Jul 13 2012

How to wipe your iPhone

There are occasions where you might want to completely wipe your iPhone, perhaps you are selling your iPhone or perhaps you just want to start again and install apps from scratch. The process is easy but make sure you have backed up your important files first, otherwise you might permanently loose them.
To Wipe your iPhone without using your computer:

  • Goto the Settings App
  • Goto the General Section
  • Choose Reset
  • Choose Erase all Content and Settings
  • Select the option to Erase iPhone

Your iPhone will now erase its contents and settings, and you’ll be left with a clean install.

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By • Hardware, How to Articles •

Jul 11 2012

How to Create your own Ebooks

Ebooks are becoming common place and mobile devices like the iPhone or iPad provide a natural home for your mobile library, in this previous article we looked at how you can read your Kindle Library on your iPhone.
Now it’s possible to create your own Ebooks on the iPhone with Book Writer
The Book Writer app is an easy way for you to create Ebooks for either distribution or for your own personal iBooks account by providing you with a friendly interface for creating your content.

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Creating a book is easy, simply choose one of the supplied templates to select the orientation and size of the book, photos can be added from your media collection, text can be entered directly onto the page and you can even insert videos into pages. On-page objects can be moved and resized to your requirements and you can format text as you expect to do in any text editor. You can also alter the quality of the images in your book if you want to reduce the file size and you can even add background music. Ebooks have gone multimedia.

The process of creating your books is easy and results can be stunning, especially when creating photo heavy books.
The app mimics that of a traditional Apple app, for example Pages, which means that you should find it easy to navigate through.
When you have complete your book you can share it in a number if ways.

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The ability to create a PDF is a useful one as this opens up the possibility of mass distribution but I also like the option of interacting with Apple services like iTunes & iBooks do that your books are integrated into your iPhones file system.
The book writer App lets you create your own high quality ebooks allowing you to be creative on your iPhone.

You can download Book Writer from the App store or by clicking here.

By • How to Articles, Software • • Tags: , , , ,

Jul 4 2012

How to use your iPhone as a Scanner to create PDFs

As an increasing number of business minded people start to use iPhones in their workplace, the possibility of becoming paper light becomes a reality, but what to do with those remaining papers that you pick up at meetings, with Snap2PDF you can turn them into PDF’s for digital storage.
Snap2PDF is a great tool that’s easy to use and creates impressive results, effectively turning your iPhone into a scanner,
creating a PDF is simple, all you need to do is press the camera icon to be given the choice of taking a photo or using a photo from your library, this process creates a PDF document and inserts your photo into it, you can keep adding photos into the document until you have scanned all your papers.

Clicking on Done finalises the PDF document and let’s you name it and add a little meta data.
After you have created the document there are a couple of options for sharing the document, you can either email the PDF’s as attachments or you can upload them to DropBox – a very useful feature.

The App also includes basic OCR functionality but the real power of Snap2PDF is the ability to create PDF’s on your iPhone. In a world were carrying paper adds complications and is a pain in the neck, Snap2PDF provides a true mobile solution for scanning your printed materials, and this APP would be a welcome addition to any mobile workers productivity Apps.

You can download Snap2PDF from the App store or by clicking here.

By • How to Articles, Software • • Tags: , , , ,

Jun 28 2012

Google Chrome Browser for the iPhone

With Apple starting to move some of it’s key services away from Google to in-house a sense of competition has started to appear between the two companies in the iOS app space.
Playing it’s part Google has started into introduce more of its high profile apps into the App store, including it’s Chrome Browser.
Chrome has become a popular browser on desktop devices, with it’s simple interface and fast web page rendering engine it’s raised the bar for browsing, but how does it’s iPhone mobile counterpart compare.
Firstly the bad news, due to Apples App Store rules Google hasn’t been able to bring its rendering engine to the Chrome App so the actual display of web pages is pretty similar to that of the default Safari browser.
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Now the good news, Google have done a great job of bringing it’s streamlined interface to the iPhone.
The Chrome start page will look familiar to those familiar with the desktop browser, with your most popular sites listed as snapshot icons.
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In a similar way to the desktop version Minimum space has been used on the interface leaving as much real estate for the web page as possible, drop down menus are activated through only two small icons.
Google Chrome supports tabbed browsing, with the mechanism, ease and speed of switching between tabs being very impressive. Pressing the tabs menu displays all open tabs in a tiled format allowing you to swipe and jump between tabs.
Whilst it may not improve the speed of page rendering, Google Chrome Browser is a fantastic mobile web surfing experience, and many will adopt it as their default iPhone browser.

