visionapp Remote Desktop 2010
(Credit:
CNET)
Do you have a "jailbroken" iPhone? Ever since the iPhone first came on the scene, there has been a large group of users who believe Apple tries too hard to control what works and what doesn't on the iPhone. The minute a new iPhone firmware update is released from Apple, a whole slew of people search for ways to unlock the device, letting them download apps that have never had to go through the App store acceptance process. This means that apps that would have otherwise never seen the light of day can be used on an unlocked (or "jailbroken") iPhone.
I personally have no opinion about those who jailbreak iPhones because I believe in the free-flowing open-source idea of software, while also believing a company ought to have some control over their products. In other words, I guess I fall somewhere in the middle. But I have never jailbroken my iPhone because part of my job is to review apps that everyone has access to (in the iTunes Store) and I need to have the same user experience with the iPhone that most people have. Also, I would say I'm happy with the iPhone as is.
According to AppleInsider, a recent release to Apple's iPhone firmware makes the device invulnerable to the usual jailbreaking tactics. I guess we'll have to wait and see how long it takes the community to jailbreak the latest version (if they can), but you can bet they're working on it right now. If you have a jailbroken iPhone, please tell us all about it in the comments.
This week's apps include an excellent product bar code scanner and a four-wheeling ATV game that's probably the best of its kind in the iTunes Store.
You'll need to hold still (better than I do) in order to get an accurate scan.
(Credit: Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)RedLaser ($1.99) lets you "scan" products to give you a list of prices from online retailers. There are a few products that perform a similar function at the iTunes Store and several have been made for other devices, but RedLaser is surprisingly effective using only the built-in camera on your iPhone. Simply tap the lightning bolt icon and line up the bar code in between the guidelines on your screen. You have to remain still for about a second, but soon RedLaser beeps, indicating it has scanned the code. Once scanned, you are presented with a list of matches from various stores so you can find the best price.
I tried RedLaser on a number of products including old game guides, CDs, and books I had lying around, and in almost every case, RedLaser was able to identify the item. The app also saves all your previously scanned items in a list making it easy to check back once you're ready to buy it online or at the store. Overall, if you like to comparison shop or just want to make sure you're getting a good deal when out and about, RedLaser is a fun and useful app to have. Frankly, it's fun just to try to stump RedLaser with the most obscure object you can find.
Even on the medium level, it's tough to stay out in front
(Credit: Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)ATV Offroad ($7.99) is made by 2XL games, the same company that made SuperCross, a motocross racing game I talked about in an earlier post. Not only does ATV Offroad add two more wheels (instead of dirt bikes, you're on four-wheelers), but it adds the feature I and many other reviewers complained Supercross lacked: a career mode. Now, in addition to amazing graphics and excellent physics, you'll be able to race through challenges and multirace competitions to unlock more tracks. There also are freestyle, quick race, and multiplayer modes, but you'll need to be on the same Wi-Fi network to race against your friends.
ATV Offroad sets itself apart from other racing games the second you hit the track with smooth-looking graphics and excellent accelerometer-based controls. You can even pull off huge tricks while in the air by hitting onscreen trick buttons. You can choose between three skill levels, though I found even the medium skill level to be very hard to beat. If you don't like the look of your racer, you can easily switch between multiple ATV designs and different-color leathers with a swipe of your finger before a race. Overall, ATV Offroad adds just the right amount of core features to be the great game SuperCross could have been. If you like off-road racing, I highly recommend this game.
What's your favorite iPhone app? Have you priced all the products in your house with RedLaser yet? Do you think the addition of the career mode makes ATV Offroad the dirt racing game to beat at the iTunes store? Is your iPhone jailbroken? Let me know in the comments!
(Credit:
CNET)
Apple recently announced that September 9 will be the date of their 2009 iPod event. For the past four years, Apple has hosted these events in San Francisco to unveil its latest generation of iPods. This year, there has been much speculation at rumor sites that Apple will introduce camera capabilities to its iPod Nano and iPod Touch media players. Many sites are also posting that we will see iTunes 9 with rumored social networking features. As with all things Apple, you can never know what its going to announce at the event, but as we get closer to September 9, check our Download blog for the latest rumors.
