Welcome to my technology blog!
Apple just took the wraps of Mountain Lion – aka Mac OS X 10.8, which is due out later this year. The above video shows a nice walk through of how your Mac is about to become even more like an iPad. Personally I'm looking forward to the AirPlay feature and it's great having the Messages App (now in public beta). What are your thoughts on this direction of the Mac OS? Mac OS X 10.7 Lion left me feeling very underwhelmed, but Mountain Lion looks useful.
Rarely will you hear me complain about the price of anything. I feel that companies and individuals have the right to charge whatever they want and we as consumers have the right to buy it or not. Ultimately if no one buys a product then the company will either fail or adjust accordingly. I saw this product recently and I thought "COOL!" That was until I reached the price point. My eyes opened wide for a bit, but then I remembered my rule. Don't complain. You don't know what it cost to develop the product?You don't know what it cost to manufacturer the product? You don't know what ti cost to distribute the product, etc.
A nifty product for sure. On one end it has a standard USB plug like any other flash/thumb drive and on the the other end it has a 30pin dock connector. Plug it into your computer, copy files to it and then plug it into your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch and copy files from it using their App. Sounds great! I could actually see using one of these from time to time especially when getting files from others. However, for me I can't quite justify the price (starting at $99.95 for 8GB). I can get an 8GB flash drive for $8 all day long. I can even get a 32GB flash drive for $27. Wait, that's not a fair comparison. These low priced thumb drives can't plug into your iDevices. Right! OK, I can sign up for a free Dropbox.com account and transfer up to 2GB's of files back and forth all day long for Free between my computer and iDevices. Wait, that's not really fair either. You need an internet connection to make that work and if you're wanting files from someone else then you got to do some setup work on their end to get the files into your Dropbox. True! Well can't you just download an App that lets you transfer files between computer and iDevices wirelessly? Yep, there are tons of them and here's a cool one called Air Sharing. Alas, it's not as simple as a physical flash drive either and these apps either require an internet connection, WiFi connection or Bluetooth connection. Yes, it would appear that this is a unique product offering a unique advantage and perhaps it can command a uniquely high price too. This product will be especially attractive to those who are now carrying their iPad most of the time instead of a laptop. The market will ultimately decide!
You can get an iFlashDrive starting at $99.95 for 8GB here.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNKmcXI-hRU
In this episode of the Adobe Creative Suite Podcast I'll show you how to use the recently updated Digital Publishing Suite (DPS) tools to create scrolling slideshows that can contain pictures, captions and even movies.
See more of my Adobe Creative Suite Videos on my Adobe Creative Suite Podcast and get the App here. It features EXCLUSIVE CONTENT that no one else gets to see. This episode has a BONUS CLIP that is available only in the App! My iOS App is a Universal App for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. I also have an Android version:
I've been a fan of the Harmony One for some time now. It's actually my favorite off the shelf universal remote. While it's not perfect, it offers the best universal, multiple device experience I've seen to date (aside from the Bose Lifestyle T20 RF remote). Recently I stumbled upon the Harmony Link. This small module connects to your WiFi network and basically serves as an wireless IR repeater to send commands from the Harmony Link App running on your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch or Android device to your audio and video equipment. In essence with the Harmony Link, your mobile device because your touch screen universal remote that does NOT require line of sight.
The Harmony Link comes with an AC adapter and USB cable. Dont' worry about the USB cable being short because you only need it for the initial setup and you can plug in the Harmony Link to any AC plug near your computer long enough to set it up and then relocate it near your TV when you're done. Since Harmony prides themselves on having a large database of remote codes, you merely need to collect all the Make and Model Numbers of your gear. Then you simply download the Harmony Link setup app on your Mac or PC. The 1st step is to join the Harmony Link to your WiFi network. Then walk through the setup by entering plain English to identify each device you want to control. If there is a device that you have that Logitech doesn't know about, it will prompt you to get the original remote so that you can teach the Harmony Link the commands it needs to know.
The next step is to grab the App for your mobile platform. I downloaded the Harmony Link App for iOS (see my review here). Once you have the App and your mobile device is on the same network as the Harmony Link module it will see it. Then just log in with the same user name and password that you used during the initial setup.