You can download Chrome Browser for iPhone by clicking here.

By • Software • • Tags: , , ,

Jun 7 2012

A Look at Clip on Camera Lenses with the Eye Scope Zoom Lens for the iPhone

The iPhone has a wonderful camera for a mobile device, particularly the iPhone 4s with it’s 8 mega pixel camera and impressive sensor. With it’s easy to use interface the iPhone has put easy but powerful photography into everyone’s reach.

Whilst it is a fantastic all round camera the iPhone lacks a hardware zoom option, and the included optical zoo loses a lot of shot clarity, which might make it inappropriate for taking detailed pictures of objects that are a distance away. To try and resolve this problem a number of third party clip on zoom lenses have been released, and to see the quality of results I’ve tested the Eye Scope Zoom Lens.

The Eye Scope Zoom Lens for iPhone

The Eye Scope Zoom Lens comes with a special phone case with a screw connector which allows you to attach the lens over the iPhones camera. The lens has a focus wheel to allow you to fine tune your pictures and it can take a while to set your photos so don’t expect to point and shoot anymore but with a little time you can get impressive results.

The Results can be very Impressive

The lens magnifies the image by 8x and unlike digital magnification keeps must of the detail intact, although if you are recording video you need to be aware that every hand movement is also magnified 8x, so you really need to keep the iPhone still and steady.
The package also comes with a tripod grip which comes complete with a standard tripod adapter which is incredibly handy.

With and With out the Lens

The clip on camera kits are incredibly good value at about £15 and provides a useful tool for those into their photography and need to take photos at distance.
Click here to buy the Eye Scope Zoom Lens 8x Magnification for iPhone 4

By • Hardware • • Tags: ,

May 27 2012

A Review of Sega’s Virtua Tennis on the iPhone

Originally released in 1999 Sega’s Virtua Tennis series of games have found success over the years. It’s blend of highly detailed graphics, fluid animation and TV style presentation proved to be a hit with gamers.

Whilst not as realistic as some of its competitors it’s arcade friendly gameplay and quick learning curve meant that it provided unparalleled accessibility to both tennis and sports fans, and now the game has arrived on the iPhone.
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The first thing that hits you about the game is the incredible visuals, the graphics on the small screen look as good as on a console, and it remains smooth on the iPhone 4s in singles matches, although looking through the App Store reviews older models may struggle, and on the 4s in doubles matches you do occasionally see a little slow down. Hopefully this will get resolved in future updates as the games looks incredible.
Virtua Tennis had managed to keep its accessibility in translation to the touch screen iPhone, several virtual joypad options are included but the new touch control scheme works best of all. Tapping the screen causes your player to run to the point you tapped whilst swiping the screen will make your player hit the ball in that direction. It takes a little getting used to but very quickly you’ll pick up how to pull off a variety of shots.
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There are several game modes to choose from, if you fancy a quick game then you can play an exhibition match where you play either a singles or double match against a CPU opponent, but the main meat to the game is in SPT World Tour mode.
In the World Tour mode you have a choice of 3 tournaments per real world day, each tournament has an entry fee and a prize fund, the more cash you have in the bank the bigger tournaments you can enter.
There is also an Internet multiplayer mode where an appropriate opponent is chosen for you for an online match. Online play works well although you’ll need to get used a tiny bit of added lag in the game.
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Virtua Tennis is a big name and a big game, and if you have the device to run it then it’s a fantastic arcade experience in the palm of your hand. I only hope that future updates include optimisations for lower end iOS devices.

By • Games • • Tags: , , , ,

May 16 2012

A Look at Rummikub on the iPhone

Rummikub is a popular classic tile based game for 2 to 4 players where the objective of the game is to get rid of all the tiles in your hand before your opponents get rid of theres, and now Games Factory Online has brought Rummikub to the iPhone. Providing 1, 2 or 3 computer controlled players Rummikub certainly provides an engaging challenge.

To remove the tiles from your hand, you are required to organised your tiles into sets of Groups and Runs. Groups are

three or four same value tiles of different colours, Runs are sets of three or more same coloured tiles in consecutive number order. After your initial move, which must value a combined total of 30 or more, sets can be made from either the tiles in your hand or from the tiles on the board, If you can’t make a move then you have to take a new tile and add it to your hand.

