and provides a refreshing new way to experience Facebook on your iPhone, with a simplistic, elegant user interface.

Also among our favorites this week is Blueprint – a powerful application for iOS developers that enables you to easily plan and create stunning user interfaces for your applications.

Check out the rest of this week’s must-have iOS apps after the break!

OBiON, a free mobile communications app for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch now available for download from the iTunes App store, is an exciting — if still evolving — tool that offers more power and flexibility than any similar app available today.

The app is the mobile centerpiece in a new communication paradigm being charted by Obihai Technology, a Cupertino, CA start-up founded by the developers of the first Analog Telephone Adapter, which made “Internet calling” possible without the use of a computer and spawned the growth of Vonage and dozens of other Internet Telephony Service Providers.

Now, in conjunction with the OBiTALK web portal and the company’s Obi110 Voice Services Bridge, OBiON users can leverage the ability to make and receive calls from local or remote landlines, as well as to and from multiple VoIP services on Apple mobile devices.

Nearly 20 years ago Snagit was introduced for Windows and it has quite a following. It has always been very successful as a Windows utility so it’s odd that it has taken so long to come to the Mac, but it is here finally and worth the wait.

The release version of Snagit for Mac OS X, a screen capture and image-editing utility, is now shipping after spending a year in beta. It’s a bit expensive at $49.95, but I think it is worth the money especially after years of using it in a corporate environment along with a slew of co-workers. Now I’ll have access to it on both platforms.

However, although Snagit on the Mac features the core feature set of the Windows version, that many know and love,  it doesn’t have all the features of the award-winning Snagit 10 for Windows. Perhaps that’s why the Windows version is included for free. The serial number you purchase works on both platforms.

With Christmas just around the corner, most of us are setting up our homes ready for the festive season. If you are looking to add some geekery to your festive decorations this year, MEA Mobile’s latest product, the iGlo iPhone controlled LED set could be just what you are after.