New Technology Reviews!.: ios 4

iOS 5 Safari speed gains demonstrated in New Relic infographic

iOS 5 Safari speed gains demonstrated in New Relic infographic

Web application performance company New Relic released the results of a study comparing the mobile browsing speeds of iOS 4 and iOS 5 on...

MyTunes for iPhone gives your music an impressive kick

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SRS Labs has just released MyTunes, a free iPhone app that rather dramatically enhances music playback on your iDevices. Instead of using the stock player provided by Apple, you launch the MyTunes app, select your playlists, albums or artists, and you're away.</div>
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The sound of most tracks transforms in an often spectacular fashion. Matt Yaney of SRS told me the app uses a variety of proprietary techniques to eliminate the degradation provided by MP3 encoding and produce a more natural and immersive experience, usually lost by the recording and compression process.</div>
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I have to agree. Listening to a variety of Rock, New Age, Jazz and Classical improved every track I tried. Bass was firmer, percussion was much sharper, and the position of instruments across the sound stage are more precise. The changes just aren't a matter of boosting high and low frequencies, there is a good deal of sophisticated audio processing taking place. I found the effects most pronounced on music that was recorded live with acoustic instruments, but as I said, just about every genre of music sounded better.</div>
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This app is a bit of a breakthrough for SRS Labs, because the only previous way to get this technology was with a hardware dongle on the SRS Wow! product. I've compared the 2 systems, and found the audio quality quite close. The SRS Wow! does have an actual hardware DAC (digital audio converter) but I was hard pressed to hear the difference when listening to MyTunes.</div>
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There are a few caveats. The MyTunes app won't work with any music that has DRM, and it won't work on any videos you have. Since the app only connects to your iTunes library, it won't enhance Pandora, Spotify or any online streaming services.</div>
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If you want even more features there is a US$4.99 in-app purchase that provides additional custom controls for audio enhancement, more EQ settings, volume leveling, and an simpler interface to use when driving. I didn't find the extra features all that compelling, but SRS Labs will let you sample them for ten minutes to see if they are worthwhile for you.</div>
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If you listen to a lot of music on your iDevice, and most of us do, I wouldn't hesitate to download MyTunes. The basic app is free. It takes a little effort to explore all the features provided, but if you try it I think it will have a permanent place on your iPhone or iPod touch. The app also will work on an iPad, but MyTunes is not universal, and a separate iPad app is coming later this year.</div>
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Give the app a listen and report your impressions in comments, and check the gallery out for some screen shots.</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" mce_name="strong" mce_style="font-weight: bold;" style="color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-weight: bold; line-height: 1.5;">Gallery: MyTunes from SRS Labs</span></div>
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<img alt="" height="75" mce_src="http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/6826/mytunes1thumbnail.jpg" src="http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/6826/mytunes1thumbnail.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="75" /><img alt="" height="75" mce_src="http://img849.imageshack.us/img849/853/mytunes2thumbnail.jpg" src="http://img849.imageshack.us/img849/853/mytunes2thumbnail.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" width="75" /><a href="http://localhost/1/wp-admin/post.php?post=6121&action=edit&message=1" mce_href="http://" style="color: #0066cc; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5;"><img alt="" mce_src="http://img838.imageshack.us/img838/9118/mytunes3thumbnail.jpg" src="http://img838.imageshack.us/img838/9118/mytunes3thumbnail.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" /></a><a href="http://localhost/1/wp-admin/post.php?post=6121&action=edit&message=1" mce_href="http://" style="color: #0066cc; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5;"><img alt="" mce_src="http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/3359/mytunes4thumbnail.jpg" src="http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/3359/mytunes4thumbnail.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" /></a><a href="http://localhost/1/wp-admin/post.php?post=6121&action=edit&message=1" mce_href="http://" style="color: #0066cc; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5;"><img alt="" mce_src="http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/8981/mytunes5thumbnail.jpg" src="http://img13.imageshack.us/img13/8981/mytunes5thumbnail.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; color: #444444; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; line-height: 1.5; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; max-width: 640px;" /></a></div>
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MyTunes for iPhone gives your music an impressive kick

SRS Labs has just released MyTunes, a free iPhone app that rather dramatically enhances music playback on your iDevices. Instead of us...

Garmin reverses course and offers on-board maps for iPhone

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I didn't like the first Garmin StreetPilot app for iOS because maps had to be downloaded on the fly. Not good if you are out of cellular range, and even worse if you you are downloading lots of maps on a metered data plan.</div>
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Garmin has finally come around and is offering maps that are contained on your iPhone. There are two US versions, one with the 49 states (Alaska is excluded) and and some Caribbean islands for US $39.99 and a North America version for $49.99. There is also a UK and Ireland version for</div>
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Garmin reverses course and offers on-board maps for iPhone

I didn't like the first Garmin StreetPilot app for iOS because maps had to be downloaded on the fly. Not good if you are out of cel...