Once I got the device setup and the App installed on my iPhone 4s and iPad 2 I took the Harmony Link for a spin. I configured three "activities", "Watch TV", "Watch DVD/BD" and "Watch Apple TV" my only challenge is that my Sony Google TV has the worst input switching implementation ever. Unlike most TVs that either have a direct Input button (ie. HDMI 2) or the ones that simply go "Input Next", mine brings up an on screen menu and while that's not the end of the world, after choosing the Input you have to click "OK". This isn't a standard thing and therefore it threw my Harmony One and of course the Harmony Link for a loop. To make matters worse each time the menu comes up on screen it doesn't highlight the current input, instead it starts at the top. I was able to get it to kinda work but I need to put a call into their tech support to get the best setting. Outside of my weird Input problem on this one TV, everything else worked perfectly. I was able to easily control my Sony Google TV, TiVo Premiere XL, Sony Blu-ray player and Apple TV. When I done watching tapping a single button on my iPad or iPhone turns everything off. Since this is working via WiFi you don't have to worry about pointing your phone or tablet at your screen (great for turning off the stuff that was left on upstairs or downstairs without having to make the trip. There goes that little bit of exercise you were getting 🙂 ). Also the Harmony Link works in cabinets and has two ports for IR blasters to get to hard to see IR ports.
While the Harmony Link does work as advertised, there is room for improvement. The first thing is that if you have more than one mobile device or other Harmony remotes, those other remotes/mobile devices don't know that your gear is on if you started with a different remote. For example, let's say I turn everything on with my iPhone 4s and then later pick up my iPad. The iPad doesn't know what activity I'm using or which gear is on or off. It would great if each remote/device could read from the Harmony Link to see the current status/activity. Also if you've got any AV gear that uses RF instead of IR you're out of luck. Another drawback in general is that since it's using your phone or tablet this means that it's 100% touch screen and that's not a good thing because it means always having to look at your display to see the button you want to use. On the Harmony one, there are physical buttons that you can use without looking. Lastly can we kill the green LED that's always on?
I'm one step closer to having the perfect universal remote. I would actually like to see an upgraded Harmony One that allows for the button customizations of the Harmony Link App and offer WiFi connectivity. If you're in Remote Control Hell and you have a smartphone or tablet, then you should take at the Harmony Link.
You can get the Harmony Link for $99.89 here.
When I reached out on my social media channels for ideas of what gadgets you'd like to see me take a look at, overwhelmingly the response was "Kindle Fire". People also wanted a comparison of the Kindle Fire and Color Nook. I'll say more on that in a minute. First of all, as many of you already know, this is not a general review site. The guys over at Engadget do a great job of reviewing ALL things tech. My goal has always been to talk about the products I actually use. Luckily I do have a use for the Kindle Fire and it's actually more to do with my day job at Adobe. We are bringing the Kindle Fire into our list of supported devices for the Adobe Digital Publishing Suite. With that in mind I figured it would good to have a Kindle Fire to test on and while I've got it, it couldn't hurt to review it.
While it's easy to want to draw comparisons to the iPad (and I will), I look at the two as aimed at two totally different markets. To keep it simple I would say that if you are primarily looking for a general purpose tablet to run lots of Apps on and possibly use instead of a laptop/desktop computer then the iPad is probably going to suit you better. If you're looking primarily for a digital book/magazine reader that can also run Apps/play content and you don't want to spend a lot of money, then the Kindle Fire is a PERFECT choice!
What about the Nook? I don't have one, have never held one and therefore have no comparison to give you. I have no plans to get one at this time, but if I do then I'l compare it with the Kindle Fire.
Now that I got the iPad vs. Kindle Fire piece out of the way, let's concentrate on the goodness of the Kindle Fire. It's a 7" color Wi-Fi tablet. The display is very vivid and easy on my eyes. The design is a bit on the thick side (7.5" x 4.7" x 0.45"), but still very comfortable to hold and use (14.6 ounces).
It has 8GB's of storage (not a lot) and only 6GB of that is available to you for content. You can expect to get about 7-8 hours of continuous use out of it. I was impressed with the out of the box experience. What I didn't notice during the ordering process is that Amazon knows me! Therefore when my Kindle Fire arrived it was already configured to my Kindle/Amazon account and all my books were already there. That gave me a definite "aha" moment, because I then realized that since Amazon knows me that my Amazon Cloud music was also there for streaming/download. Don't worry, if you're buying one as a gift then you can specify that it's NOT for you during the ordering process and it will ship unregistered. Navigation seems pretty straight forward and out of the box there really wasn't anything that I struggled with not knowing how to do or having to refer to a manual. It asked me to log on to my WiFi network and I was off and running. The battery had enough charge in it out of the box for me to set it up and play.
More than books and magazines! While the Kindle line has been traditionally targeted at only those interested in reading, the Kindle Fire breaks away from this mold nicely. It can browse the web, do email, run Apps (yes games too), play music, play movies, and play TV shows. Amazon is giving away free cloud storage for your digital content this helps combat the limited storage on the device. Also Amazon offers up their Kindle Lending Library so that you can actually borrow free books with no due dates.