The iPhone version of Rummikub is well implemented, with clear tiles and crisp graphics, although given the nature of the game the graphics are only ever going to be functional. If you aren’t familiar with the game then it might take you a while to learn the rules and strategies of the game as the included rules aren’t very user friendly for the novice,but stick with it as after you get into it, Rummikub becomes very addictive.
This is one of those games where because of the set up time of the original the computer version has advantages over the real world counterpart, and whilst the computer opponents provide an engaging experience, even better is the inclusion of game centre functionality and multiplayer challenges.
Game Centre will automatically find you an opponent and then go one step better, because Rummikub is a turn based game it will give you a notification when it’s your turn, this means that you don’t have to sit waiting around waiting to play you can just return to the game when it’s your turn, this is a great feature of the iPhone version. If you are into classic games then you should check out Rummikub.

You can find Rummikub in the Apple App store.

By • Games • • Tags: , , , ,

May 12 2012

A Look at Spectrum Emulation with Sinclair ZX Spectrum 100 Greatest Hits

Emulation is a popular method of playing games from older systems on your current device. Traditionally emulation involves the copying of game files or Roms from your computer but on the iPhone due to Apples App Store policies emulation works in a slightly different way.
On the iPhone it is more common for you to buy an emulator with games included, this guarantees that the files are legal and don’t breach copyright, it also provides a legitimate way for those in search of classic games to purchase a digital copy.

The Sinclair ZX Spectrum was a popular home computer which holds a place in the heart of many gamers and is a much emulated system. The Spectrum has also recently celebrated it’s 30th Anniversary and to celebrate the event Elite Systems have released a special 100 greatest hits emulation package.

Many Classic Games are included

The package contains several top spectrum games from several top Spectrum Publishers and there are some true classics here including Chuckie Egg, Manic Miner, Skool Daze & Barbarian. The quality of emulation is superb, the games look and feel exactly like they did on the original Spectrum Hardware, which is its strongest strength and also it’s biggest weakness.
Game control is performed through on-screen virtual controls, and by default this method has a few problems as important sections of the screen are covered by your figures during play. To help improve this, Elite have included the iDaptive toolkit which allows you to edit the size and layout of the screen on a game by game basis, this allows you to optimise the controls for each game.
This highlights the problem of emulation though, games have come a long way in 30 years and some old games just don’t stand up today. This is especially true of some of the coin op conversions like Dragon Ninja which did the best it could with the available hardware but it wasn’t great 20 years ago and today is a frustrating unresponsive mess.

True 8 bit classics running on the iPhone

It’s not all bad though, the Spectrum classics that were designed around the hardware tend to be simple and fun to play and games like Manic Miner still retain their classic status.
If you are a fan of the Spectrum and want a mobile method of accessing your games or are looking for a cost effective way to see some proper gaming classics then Sinclair ZX Spectrum 100 Greatest Hits is a great way to do it.

By • Games, Software • • Tags: , , , , ,

Apr 28 2012

Doodle Block – a Fun Tower Building Physics Game

Every now and again a little gem crops up on the App Store which may not be complex or have a famous name but is fun to play, a perfect example of this is Doodle Block.
Doodle Block is a physics game where cartoon style blocks fall from the top of the screen and land on a weight balanced platform.
The objective of the game is to build a tower with the falling blocks from the platform as high up the screen as possible, the rules of physics apply so you need to make sure that the platform remains balanced, if the platform topples or if any blocks fall off then the game is over.
A couple of features make the game more challenging, your first task is to set the size of the falling blocks, this is done by touching the screen to start the block growing and shrinking, and then pressing the screen to set it’s size, while this allows you to plan a strategy it isn’t an exact science so you often have to react to slight variations in size and therefore weight of blocks. The second feature is the fact that the blocks are slightly different shapes so they don’t fit perfectly together and sometimes edges of blocks catch causing your tower to become less stable.
With this type of game the graphics tend to be functional and this is true of Doodle Block, but they do have character and serve a purpose, the games music is great but its the games physics engine that is outstanding and makes the game wonderful to play.
Doodle Block is a great little game, highly addictive and quick to get to grips with.
Download the game from the App Store, you won’t regret it.
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By • Games • • Tags: , ,

Apr 18 2012

Has your iPhone Personal HotSpot vanished in iOS 5.1

In this previous article I explained how you can use your iPhone as a WIFI Hotspot.
Several of you have contacted me to say that your personal hotspot option has disappeared since the recent iOS 5.1 update.
After doing some research it looks like this is quite a common problem, but there appears to be a simple fix.
When you apply the fix you will loose your wifi network passwords so make sure you have a note of these.
If you find that you have lost your personal hotspot in iOS 5.1 try these following steps.
1) Make a note of any wifi passwords that you might need.
2) Open the settings App
3) Go to the General Section
4) Select the Reset menu
5) Selection the Reset Network Settings Option.

The Personal Hotspot option should now be available again

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By • How to Articles • • Tags: ,

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