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Part One Traveling with the iPad: Apps

On my recent trip to Europe I decided to ditch my laptop and take my shiny iPad to save room in my carry-on bag. This inspired me to make a new series of traveling with an iPad whether it is international or domestic. In part one of traveling with your iPad I am going to show you some essential apps and other things to bring. With more to come.

Here are my top ten business traveling apps: Pages, Keynote, Dropbox (or Mobile Me iDisk), Evernote, American Airlines (or your airline), XE Currency, The World Weather, Flight Tracker, BBC News, and CNN News. Most of these apps are free, but some like Pages and Flight Tracker cost money. If you don’t want to spend money you can always find apps similar to these at the App Store for example Plain Text and Flight Status – Free. Some apps for when you travel around for vacation that pass the time and help out are: Twitter, Friendly for Facebook, Yelp, travel guide apps (depending on where you go), Adobe Ideas, TED, ABC Player (only in U.S.), any game (I would recommend a game that has a long duration so maybe one from Gameloft), a magazine app of your choosing (some of them are free, but you still have to buy the magazine; for the ones that cost money they come with the most current magazine, some examples of magazines are Wired, Fortune, or GQ), and the iBooks app. Apps like TED and Magazine apps need the Internet, but you can download them, so you can use them when you don’t have Internet.

You might also be thinking that I am wrong and you shouldn’t use this for business travel. Just as evidence that will support my idea of traveling with the iPad I wrote this whole article from my iPad and for those of you who don’t want to bring it because it is hard to type on. Buy an external keyboard for your iPad it will solve the problem and you can find one at www.zagg.com for about a hundred dollars.

Clearly, the iPad is a convenient solution for travel if you don’t want to bring computer thanks to apps like Pages and Keynote that transform it into your computer away from home.

Stay connected at my new twitter handle to stay updated 24/7 @TRMGaveragejoes and @realmacgenius

What do you think? Let us know in the comment section.

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News

Apple working on new iOS notifications?

Is Apple working on a new iOS notification system? Apple may be buying a small company to build its technology into the operating system. Apple has been criticized for their average and often annoying notifications such as, new text messages, voicemails, and other ways have been criticized as the weakest part of their iOS. Last year, there were rumors that the iPhone notification would be fixed because of the return of Rich Dellinger, the chief architect of Palm’s system. It still hasn’t been fixed and if Apple does buy the small company, I hope that they do fix these problems. I think that the notification system is actually kind of annoying. Just think about it, you’re playing a game or you’re into a really good book, and all of a sudden a text message appears. I would get annoyed of that because it causes me to lose my concentration. Does Apple need to have us look at our messages all the time? Why can’t we just hear the noise or feel the vibration of the phone. I don’t see why we need to check our messages once w receive them. If the person that texted us really needs to reach us, they should call us. I mean, isn’t that really the main point of having a phone in the first place? Drop a comment below to let us know what you think of a new iOS notification system.

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News

Verizon’s iPhone 4, from the inside out

The iPhone 4 for Verizon has been released and already stripped down by the team from iFixit. The iPhone 4 from Verizon has some differences, but do the changes really change your mind about switching over form AT&T to Verizon, let’s find out. On the new iPhone, there is a redesigned vibrator, and changes to the location and design of the RF components. The most surprising part about the new iPhone is that it has a Qualcomm MDM6600 chip, which is a dual-mode GSM and CDMA compatible. On the back on the iPhone, they removed the visual warning o not throw your iPhone 4 in the trash. Unlike AT&T which has he image on the back of their iPhone. Apple has updates the model number from A1322 to A1349. This and the warning not to throw your iPhone away may be the only external difference on the iPhone. There is no Verizon emblem just like the AT&T iPhone. If you put the two iPhone 4’s side by side, there wouldn’t be a difference, until you look at the back that is.

On the iPhone, there used to be a SIM slot, but Apple has removed it from the iPhone for Verizon. According to Apple, the SIM card and SIM slot were the only user-serviceable parts on the iPhone 4. Apple now says that “iPhone does not contain any user-serviceable parts.” When you uncover the back of the iPhone4, you will notice a couple of differences. The battery is interchangeable and is listed as the same 5.25 watt-hour capacity. The battery does have a new model number, 616-0520, but I doubt that really makes a difference between the iPhone 4’s. The new battery weighs less too, from 26.9 grams to 25.6 grams. The Wi-Fi antenna is exactly the same as the GSM iPhone 4. That may be the only RF component that did not receive a revamp. The chipset is the same as the Droid Pro world phone; it supports both GSM and CDMA. Apple chose not to support GSM because they may have thought that it’s easier to design antennas for a CDMA-only phone. The last thing that may have changed is the iPhone 4’s vibrator. The vibrator has a quieter, softer feel. It also sounds a little better when it vibrates on a table. DO you think that these are big differences between the AT&T and Verizon phone? Let us know, drop a comment below.