Hitpad brings popular news to the iPad

<img align="right" alt="" border="0" height="177" hspace="8" src="http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/7315/hitpadicon46.jpg" vspace="8" width="200" /><br/><br/>News apps on the iPad are getting more and more interesting. With a lot of news going behind paywalls, we're seeing a trend toward more and more free news apps that are increasingly creative and functional. Pulse is already a popular news reader, and Zite has entered the game with an excellent app that checks half a million sites for news that will be of interest to you.<br/><br/>Now you can add Hitpad to the list. This free app has an interesting take on getting you the news. Using some proprietary algorithms, it determines what people are interested in on the web across various media like Twitter and video. It then displays them according to topic, so if you tap on a listed subject (like Charlie Sheen for example), you get a screen full of headlines about Sheen, videos and tweets. When you click on the headers, you get transported to the source web page in Hitpad's built-in browser, so publishers should like it as well.<br/><br/>The GUI is nice, and there should be virtually no learning curve in getting up to speed. Stories can be shared to Facebook, Twitter and by email. Google provides the news stories, videos and photos. Relevant websites are also included. Once you bring up a story, Hitpad also displays related stories, which is a very nice feature.<br/><div><br/><br/><strong>Gallery: Hitpad news reader for iPad</strong><br/><br/><img alt="" src="http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/6832/hitpad1thumbnail.jpg" /><img alt="" src="http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/4579/hitpad2thumbnail.jpg" /><img alt="" src="http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/7407/hitpad3thumbnail.jpg" /><br/><br/></div>

Hitpad brings popular news to the iPad

News apps on the iPad are getting more and more interesting. With a lot of news going behind paywalls, we're seeing a trend toward more ...

MLB offers free MLB.tv trial during April for buying app

<br/><br/><img alt="" border="0" height="345" src="http://img847.imageshack.us/img847/5549/mlbatbat11apps.jpg" width="530" /><br/><br/>Baseball season started this week, and things are already off to a rip-roaring start, with the Yankees in first place. My Cubs are, well, losing as I write this (Dempster's grand slam on Friday didn't help my fantasy baseball team, either). We've already reported that the terrific MLB apps for iPhone and iPad have been updated this year, but now Major League Baseball is offering an even better deal: buying either of the apps for iPhone or iPad (or Android, if you happen to have that kind of phone) gets you a free MLB.tv trial through the month of April courtesy of automotive sponsor Volvo.<br/><br/>I like the MLB.tv service. I didn't go for it this year (at least, not yet), but I subscribed last year and really enjoyed watching my Cubs games out of market here in Los Angeles, as well as pulling up all of the HD game videos on my iPhone (and even the PS3). The only drawback of the service for most people is the price (it's at least $99.99 for the entire year), so this trial is great. You basically get to watch a month of baseball games from all over the league for free.<br/><br/>If you haven't been sold on the apps yet, maybe this free trial of the TV service will change your mind. Speaking of the apps, you can definitely use them without the video service; you still get updated scores, standings, and radio broadcasts without any extra subscription charge. You can find the MLB.com At Bat 11 apps on the App Store right now.

MLB offers free MLB.tv trial during April for buying app

Baseball season started this week, and things are already off to a rip-roaring start, with the Yankees in first place. My Cubs are, well, lo...

Angry Birds creators: Apple still does mobile apps best

<div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" height="202" hspace="8" src="http://img691.imageshack.us/img691/422/petervesterbacka4742495.jpg" vspace="8" width="400" /></div><br />
<a href="http://technmarketing.com/iphone/peter-vesterbacka-maker-of-angry-birds-talks-about-the-birds-apple-android-nokia-and-palmhp/">In a recent interview</a>, Peter Vesterbacka of Rovio (the makers, if you haven't heard by now, of Angry Birds) says that from a developer viewpoint, Apple is the platform to go with. "They have gotten so many things right," says Vesterbacka, "and they know what they are doing and they call the shots." He says that Android's issue isn't so much about device fragmentation as it is "ecosystem fragmentation" -- by spreading itself out so much, Google's smartphone OS has "so many different shops, so many different models" running that it's tough for developers to find their own place in all of the chaos.<br />
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Vesterbacka also makes the point that much of the Angry Birds success has come simply from marketing. His two steps to succeeding on the App Store are first to "create a great app," and then to "get the message out." He repeats that a few times -- Angry Birds itself is definitely a solid game, but part of the reason that Rovio enjoys such success is their effective marketing and reaching the people who are interested in buying their game.<br />
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You can watch the full video of Vesterbacka's interview with Google after the break. Personally, I think a lot of the success that Angry Birds has had is a "right time, right place" kind of thing. That's not to take anything away from Vesterbacka and Rovio -- his insights are certainly dead-on and he clearly knows what he's doing, and the company deserves all of the success it has earned. But with a platform as big as the iPhone, there was bound to be a killer app at some point, and Angry Birds is definitely one of those.<br />
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<a href="http://technmarketing.com/iphone/peter-vesterbacka-maker-of-angry-birds-talks-about-the-birds-apple-android-nokia-and-palmhp">Source</a>

Angry Birds creators: Apple still does mobile apps best

In a recent interview , Peter Vesterbacka of Rovio (the makers, if you haven't heard by now, of Angry Birds) says that from a developer...