Both of this week's apps are games. The first app is a close remake of a physics-based motocross Flash game, and the second game is a new survival shooter with RPG elements to keep you playing.
Tilt your iPhone to land safely so you don't lose your momentum.
(Credit: Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)Moto X Mayhem (99 cents) is a fun physics-based side-scrolling game that's been popular at the iTunes store in recent weeks, but I've been reluctant to write about it. In the game, you use your accelerometer to lean forward or back, and press the screen to accelerate as you navigate your way through a 2D course. You get five lives to try to complete seven different courses in a row to finish the game. The graphics are cartoon-smooth and the controls are excellent, but once you've played a few games, you'll be able to finish fairly easily.
I was reluctant to write about this game because I used to play what I assume was the original--a free game called TG Motocross--at Teagames.com a couple of years ago. At the time, I was obsessed with getting the best times and thought it was a great free time waster (and so was the sequel), but now that it's on the iPhone, I feel as if it isn't enough. Teagames hasn't had any new games for quite awhile, so maybe this iPhone game is its new endeavor. In any case, Moto X Mayhem is quite a good game, but if it added more levels or a way to pull off tricks, I would feel better recommending it at 99 cents. I guess the good news is that you can try it online before you buy.
Don't forget to reload (bottom center) or you may end up surrounded.
(Credit: Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)Alive4Ever is part survival shooter and part RPG in which you'll fight off zombies using onscreen joysticks. It's similar to iDracula: Undead Awakening, a survival shooter game I've reviewed here before, but adds several new elements to make it even better. In Alive4Ever, you choose between four characters with varying strengths and weaknesses, and you play through 30 missions of increasingly hard zombie mayhem. When you're low on health or ammo, you can often fight your way to pickups to replenish your supplies. As you complete missions, you'll earn experience to increase your character's capabilities and extra cash to buy new and more powerful weapons.
While it is a top-down 2D survival shooter, Alive4Ever also borrows a lot of elements from Left4Dead (yes, even the name is similar), the 2008 game-of-the-year first person shooter from Valve. There are four characters to choose from and even some of the zombie characters resemble those in the popular PC game. But probably the best element borrowed from Left4Dead is the capability to play co-op multiplayer over a Bluetooth connection with your friends. We tried it here in the office with a couple of iPhones and had a great time working together to stay alive as long as possible. Overall, Alive4Ever is an excellent and well thought-out app that combines good elements of two popular games to make probably the best survival shooter for iPhone. One word of warning: it can get quite bloody so it might not be right for the whole family.
What's your favorite iPhone app? Is Moto X Mayhem just fine the way it is or do you agree with me that there should be more? What do you think of Alive4Ever? Let me know in the comments!
(Credit:
CNET)
Last week I mentioned how long it took to sync my iPhone to iTunes and it seems I'm not alone. I think almost all Mac users reported that syncing only took a few minutes, but a lot of Windows users (with some exceptions) were having the same experience as me. Is Windows doing something to muck up the process or is syncing different across platforms? Hopefully, this is something Apple will look into in future updates.
Following your advice, and the advice of other iPhone forums, I restored my iPhone and then used my latest backup to get my information back. Unfortunately, I lost almost all of my apps...it seems Transfer Purchases to iTunes doesn't mean what I think it means. While I redownload all of my favorite apps check out this week's picks.
This week's iPhone apps include a program that lets you create unique presentations with your images and a free-form off-road racer that's surprisingly fun.
Follow the onscreen instructions to create pan and zoom presentations (Ken Burns style)
(Credit: CNET)Pix Remix ($2.99) lets you take photos with your iPhone camera and present them in three unique ways. You can create a slideshow, a collage, or a slow pan/zoom type of thing (Ken Burns style) which you can then share with your friends via e-mail or post to Facebook or Twitter. Pix Remix is very easy to use, with a fairly straightforward interface, and also gives you onscreen instructions to create each type of presentation.
