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NVIDIA Sources Refute Claim of Split With Apple
Fudzilla has heard from industry sources close to NVIDIA that a recent report claiming that Apple will be dropping NVIDIA-based designs for future Macs is false and that the companies' relationship is "just fine."Apple is still buyin...
Want to BBQ with the iPhone? You don’t even need an app
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, Humor, Odds and ends, iPhone
My iPhone does get hot, but not so hot I can't pick it up -- usually when I'm running 3D for a longer stretch of time or when the phone is doing some serious calculating like audio or photo editing, I start to feel the heat coming off the back. Batteries are to blame for some of the more extreme problems, however, and that's not a huge surprise, given that batteries in any mobile device have their issues. The good news in that case, however, is that the phone is unlikely to actually explode -- the repair guy Wired talks to says that "a little bit of smoke eventually is probably the best bet." Not that a smoking iPhone is a good situation at all, but you can at least be sure that your iPhone is not quite as hot as the fire under your burgers this weekend.
Want to BBQ with the iPhone? You don't even need an app originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Want to BBQ with the iPhone? You don't even need an app originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Ngmoco releases Rolando 2 for iPhone, iPod touch
Ngmoco has released Rolando 2: Quest for the Golden Orchid, a sequel to the hit 2008 game Rolando.Cruising with the AT&T Navigator
Filed under: iPhone, App Store, App Review
I love GPS. in the mid 1990s I had a Garmin unit that had no maps, just a bread crumb trail of where you were and where you'd been. I lived in England at the time, and thought I had a highly original idea to take it to the Royal Observatory at Greenwich and walk across the Meridian line and watch the screen as the numbers dropped to zero longitude. When I got there, I was hardly alone. I was surrounded by other geeks doing exactly the same thing. Oh well.GPS has come a long way, and AT&T has released their subscription based Navigator [App Store] for the iPhone. It requires OS version 3.0. It is fee based, and will set you back US$9.95 a month on your AT&T bill. It is loaded with features, and has voice guided turn by turn directions. It also offers:
- Automatic rerouting
- Updated maps with no additional charge
- Real time traffic updates
- Fuel Price searches and navigation to those locations
- Point of interest searches in all the usual categories like ATM machines, hospitals, restaurants, airports
The map gives you a 3D view from a position just above and behind your vehicle. On the setup page you can chose flat maps if your prefer. I found the maps easy to read but would have preferred a landscape view instead of portrait, but there is no option to change. I saw a little lag when driving, but generally the response was fast. The app really needs a 3G connection. It works on the Edge network but was slow to load graphics. If you are somewhere where you have neither you are out of luck. No maps are contained on the app and nothing is cached. In essence, the app is only as good as the AT&T network, and if you do a lot of driving where the network is weak or absent, you'll be navigating on your own.
I found the voice very hard to hear. This is a limitation of the iPhone speaker. It just wasn't designed to be played at a loud volume. On the highway, with road noise, good luck hearing that warning to turn. Of course, the directions are on the map, but the whole purpose of voice instructions is to keep you from looking at the map.
Other features are a high altitude view of your entire trip from beginning to end, a list of your turns on a scrollable page, directions to the nearest AT&T WiFi hotspots (nice), and the ability to set your default navigation method like shortest, fastest, traffic optimized, prefer highways or streets, or pedestrian routing if you're not driving.
I found the voice alerts were too frequent. Frankly, the app is a blabbermouth, and it kept reminding me of a far away turn too often for my taste. It would be nice to be able to set just how aggressive the voice warnings are.
The big questions for most iPhone users will be to wait for other Nav apps to appear. TomTom is imminent, as is an app from Navigon. They both download the maps to your phone, so you are not dependent on the AT&T network. You only need GPS, and that signal is everywhere. You could also buy an inexpensive dedicated unit, that on the low end will cost about the same as a year of the AT&T subscription, and will certainly have a better speaker. Of course, there will be fees to update the maps, but in my experience you can use a GPS for years without doing that. Points of interest change, but the iPhone provides other sources like Google for up to date info.
I also think it is a bloody shame that the AT&T app has no access to your address book. Apple has walled that data off from 3rd party apps, and it is just senseless to have you type everything in again. You can copy and paste the data, but it is a needless pain. The AT&T app has this access when it runs on other phones like the Blackberry.