Facebook for iOS, Tapulous see big iOS downloads over the holiday

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As expected, we're starting to see huge download numbers for iOS from over the weekend. As people unwrapped their new iOS devices, they also took to the App Store to pick up new games and apps as soon as they could. Facebook for iOS <a href="http://statistics.allfacebook.com/applications/single/facebook-for-iphone/6628568379/">saw a gigantic jump</a> in users -- as you can see in the chart above, the app saw an increase of a million users just over the holiday weekend, and it has gone up by almost 5 million users since Thanksgiving. That's pretty phenomenal, even considering that we knew the App Store would be busy.<br />
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We probably haven't seen the last of the record numbers, either -- Tapulous says that its new Tap Tap Revenge 4 app saw twice the downloads this year <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/iphone-app-download-traffic-is-2x-what-it-was-last-christmas-says-tap-tap-revenge-maker-2010-12">that the last version did last Christmas</a>. The peak downloads for that app (which is number one on the free App Store chart during the current freeze) reached <i>45,000 per hour</i> over the weekend, which is just huge. I have a feeling that a lot of devs saw some really high sales and download numbers over the Christmas holiday. We'll keep an eye out for more as the next week goes on.<br />
<h6></h6><a href="http://statistics.allfacebook.com/applications/single/facebook-for-iphone/6628568379">Source</a>

Facebook for iOS, Tapulous see big iOS downloads over the holiday

As expected, we're starting to see huge download numbers for iOS from over the weekend. As people unwrapped their new iOS devices, they...

AirMedia Player for Windows: Stream from iOS to your Windows PC

<img align="right" alt="" border="0" hspace="8" src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.tuaw.com/media/2010/12/airmediaplayer-for-windows.jpg" vspace="8" />We've been chronicling the fast evolution of AirPlay media players that allow owners of iOS 4.2 devices to stream media to their Macs and Linux machines. Now, from developer Apostolos Georgiadis comes word of <a href="http://apogeorgiadis.blogspot.com/p/airmediaplayer-for-windows_22.html">AirMedia Player for Windows</a>.<br />
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The player requires Windows XP, Vista or 7, the Microsoft .NET framework 3.5 SP1 (<a href="http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=ab99342f-5d1a-413d-8319-81da479ab0d7&displaylang=en">available here</a>), Bonjour for Windows (included with iTunes or the <a href="http://support.apple.com/kb/DL999">Bonjour Services for Windows</a>) and QuickTime (<a href="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/">available here</a>). Once installed, users can stream video or music from their iPad, iPhone or iPod touch straight to a Windows PC.<br />
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<strike>A short video showing the AirMedia Player for Windows in action is available on the next page</strike>. Looks like Apostolos has pulled his video; however, the app page is still up and it's been <a href="http://apogeorgiadis.blogspot.com/p/airmediaplayer-for-windows_22.html">revised to version 1.0.6.</a><br />
<a href="http://www.tuaw.com/2010/12/22/airmedia-player-for-windows-stream-from-ios-to-your-windows-pc/"></a> <br />
<h6></h6><a href="http://apogeorgiadis.blogspot.com/p/airmediaplayer-for-windows.html">Source</a>

AirMedia Player for Windows: Stream from iOS to your Windows PC

We've been chronicling the fast evolution of AirPlay media players that allow owners of iOS 4.2 devices to stream media to their Macs an...

iOS 4.1 quietly added Cherokee language support

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.tuaw.com/media/2010/12/sequoyaharrangedsyllabary.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img align="right" alt="" border="0" hspace="8" src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.tuaw.com/media/2010/12/sequoyaharrangedsyllabary.png" vspace="8" /></a></div><br />
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The Associated Press reports that <a href="http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_IPHONE_CHEROKEE_LANGUAGE?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT">Apple has quietly incorporated Cherokee language support into iOS</a>. Cherokee tribal officials were worried about the demise of the Cherokee language as the tribe aged and its younger members increasingly adopted the English language -- and iPhones. However, instead of seeing technology as a threat, Cherokee tribal leaders opened talks with Apple three years ago about including native support for the Cherokee language in iOS.<br />
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This fall, Apple replied to the Cherokees' request and announced that it was adding the Cherokee language to the roughly 50 languages supported by iOS. Apple's announcement was a surprise to Joseph Erb, who works in the Cherokee Nation's language technology division. He told the AP, "There are countries vying to get on these devices for languages, so we are pretty excited we were included." <br />
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The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherokee_language">written Cherokee language</a> was created over 200 years ago when a blacksmith named Sequoyah converted the spoken Cherokee language into text. Use of the language has diminished in recent decades. Only 8,000 of the 290,000 members of the Cherokee tribe still speak the language -- a number the tribe hopes to increase with a little help from Apple.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><a href="http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_IPHONE_CHEROKEE_LANGUAGE?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT">Source</a></span>

iOS 4.1 quietly added Cherokee language support

The Associated Press reports that Apple has quietly incorporated Cherokee language support into iOS . Cherokee tribal offici...