The Kindle Fire can run Android Apps and that's a great thing! However, there is one small problem and that is that there is no built-in way to access the Android Market. That's right! No Android Market. If you want to buy or download free Apps you have to do it from the Amazon App Store. To a new Kindle Fire/Android user this won't be a big deal at all, but in my case I have a few Android Apps that I've paid for and unless I do some hacks, I'd have to buy them again from Amazon. It's not the end of the world because I don't have that many, but it kinda blows! While WiFi is great I would have loved to have seen a 3G offering too even if it costs more.
The built-in stuff – This will likely be another source of disappointment for anyone who has looked at or used an iPad. The quality of the built-in Apps vary. For example, the email App, while not stellar is functional. The web browser is OK too, but when I tapped on the Facebook "app" it merely took me to the Facebook mobile page. In other words what appear to be Apps in some cases are merely bookmarks.
The Kindle Fire is an excellent choice for those of you that kinda want a tablet, but don't want to spend $500 on one. At $199 the Kindle Fire is priced right and will definitely keep the guys in Cupertino on their toes. Best Buy recently announced that the Kindle Fire was the first and only tablet they've sold to outsell the iPad and at that price it's a no brainer. However, for the heavy tablet user you will probably be disappointed in the Kindle Fire App selection at this point. This will hopefully only be a temporary problem. I've already bought a second one as a gift for an immediate family member who has never wanted an iPad and who has an older Kindle.
You can get the Kindle Fire for $199 here.
I've been an iTunes user since day one (and even SoundJam before that). I've been an iPod user since day one too. I have a decent sized *music collection (6,649 songs) with a mix of tunes ripped from my CDs, purchased from the iTunes store and purchased/downloaded from other sources such as Amazon.com. While Apple has always done a good job in allowing me to sync my music/playlists to any number of iDevices, for some reason the company never saw fit to allow automatic syncing of music between multiple computers. I've complained about this on my blog in the past as well as going with 3rd party work arounds.
In addition to iOS 5, iCloud and iTunes 10.5, Apple rolled out a new service called iTunes Match. iTunes Match is a paid service ($24.99/Year) and the idea behind it is that once you sign up (via iTunes 5) your music collection will be analyzed and "matched" with the music currently available on the iTunes store, whether you originally bought the music from the store or not. Tracks that are matched are then available to up to 10 of your devices (Macs, PCs, iDevices running iOS 5, or Apple TVs) via the cloud.
This also includes your playlists! Tracks that were not matched (in other words songs you have that aren't on the iTunes store) are then UPLOADED from your library to the iTunes cloud (iCloud). This means that ALL of your music is now available in the cloud no matter where you obtained it originally.
Once it did the initial "match" on my dedicated iTunes media server (a dedicated iMac running iTunes 24/7). I then went to my MacBook Pro and deleted all the music from that library. Once I deleted all the songs and playlists, I turned on iTunes Match on that computer as well. After a few moments ALL of my Playlists appeared on the MacBook Pro that are on the iMac. Any song/playlist that I want to listen to can now be streamed via the cloud. Also any music/playlists that I actually want to be physically on the drive say for offline listening can be downloaded with a single click. As long as my MacBook Pro has an internet connection I have access to ALL of my music at all times. Those times that I don't have access to the internet I can still enjoy the music that I've downloaded.
On my iPhone, iPod touch and iPad – we know that these devices have limited storage. Therefore carrying around a large music collection means giving up something else. Once I turned on iTunes Match on these devices the music that was stored on them was immediately wiped and just like on my MacBook Pro, after a few moments I had access to ALL of my Playlists and All of my songs. The difference here is that any song you play is not only streamed initially but also stored so that it won't have to stream a second time. And yes you can proactively download any song(s) playlists that you know you'll want to be stored on the device for offline listening.
The benefits of iTunes Match are clear! I have access to ALL of my Music on any of my devices at all times (with an internet connection). I now use less space on my iDevices because I don't have them loaded up with music that "I may want to listen to someday". The other advantage is QUALITY! Some of my original CD Rips were at a lower bitrate. With iTunes Match you get everything at Unprotected AAC, 256Kbps (iTunes Plus) Quality. The other slick feature is that now it doesn't matter where I make organizational changes or new purchases. If I change a playlist on my MacBook Pro it's updated everywhere. If I buy a new song and add it to a playlist on my iPad, it's updated and available everywhere. This is one of those services that's worth every penny to me!
You couple iTunes Match with the new iTunes WiFi Sync for iOS (iPod touch in the car) and I'm completely in music heaven! I pull into my garage and it connects to the WiFi in my home and syncs the iPod with the latest changes.
Now let's get iTunes Match for video/movies!
*Note: If you have more than 25,000 songs in your library that you did NOT get from the iTunes store then you exceed the limit of iTunes Match. iTunes Match only works for songs, not audiobooks, videos, ringtones, podcasts, etc.