In summary, the app works, and is feature laden. I'm not sure it is the best option for in-car navigation, and you might want to wait for other solutions to appear. Of course, you can always get the AT&T app and cancel. It's a month by month charge.
So how is it like to drive with this app? My colleague Steven Sande did just that and his report follows.
Before you go, here are some screen shots to give you a look at some of the features on AT&T Navigator:
Cruising with the AT&T Navigator originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Cruising with the AT&T Navigator originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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iPhone 3GS #1 in Consumer Reports New Smartphone Ratings
The latest piece of hardware to come out of Cupertino, Apple’s iPhone 3GS, has claimed the honor of being ranked number 1 in Consumer Reports new smartphone ratings. Now does this come as a surprise to anyone? In all actuality, it was pretty close within the top 8 devices: (Device/Overall Score):
- iPhone 3GS (16 GB) 73
- iPhone 3G (8 GB) 70
- Samsung Omnia 69
- BlackBerry Storm 69
- HTC G1 69
- BlackBerry Bold 69
- Samsung Epix 69
- Palm Pre 67
While the race to top honors was anything but a blow-out, the iPhone shined when it came to it’s 3.5-inch widescreen display, top of the line multimedia, ease of navigation, web browsing, and battery life. Devices like the Palm Pre, among others, beat out Apple’s gem when it came to messaging along with superior multitasking capabilities.
So the iPhone ranked number 1 this year as it did almost two years ago, congratulations goes out to Apple for a continuing job well done!
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]
This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.
iPhone 3GS #1 in Consumer Reports New Smartphone Ratings
AT&T Memo Leaked — iPhone 3GS Makes for Best Selling Debut Ever
We already knew Apple sold — and upsold — 1 million iPhone 3GS devices opening weekend, but an internal memo shows just how big an event that was for AT&T. Massive summer blockbuster, thy name is iPhone 3GS.
On this year’s launch day, iPhone sales exceeded sales recorded on 2008’s iPhone launch day, Black Friday 2008 and Dec. 26, 2008 — all heavy-volume sales days. In fact, this year we surpassed 2008’s launch day sales at about noon Central time, and sustained our previous peak hour record, also set in 2008, for 11 straight hours.
Now imagine how many they would have sold if MMS and tethering were ready, and they’d expanding their network to better handle iPhone traffic.
(What, the dead horse had it coming!)
[Via MacDailyNews, thanks to everyone who sent this in!]
This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.
AT&T Memo Leaked — iPhone 3GS Makes for Best Selling Debut Ever
iHacker Charlie Discloses iPhone SMS Security Vulnerability
In an ideal world, Mac and iPhone hacker Charlie Miller would discover vulnerabilities, inform Apple, and Apple would then patch them before they had any chance of being exploited “in the wild”.
Miller, however, prefers to keep them to himself so he can win MacBooks and detail them at Black Hat conferences. The good of the hacker obviously outweighs the good of the users, every one. So be it.
Miller’s latest iPhone-related find was disclosed at SyScan in Signapore:
a hole that would let attackers “run software code on the phone that is sent by SMS over a mobile operator’s network in order to monitor the location of the phone using GPS, turn on the phone’s microphone to eavesdrop on conversations, or make the phone join a distributed denial of service attack or a botnet.”
Apple, for their part, is hoping to have this patched before Miller’s upcoming Black Hat gig.
We hope so too.
[via Engadget. Thanks Travis for the tip!]
This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.
iHacker Charlie Discloses iPhone SMS Security Vulnerability
iPhone 3GS jailbreak released by GeoHot ahead of Dev Team
Normally I don't make tools for the general public, and rather wait for the dev team to do it. But guys, whats up with waiting until 3.1? That isn't how the game is played. We release, Apple fixes, we find new holes. It isn't worth waiting because you might have the "last" hole in the iPhone. What last hole...this isn't golf. I'll find a new one next week.Meeeeow. After performing the jailbreak, ultras0w should then take care of the unlock although we haven't seen official comment on this by GeoHot or the Dev-Team yet. Good luck, backup, and kiss the children goodbye -- it could be a long weekend if you brick your new iPhone. Now hit the read link if you must.
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
iPhone 3GS jailbreak released by GeoHot ahead of Dev Team originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 03 Jul 2009 05:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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