July 2nd, 2010 by GEEK!
No comments »
Yes, the news that every Spotify customer has wanted to hear. Spotify finally supports multitasking on the iOS4 with the latest update.
You will of course need an iPhone 3GS/4 or an 3rd gen iPod Touch (unless you have jailbroken) to get the multitasking ability.
The new app also supports control from the lock screen and double-click control buttons, which does make the app much more usable. It also features a new “What’s new” section like in the PC application, so you can see the top tracks of the moment and any new releases.
A well deserved update I think.
June 20th, 2010 by GEEK!
No comments »
How many times have you been on your computer and then had the phone ring? You go out of the room to answer it, and when you come back you’ve left the computer and monitor on pointlessly for half an hour.
PecoBoo, developed by VeryPC, is an attempt to try and solve that problem. It utilises your webcam and uses face recognition to work out whether you are sitting at your computer. If it can’t find a person for a predetermined amount of time, it will automatically turn off your monitor. However the webcam and software stays on – so as soon as it notices that you have got back to your PC, it switches your monitor back on.
I downloaded the 30 day trial and gave the software a spin. I’m relatively impressed – it takes a bit of fiddling to stop it turning off your monitor when you are still at the system. I found that if you set the idle time to less than about 20 seconds you end up switching your monitor off if you hold your head still – and if you turn your monitor on and off too much you’ll not only end up using more energy than just using it normally, but you’ll also considerably shorten it’s life. It’s also extremely irritating!
Nevertheless, the software did a good job and I do think the face recognition technique is very clever.
To be honest though, the fact that it isn’t free puts me off. To earn back the £9.99 I’d spent in buying the software from turning my monitor off, I’d have to use it for months – which defeats the point a bit. It also poses the question of how much energy does your webcam use if you’re having that on whenever your PC is on.
Overall, if you’re a green geek – buy it and it will save valuable energy utilising extended breaks from the PC. However, for the average user, this will be of little interest.
June 18th, 2010 by GEEK!
1 comment »
I’ve always found it really hard to find decent apps for the Nokia 5230. The “Ovi Store” is total rubbish on the device (constantly getting the random error problem) and it’s pretty hard to work around that.
I’ve been looking for a decent IM (instant messaging) client for the device for some time and there’s plenty of choice – eBuddy, Socially, Nokia Messaging IM Beta – but none of them perform very well. Until very late yesterday night, when I came across Nimbuzz.
Nimbuzz is a free client that supports a wide range of phone brands and works as an IM and VoIP client. It supports a wide variety of services including MSN (Windows Live), Yahoo, Facebook, Google Talk and many more. You simply hook up your account details into a Nimbuzz account, log on and off you go.
The interface has really come to my liking – much better than eBuddy’s for touch devices – that’s just unusable. You can also use it in both portrait and landscape modes and best of all, there are no adverts!
An addition to all of that, it also supports VoIP – so you can use either Nimbuzz’s cheap online call rates or you can use SkypeOut (very handy). So if you have a subscription on Skype, as far as I know, you can make use of use of it from Nimbuzz (sadly I haven’t been able to test that yet as currently I don’t get EDGE or 3G where I live – that will soon change).
Overall, it’s a fantastic client. It’s very simple to use and has the best interface I’ve seen yet. You can get it free either from the dreaded “Ovi Store” or by going to nimbuzz.com. If you want to chat on the go with a Nokia 5230 or Nokia 5800 – this is the way to go!