Can you hear us now? Maybe if you held your phone in a different hand? Can you hear us now? What if you put a bumper on your phone? Can you hear us now? What if you switched carriers? Ha ha, we kid. But since you kept losing your bars when you tried to surf the net and hold your phones, here's some of the stories we didn't miss at Mac|Life.
Features:
- From 2-Way to 4G: The Complete History of Cell Phones - So the iPhone 4 marketing slogan is "This changes everything. Again." Does it? And just how has cellphone technology changed and adapted over the years? Walk with us, won't you, down memory lane to ye olde days and backpack sized walkie-talkies and $4,000 pricetags for 30 minutes of talk time all the way up to the current day.
- Can These 6 Tablets Take Down the iPad? - You know it's just a matter of time before some promising new tablet is being described as "the iPad killer." We've heard it all before with the iPhone. So how do the current crop of slate computing stack up? Meh, we think.
How-Tos:
- How-To Make a Blank Space on Your iPhone's Home Screen - Sometimes you don't want to fill your iPhone home page with apps, you want to leave a tidy little blank spot so new apps load further down the screen list. It's not foolproof (what is?), but we've come up with a neat little workaround that should satisfy that urge.
- How-To Clear Your Mac's Font Cache - This one can drive you bonkers if you don't know what happened or how to make it stop. Font caches can get ugly if you don't keep 'em tidy. And all it takes is a tiny bit of Terminal command -- wait, wait, it's EASY Terminal commands, copy and paste jobs. You can do it! We have faith in you.
Reviews:
- June's Highest Rated Reviews - End of the month meets end of the week in this round-up to rule them all. Our top-rated gadget and app reviews all in one place for your convenience. Be sure to check these out because the iPad is making apps go crazy with the sweetness.
- Bowers & Wilkins MM-1 Review - You'll be seeing these babies in our July's Highest Rated Reviews, you can bet on that. Computer speakers suck oh so mightily, but Bowers & Wilkins have a solution; it's pricey, but it's worth it. These tiny desktop wonders could handle whatever we threw at them and still delivered crisp treble and tight bass. In a word: awesome.
News:
So, once again, it really was the week of the iPhone 4. It sold like hotcakes right out the gate, Apple announcing that it moved 17 million of 'em....and if the Verizon gets the iPhone in January, like yet another article claims, an analyst predicts Apple could sell another 12 million; add those two numbers up and you get the number of articles written as of today predicting a Verizon iPhone...and while everyone sold out of the latest model, these die hards are out waiting for more to come in, camping out for the second wave...and this is even after all the articles about the reception issues, which Apple denies, naturally...and deny at some length after reflection...though if you have one of those Lance Armstrong Livestrong bracelets, the point is moot...not that reception is the only problem some users have reported; turns out some cameras give you an instant case of jaundice, at least in your low-light pictures, that is...also, it seems some have claimed there's a bit of bugginess with the proximity sensors, though this hasn't been as big an issue...we suppose, were you to follow iFixit's guide, you could fix it yourself, now that their repair guide is up...the bits inside are only worth about 188 bucks, so we suppose you could find replacements at a decent price...and in other teardown news, it seems a bit of the inside of the iPhone 4 shows that the next model iPad just might be getting a gyroscope too...yeah, let's have another look at the gyroscope, shall we...and it wouldn't be a Fourth of July in America if someone weren't suing someone else, in this case, a class action lawsuit against Apple regarding those antennas. Aren't you proud to be an American, where at least you know you're free to sue anyone over just about anything?
You know what else is as American as Apple pie? Big companies buying up littler ones, just like Disney has done with Tapulous; prepare for Jonas Brothers editions of great games, plus, the Apocalypse...and you can set the date of the world's end with Readdle's new calendar app that brings the suavity of Google Calendars right to your phone...hopefully there'll be some luck in getting a Google Voice app back on the iPhone, or at least maybe this nice one for the Mac will suffice...also possibly, maybe, some day coming to your iPhone? Could these leaked screenshots of iWork Pages be a sign of something great? We're sure hoping....if not, we're more than thrilled that Hulu has decided to jump into the iPad/iPhone mix with their coming soon offering of Hulu Plus; TV shows and movies whenever and now wherever we want them? Yes, please...while we wait, we might as well hit the Steam store and get our gaming addiction fix too, of course...and since we prefer our soundtracks to the gamers, we'll take a little multitasking love for Last.fm and Spotify...all right, this is starting to run into some money; time to start cashing some checks and Chase's app makes it all so much easier if you have an iPhone; just take a picture of the check, upload it through the app, and you're done. No joke.