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News

Counterfiet iPods, really now?

What has the world come too? Fake iPods, iPhones, and iPod touches that were brought in from Asia have been sold and bought around the CES this past year. Police from the port of os Angeles have seized over $10 million worth of counterfeit Apple device from a warehouse. Many sellers have been selling them around certain parts of California, but the police are not sure how much further they have gone. Many customers have bought these fake iPod’s for cheap, but not cheap enough to raise awareness about them. Cops have reported that they have found receipts along with other stolen and counterfeit items bringing in about $7 million in profit. Customers have said that these iPod’s look extremely real until you turn on the screen. Customers have been allowed to touch and feel the product, but were not allowed to turn the product on. I would think that if you can’t turn the product on, wouldn’t you be suspicious?

So far, two brothers have been arrested, and the two of them face total of four felony counts for the sale of counterfeit goods. The seizure was a result of an ongoing stolen cargo investigation that has been going on around Los Angeles and Vernon, CA late last year. I would think that there are many other sellers out there that are selling more counterfeit products. Apple has been a huge success, but with success comes fake products and people that take advantage of the poor economy. Not that many people can afford a $200 piece of technology these days. Whenever they find the product for a really good deal, of course they are going to jump on the opportunity. I don’t blame them either; I would want an iPod touch really badly after seeing many people on busses playing with them. How far would people really go in order to make money? Is it really worth it to make these counterfeit items, but also knowing that at any moment, you can get caught? Let us know, drop a comment below.

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News

Which iOS features should be on the Mac OS X?

Which iOS features would you want on your Mac? Touch screen definitely sounds like a fun feature for the Mac. Wouldn’t it be cool to change your Mac into a touch screen like an iPhone and change it back? There are rumors that Apple is planning to make an iMac with a screen that pivots into a horizontal touch mode. It sounds like it will be a combination of a Mac and an iPad. It sounds like they should call it a MacBook touch or something like that. Combining the features of both would be really cool because the touch screen is what attracts many users to iOS devices. There are also many other features that would be great for Mac OS X.

Virtual iPhone dashboard widgets could be a possible feature for Mac OS X. Your Mac would have a screen that looks similar to an iPhones, with wallpaper, apps, and etc. It would be easy to organize your programs and it would make use of all the free space on your desktop. When you look at your Mac desktop, it looks very empty and spacious, but your iOS devices have different pages of apps. Some may prefer to have this feature offered on their Mac. It should be an optional feature.

What else does your iOS device do that your Mac doesn’t? Your iOS device has the option to alert you automatically if you receive an email, even if your device is on sleep mode. Wouldn’t it be smart to give that feature to your Mac? The idea of having your Mac alert you that you have received a new email while the Mac is on sleep mode is fairly simple. Apple should definitely allow people to use that feature and for those that don’t want to, turn it off.

Have you ever noticed that when you play music off your iPod touch or your iPhone, it is simple and organized, but when you play music off iTunes, it can look pretty cluttered? Don’t you think it is time that Apple made an iPod app or Music app on your computer that may be simpler and more organized then your iTunes? I think so. Also, my iTunes can be really slow, so I think having an iPod app might help.

When you are outside, you take out your iPhone and can surf the internet from wherever if you have 3G, right? If you are lost, you can just check your GPS on your iPhone too and find directions. There are many people that also take their MacBook everywhere, so shouldn’t they have the same features as an iPhone? Should there be 3G for the MacBook? I think that 3G should be made available for MacBook users, especially when it is made available for the iPad.

Another feature that iOS devices have is that many iOS apps have notifications that are provided by third-party software. It notifies you if there is new information and other important news. Apple should definitely provide a feature that provides notifications for your apps on your Mac too.

When you go on an airplane, you can click Airplane Mode on your iOS device. But can your Mac do that? Not that I know of. If Apple adds that feature, that will be really helpful to those that travel a lot with their MacBooks. You should definitely add that feature on so people don’t have to manually turn off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth separately.

Your iOS device has iBooks and Game Center, but your Mac still doesn’t have either of them. It is about time that Apple provides iBooks as a feature. If I wanted to read a book on my Mac, rather then my small iPhone, I would really want that feature. Game Center should also be a feature for Mac OS X. People get pretty competitive with gaming on the iPhone and iPod touch. It’s time for the competition to get started on the Mac.

All and all, I figure that Mac OS X definitely needs an upgrade. Why does iOS have so many features that Mac OS X doesn’t have? It’s not because it isn’t useful on the Mac, so it’s probably about time for Apple to improve Mac OS X. Once Mac OS X gets more features such as an iPod app and touch screen, I can’t wait to use my Mac.

What do you think?

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