Reviews

Audible BlackBerry App Review

Audible provides audio books.  Customers can download the audio books to their computers or mobile devices — including iPhone/iPod, a variety of MP3 players, and BlackBerry devices.  Last week, the Audible team released an upgrade to their BlackBerry application (version 1.4.2). It is no secret that I was less than thrilled with the first release of the Audible application.  Performance was painfully slow (when it worked), and the process proved — for me — to be more cumbersome than simply plugging the BlackBerry up via USB and dragging the audio book over manually via Mass Storage Mode and playing the…


Palm Pre App Catalog. 30 Apps in 30 Days. Day 11: Classic!

One of the complaints I heard (and voiced) about the Palm Pre before its release was the lack of support for PalmOS apps and games.  It felt like Palm was missing an opportunity to feature an enormous, ready-made library of apps.  Additionally, with the large (but admittedly shrinking) army of devoted Palm users, it seemed like there was an almost built in path to an automatic upgrade.  By not supporting those apps, it seemed as though many users might choose to stick with their current devices rather than risk giving up significant functionality with an unknown operating system. Apparently, Palm…


Tobias Batton’s Proto iPhone Game Review

What do you get for around a dollar?  A donut or some candies and change? Maybe a drink?  For around a dollar you won’t get much that lasts long.  Except maybe an iPhone app, and even that is not guaranteed to last very long or be useful.  Proto from Tobias Batton’s Game Studio costs around a dollar, and I think it is worth every cent.


iNews for iPhone Review

Getting back to work has created a minor problem for me.  Since almost every waking hour is spent either in the coaches’ office or on the practice field for two more weeks, I have a really hard time keeping up with daily news.  Having all day computer access in the summers has spoiled me by allowing for a daily information overload of world and tech news.  There are several news apps that I like on my iPhone, but they are not customizable. I need news the way I want it.  Some world, some sports, and lots of tech.  These needs…


Cable Jive iStubz & Dock Extender Review

Cable Jive makes some really simple but very ingenious products for the iPhone and iPod. They were kind enough to send along their iStubz charge and sync cable as well as their Dock Extender Cable for review. These two cables serve different purposes and both provide a great solution for your iPhone or iPod charge and sync as well as overall daily needs.


Sungale ID800WT 8″ Digital Photo Frame Review

I first spotted the Sungale ID800WT back in May when the company issued a press release to announce the frame’s arrival in the marketplace. What intrigued me is that for about $230 you’d be able to have both a digital picture frame as well as a Wi-Fi enabled monitor that displayed news, weather, Gmail and Picasa photo albums. How do the features of the ID800WT measure up in real life?


AblePlanet PSM500 Gaming Headset Review

As someone who is a gamer but also has a busy family and work schedule, I often find my video game time late at night when the house is quiet and most everyone else is asleep. This gives me two options – mute the sound or use headphones. Sometimes it is a hybrid of these, as I leave my headphones sitting my desk as low-volume speakers. For the past several years I have used fairly cheap headphones, starting with a pair from an older Sony portable CD player, moving on to a pair of cheap headphones I bought for my…


Sherpa for Android OS Review

One of the most touted apps on the new T-Mobile myTouch 3G is Sherpa.  Sherpa gives you a unique way to discover things near your current location.  Geodelic, the company behind Sherpa has put a lot of work into its interface, and it’s a very beautiful app for Android based phones.  It is also now available on the Android Marketplace, so I installed it on my G1 and gave it a spin.


Palm Pre App Catalog. 30 Apps in 30 Days. Day 10: Sudoku!

I think it is no secret around here that I am a pretty big fan of Sudoku.  I have explored many Sudoku options for various mobile platforms, and even a number of alternate variations on the theme.  For those of you who are new here, Sudoku is a classic Japanese puzzle game, in which you are faced with a grid of 81 squares arranged in nine rows of nine blocks each.  Scattered across the grid are numbers from 1-9.  Your job is to fill in the remainder of the grid by placing each number, 1-9, into each row, column, and…


Quick App – Short Hand

If you send a lot of emails from your iPhone or iPod touch this app is for you. Short Hand is a small utility that let’s you create and use macros in the same way that you with an application such as TextExpander on a Mac. While it takes a bit of time to set it up the time is well worth it considering the time and effort it can save. Let’s take a quick look…


Palm Pre App Catalog. 30 Apps in 30 Days. Day 9: Tweed

Do you Twitter?  Are you a Twit with your Tweets?  I’ll be honest here and tell you that I really don’t Twitter.  Sure, I have an account, and have tried to understand it, but it just never did much for me.  That being said, I do understand that millions of people out there send what must be billions and billions (sorry, Carl Sagan) of Tweets on Twitter every day (does this make anyone else think of a little yellow canary from Looney Tunes?)