Have you ever had one of those moments that you wished you had a video camera in your glasses? If so it was probably because what you were witnessing you knew no one would believe you. 🙂 While I don't quite have a video camera in my glasses just yet (or a heads up display either), I do find the Looxcie LX2 to be a viable alternative. At first glance it looks like one of the early (fairly large and obnoxious) bluetooth headsets that people used to wear. You know the ones with the big flashing blue light that everyone else but you could see? However, what we have here is a very capable video camera that captures up to 480p video and audio to a built-in 2GB memory chip. Oh by the way, it's also a bluetooth headset (sans the blue flashing light too). I've seen and used small video recorders disguised as other things before. Typically while they worked, the resulting video quality was poor. That's not the case with the Looxcie LX2. I was actually quite impressed with the quality of the video considering the relatively small form factor and low cost. Yes it would be nice if it were 720p HD, but for the most common use cases for this kind of camera the 480p quality is usually more than enough.
The Looxcie LX2 comes with a USB cable and various ear gels and over the ear clips for you to get the right size. You can charge it via USB and of course connect it to your computer to access the video files. You turn it on/off via a switch on the inner side of the unit. Once it's on you can start and stop recordings with a dedicated button as well as answer calls/hang up on a second dedicated button. There is a green status light so that you know if it's on and a red light on the front to indicate recording.
Rather Borgish, but hey, it works. Once you record your clips, just plug it into your Mac/PC to retrieve them. They are in .MP4 format. There is no zoom or any other manual controls on the device itself. It does autofocus.
While the device works as advertised and as I've indicated above, it's soooo much better if you have an iOS or Android device. You can download their FREE mobile Apps that not only allow you to control the camera via bluetooth, but also serve as a LIVE LCD Viewfinder so that you can see on your device what the camera sees in real-time (not the same quality of course). Very Mission Impossible like. You can even edit and share the footage you just captured right from your phone. Sweet!
You can get the LooxcieCAM (basic recording functions) for free here from the or here from the Android Market
You can get the LooxcieMoments (capture, editing, sharing) for free here from the or here from the Android Market
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C27x_QJXTdY
This is a really cool gadget! I can think of a few good uses for it. While ti could also be used for evil, so can most gadgets. I'd like to see it get down to about half the current size. Perhaps in the LX3 some day. You can get the Looxcie LX2 here for about $149.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gsl85KSbwug
One of the questions that came up during my New Class at Photoshop World on creating Digital Portfolios for your tablet was "how do I create scrolling content?" There was always a way to do it with the DPS tools for InDesign, but it just got a whole lot simpler with the latest update to the DPS tools. In this video I show you just how easy it is now.
See more of my Adobe Creative Suite Videos on my Adobe Creative Suite Podcast and get the App here. It features EXCLUSIVE CONTENT that no one else gets to see. This episode has a BONUS CLIP that is available only in the App:
PS. My iOS App just got an update that fixes the iOS 5 video playback problem and adds the following features:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6M_HvgoRiM
Not long ago I did a post on the "State of AirPlay" speakers and at the time I couldn't get my hands on the long awaited iHome iW1 AirPlay Speaker. While this speaker is stil in short supply I was able to snag one at my local Apple Store. Rather than write a review I decided to record a short video on why this speaker rocks!
As of the writing of this post, most places are still out of stock. However, you can check this link for availability. List price is $299.99
Once Apple updated iOS to allow Apps to run in the background I gave up on dedicated Turn-byTurn GPS units. I've been using the Navigon App on my iPhone ever since. Navigon updated their Apps to be Universal Apps so that they would be native on the iPad too. I remember thinking at the time, "when would I ever want to use a big iPad for GPS navigation?" The first time I used Navigon on the iPad was actually the Europe version in Denmark. The advantage for me then was that i didn't have a car charger with me and the iPad battery would last much longer than the one on my iPhone 4. On that trip I was the passenger, so I could hold the iPad while Scott Kelby drove. I realized something during that drive. It was really nice having a big screen navigation system. While I love the Navigon App, I've always said that the text was a tad bit too small. However, on iPad that's it's big, beautiful and easy to read. Another advantage is that the iPad has a louder speaker that's easier to hear the directions.
I decided to give it a try solo. During my last trip to LA I used the iPad as my GPS navigation. I just set the iPad on the seat as I didn't really need to look at it once I started driving. The voice directions were good enough. If you wanted to mount an iPad in your car permanently you could use something like this Arkon mount. However, I only use these devices/Apps in rental cars. Therefore, I don't need a permanent mounting solution.
The iPhone is always with me and I have no plans to delete the Navigon App from it. However, if I have both devices with me and I'm in a rental car, I'm going to use the iPad for navigation over the iPhone. If you want to use an iPad for navigation, you're going to want the WiFi+3G model as it has a GPS chip in it and the WiFi model does not. Also here's a car charger that will charge both your iPad and phone.
You can get the Navigon North America App here from the