To start, just pick which type of "show" you want to create. The slideshow is pretty straightforward--just pick all the pictures you want to include, add captions, reorder as desired, and you're done. With the collage option you can pick whatever images you want, and then you're given the opportunity to drag and arrange them how you want on screen. The pan and zoom option might be the most dramatic because you can write captions for each stage, turning one image into a complete story. Pix Remix also utilizes iPhone specific features letting you shake your iPhone to rearrange photos and plenty of touch screen interaction with the interface. If you want a new way to send your images to friends or post on the Web, this app is a fun and unique choice.
Use any path necessary to get to the gates before your opponents do
(Credit: CNET)4x4 Jam ($3.99) is an off-road racer that lets you drive wherever you want--an ongoing and changing landscape continues in every direction. Steer by turning your iPhone left and right and you have several options for control sets depending on how much control (over gas and brakes) you want. You can choose between a VW bug-like off-road racer or a 4x4 truck, with four skin options for each. You can participate in a couple of different race types with computer controlled players including an Off Road Race (try to beat your opponents to each gate) or a Jam (collect points by passing through more gates than your opponents. Sadly there is no career mode, so there is little to keep you interested if you don't like the race types offered. But there are three difficulty levels to keep things somewhat interesting.
The first thing I noticed apart from the free form racing was the well implemented physics. As you make turns you really notice the centrifugal force and stopping to turn on a dime is pretty much impossible. This only adds to the fun as you and your opponents jockey for position and you even have opportunities to force them away from gates to get an advantage. Overall, 4x4 Jam is an excellent concept with fun and challenging racing action, but the lack of a career mode might be enough of a reason to wait for future updates before spending the money.
What's your favorite iPhone app? Do you have an unique image app that's better than Pix Remix? Is 4x4 Jam worth it even without the career mode? Let me know in the comments!
Red, white, and blue flags flapping in the breeze, smoking grills, and blazing sunshine. There's no better time to celebrate America's 233rd birthday. And what better way to wish Uncle Sam (and ourselves) many happy returns than a schmaltzy screensaver for your desktop? Show off your patriotism and passion for dazzling explosives with this collection of Independence Day downloads.
Liberty Shines Screensaver See an entire Fourth of July day from the water, looking onto Manhattan's shoreline. Lady Liberty and New York are the daylight stars in this well-animated screensaver. As dusk falls, the buildings light up and the fireworks begin to sparkle and burst behind this enduring symbol of America's freedom.
Fireworks Screensaver
This classic fireworks screensaver draws you in to the spectacular display you shoot onto your desktop. Interact with the screensaver by choosing the number of rockets to compose your grand finale. If your tastes run high, you'll be able create in no time a blast befitting America's birthday.
Patriotic Scenic Reflections Screensaver
If to you Independence Day is more than just barbecue and pyrotechnics, you'll want a patriotic screensaver like this one on your desktop. This one displays more than 80 classic images of American icons, including a proud bald eagle, the Washington Monument, and the Statue of Liberty.
3D Magic Mahjongg
Brush aside the old-school graphics and you'll find a July Fourth-themed tile-matching game with addictive gameplay. The game opens with a stack of tiles covered with fireworks, flags, and Liberty Gells. Your job is to strategically match two unobstructed tiles. Pair them all off and you win the game, but get stuck and you'll have to start again.
3D Fireworks Extravaganza demo
If nothing but the most realistic fireworks will do to celebrate the Declaration of Independence, this could be the screensaver for you. The colorful blasts look right, and we are sure they are even better in the full version. Like many of its screensaver cousins, the trial download unfortunately obscures the view with a nag screen.