Protect Your Gear With BodyGuardz: iPhone 3GS Review

Unlike our Gear Diary friend Larry Greenberg, I only have one case for my iPhone 3GS, and am not sure how much I like carrying it with a case.  The case for me has been primarily for protection.  Yes, I found a case that I think looks cool, but I do not care for the added size of my phone.  There are many cheap clear films to protect your gadget, but few work very well.  I carry my iPhone in my front pocket and love to use it in the size and shape in which it was produced.  I recently…


Palm Pre App Catalog: 30 Apps in 30 Days. Part 8: Flixster

Yesterday, we started our two part look at movie listing apps on the Palm Pre with Fandango.  Today, we will wrap that up with a look at Flixster.  To be honest, Flixster and Fandango are pretty similar apps, with one giant difference.  With Fandango, you can actually purchase tickets straight from your phone.  Flixster does not have that option, it only allows you to view information about the movies and listings.


CASECROWN Classic Slim Case Review

CASECROWN is a southern California based company founded by self described gadget lovers. They make some of the most affordable cases around, and they were kind enough to send me one of their Classic Slim Cases for laptops to review. Here’s a quick overview of the case from the CASECROWN web site: – Perfect Fit For Your Notebooks – Premium Quality Shock-Absorbing Double Memory Foam Interior – Water & Wear Resistant; Zipper Scratch-Free Exterior Material – Light & Thin Compact Design – Internal Supporting Bands To Secure Your Gadgets How does this laptop case match up?  Read on to find…


CASECROWN iPhone Polycarbonate Slim Case Review

CASECROWN is a southern California based company founded by self described gadget lovers. They were kind enough to send me one of their polycarbonate cases for the iPhone 3G/3gS to review. An extremely simplistic case, the polycarbonate slim case is one of the most affordable snap on back covers I’ve seen.


Bluebird Pidion BM-150R from SDG Systems Review

It has been a while since I have heard from SDG Systems.  Brian Fuller from SDG Systems contacted me about the Bluebird line and offered to send me one to give the once over.  I chose the BM-150R which is the closest to what Gear Diary readers may want to carry. Let me say this up front: the Bluebird line from SDG is all targeted at enterprise users.  They are not your typical consumer device.


Belkin Headphone Adapter for iPod Shuffle

When Apple first released its current generation iPod shuffle, I complained about the impact of its design on the ability to use third-party earbuds. Sure, the shuffle has a sleek design and the voiceover feature is really neat, but the fact that it lacks physical controls ties the user to the stock earbuds.  After using high quality buds such as those from Etymotic it was a bitter pill… too bitter in fact and I initially returned my shuffle to Apple. Well it’s a few months later and Belkin has released an adapter that lets you use any headphones with the…


Twitterena+ Pro for iPhone OS Review

If there’s one thing the iTunes App Store is not short on it’s Twitter applications. Anyone who knows me knows I’m a huge Twitter user.  I’ve tried at least ten different Twitter apps on my iPhone and usually end up returning to three or so of the apps I call the “big guys.” Software developer Andrew Weeks has just recently released his newest Twitter client for the iPhone Twiterena+ Pro. Is there a new contender for top iPhone Twitter app? Read on to find out.


Local Concerts for iPhone Review

As summer has come to a close and football has begun, I find myself without a day off until December.  For those of you who might have some time off and a spare evening, live music might be your choice of spending an evening.  Local Concerts provides a one stop resource to find who will be playing in your area.  The app is developed by a huge social music engine called iLike.It does not matter your taste or style, you can definitely find something worth going to see! Live Concerts uses your GPS to determine location, then downloads many weeks…


Could your hard drive survive this? If it’s an ioSafe, yep.

As a firefighter I guess I was the obvious choice to review the ioSafe hard drive which sells itself as the first and only external hard drive that is both water and fire proof. The company includes a one time, no questions asked recovery process.  If you are unable to recover the data off the drive after a disaster you send it back to them.  If their experts are not able to recover the data they send it out to a third party recover service.  Finally, if that service is unable to recover your data ioSafe will spend up to $1000…


Sygic Mobile Maps 2009 North America Review

A few weeks ago, I took a first look at this title from Sygic.  They have since released a small update and fixed a few bugs, so lets take a closer look at Sygic Mobil Maps 2009 – one of the crop of full navigation apps now appearing on the iPhone…