3D Fireworks by the Bay
New York, Boston, and Philadelphia aren't the only places to celebrate the turning of the years! While San Francisco postdates the Declaration of Independence, the City by the Bay sure knows how to honor it. This jubilant screensaver shoots off rockets from San Francisco Bay over the city's unique nighttime skyline.
Flags Demo
You have an American flag waving in the breeze outside your door. But what about inside your home? You can easily show your pride there, too. Just download this patriotic screensaver to proudly hoist the stars and stripes on your desktop while you step away.
Awesome Navy Aircraft Screen Saver Lite
Nothing says patriotism like the U.S. Navy. This high-flying screensaver features a slew of professional-quality photos of fighter jets and helicopters in action.
4th of July Dreams Screensaver
This nifty screensaver features a festive fireworks display against the backdrop of various symbols of American heritage including the Lincoln Monument, Mount Rushmore, the Statue of Liberty, and the Washington Monument.
Fring's latest update for Symbian phones introduces the option of a merged buddy list to its mobile VoIP communication app (download links below). Merging eliminates the duplicates you often find when a contact appears for the same friend on multiple IM accounts. When you view a friend's profile after merging, Fring shows you which service your friend is signed into at any given time.
This bit of space-saving housekeeping isn't automatic, however. After highlighting the buddy's name, you'll need to select "manage buddies" and then choose to merge them. You'll need to seek out and select your friend's other aliases before saving.
Fring 3.40 also lets you update your profile picture, status, nickname, and mood from within the mobile application. All this occurs through the profile editing menu item in the Options list.
Friend suggestions are also new to the multinetwork IM and voice app. When Fring discovers that a contact from your address book or from one of its supported IM or social networks is also a registered Fring user, it will suggest you add them and will fill in their profile details. Fring's friend finder can be found in the buddy management menu in the program options.
While Symbian phones were the first to get Fring's new functionality this week, Windows Mobile and iPhone users can expect the same integration next.
Download Fring 3.40 from Download.com:
Fring 3.40 for Symbian 9.4
Fring 3.40 for Symbian 9.3
Fring 3.40 for Symbian 9.2
Fring 3.40 for Symbian 9.1
Last week, Skype rolled out a beta update to version 4.0 of its Windows VoIP application. Its pinnacle is the screen-sharing functionality that's new to Skype 4.1 beta.
Screen sharing in Skype is by no means a finished product, but it is an interesting addition that gives the desktop communications software extra dimension and definition today. In future releases, it could even help Skype compete against the other mobile communicators in the market that have incorporated voice calling of their own. Watch how it works in this First Look video.
Also check out Roundup: Screen-sharing is caring.
Screensharing comes to Skype
(Credit: Skype)Skyper users, it seemed, either loved or hated the revamped Skype 4.0 for Windows. With Skype 4.1 beta (download), unveiled Wednesday, Skype hopes to earn a little more love by reinstating some beloved extras and adding one big new feature: screen sharing.
Skype's screensharing feature is a clever addition to the VoIP communications application. In our tests it was engaging, especially when paired with Skype's voice calling and chatting capabilities. The fair screen quality and few seconds of lag time won't bother most casual users, but at this point we wouldn't recommend Skype's new feature for replacing a dedicated screensharing application or service for frequent collaborators. Skype's screensharing is view-only; it is not a remote access tool like CrossLoop, which is geared for providing technical assistance. For demonstration purposes, however, Skype's screensharing is just one more way to connect with faraway contacts.
Screensharing begins by clicking the "share" drop-down on a contact screen and choosing "Share your screen." Skype then gives you the choice to record the full screen or a region. Pressing the button to initiate the screen share also launches an audio call. You can later resize by clicking and dragging the thick red borders. During a session, a button toggles you between full and partial screen modes. Because screensharing essentially broadcasts a video recording of your screen to your contact, you can't place a video call and share the screen at the same time--you'll choose one or the other.
You can share all or some of your screen.
(Credit: CNET/Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt)It's also worth noting that Skype's screensharing feature, like many others, is unidirectional, view-only, and by invitation, which gives the host control over beginning and ending each session. With one-way viewing, your guest sees only the screen that's bounded by the recorder's borders. Because it's unidirectional, Skypers won't see each others' screens simultaneously.
Skype's screensharing addition begins to offer an inexpensive alternative for international business communications, though right now it works between two users--one host and one guest--at a time. You can switch roles easily and often. We're guessing that the screensharing capability will be expanded in the future to group calls, so a host can share their screen with multiple recipients. (It will be interesting to see if Skype will then follow that enterprise breadcrumb to compete with well-known collaboration and Web meeting software in the future--but right now this is all conjecture.)
Other changes
Skype 4.1 beta also reintroduces birthday reminder alerts and contacts-sharing, which were two features left out of Skype during its upgrade from version 3.8 to 4.0. Birthday reminders are automatic notices you receive on a contact's birthday if they've added this information to their profile. The send-a-contact feature can be found in the Conversation navigation menu under the "Send" option.
Two other notable reinclusions are the ability to import contacts from Gmail, Windows Live Hotmail, AOL, and LinkedIn in addition to Skype 4.0's support for Yahoo and Microsoft Outlook products; and a screen reader accessibility tool to help visually impaired people use Skype.
All these additions make Skype's latest a substantial beta update. But since it's in beta, there may be bugs and some stability issues--we experienced a couple crashes ourselves during testing. Frequent Skype users will want to experiment with 4.1 beta. So will those who have lamented the absence of birthday reminders, even if you don't intend to use the screensharing feature.
As those of you with older PCs may have noticed the hard way, some of the new features in Apple's Safari 4 beta for Windows require a graphics card with at least 64MB of on-board RAM that supports at least DirectX 9. This makes it the first browser I've heard of with an explicit graphics card requirement, but is this really a big deal?
Missing from next to the Bookmark icon is the toggle for Top Sites.
(Credit: Screenshot by Seth Rosenblatt/CNET)DirectX 9 has been around since 2004, and you can pick up a card for your desktop that supports it for around 20 bucks. This isn't quite analogous to Windows requiring a massive hardware upgrade for Vista, although it is definitely annoying.
What is strange is that Cover Flow on iTunes will work on these older machines, including the main Windows XP computer I use at work. The graphics card is older, yet, as you can see in the screenshots, Cover Flow works in iTunes and doesn't in Safari 4. This leads to my other complaint about the beta: Safari offers no notification when your graphics card is not compliant. Top Sites and Cover Flow merely don't appear. So if the browser must require an upgrade, when iTunes doesn't, the least Apple could do is include some kind of warning.
Taken on the same Windows XP machine, Cover Flow in iTunes works fine.
(Credit: Screenshot by Seth Rosenblatt/CNET)This isn't the biggest deal in the world, and Safari 4 is still in beta so there's plenty of time to work out the kinks. But this strikes me as a seriously annoying problem, if nothing else, when you consider that the graphics and design elements of Apple software are one of their big attractions.
Apple suggests that one solution could be to upgrade your graphics card drivers, which didn't work for me. Apple had not returned my call requesting comment at the time of publication.
If you have other problems or solutions to problems in Safari 4 beta, tell me about them in the comments.
Safari's currently the third-most popular browser for Windows, but is Apple aiming for number two? The Safari 4 beta debuts a completely reworked program, from the Nitro JavaScript engine to the Chrome-styled interface and Top Sites.
Some users are already swearing by the faster speeds in the beta, while others won't touch a browser without extension support. Let us know your favorite browser and why in the comments.
Apple's Safari was already the most used Web browser on the Mac, but other browsers like Mozilla Firefox, Opera, and Camino have been quickly gaining on (and in some cases surpassing) the browser that comes preloaded on all Macs. The new version comes packed with interface enhancements and new features to once again set the bar a little higher for the competition. But is it enough?
Check out this First Look video to find out more about the new features in Safari 4 Public Beta.
