Monthly Archives: September 2009
EyeTV app for iPhone released
Elgato, maker of EyeTV, has released EyeTV for iPhone [iTunes Link], an app that allows access to both live and recorded video content from any Mac running EyeTV 3.2 or later. The $4.99 app lets you view live and recorded TV on your iPhone or iPod touch over your local network, and it also allows you to access the same content from a remote WiFi location using a service called MyEyeTV. Unsurprisingly, just like SlingPlayer, access over 3G isn’t possible.
Accessing either live or recorded TV over your local network is simple, and usually works well. Recorded content plays back almost immediately with barely a stutter to be seen — the caveat to this is that all recorded content has to be rendered into a format the iPhone will understand, which can take a while if you have a slower Mac. Live TV takes longer to load on your iPhone and is far more finicky. I found the only way to get reliable, stutter-free playback on my iPhone was to close the EyeTV playback window on my Mac. Apparently the strain of displaying content on my Mac and simultaneously streaming it to my iPhone was just too much for a 2.6 GHz processor to handle.
You can set video quality on Live TV from 80 kbps to 800 kbps, and there’s also a setting that allows you to always use highest quality when you’re on a local network. Again, streaming over my local network almost always worked well, so long as I wasn’t trying to play back content on my Mac at the same time.
Dropbox the iPhone app has dropped
If you’ve been waiting patiently for the Dropbox app [iTunes link] to hit the App Store, your wait is over. The app has arrived, and brings with it the simplicity that Dropbox users have come to know and love.
Since Dropbox itself is a free service, it’s a pleasant surprise to see a simple, easy method for creating a new Dropbox account right off the bat if you don’t happen to already have one. The app just asks for a name, e-mail address and password, prompts you to accept the terms of service, and creates the account. During my testing, I did encounter a problem where I would receive a nondescript “Account creation failed (null). Please try again.” message, which I’m guessing may be due to high load on their servers. Still, this is not an encouraging encounter for new users.
Once logged in, everything worked pretty smoothly. On first login, You are presented with a brief welcome document that highlights some of the features of the app. Backing out of the document will take you to your Dropbox, which quickly lists any of the files and folders you may have in there. The app features built-in document preview for several types of files, including PDFs, text documents, spreadsheets, pictures and videos. You can also tag files as a favorite by tapping the star at the bottom of the file viewer, which adds the item to the favorites panel and caches a copy locally on the device so that it’s immediately available.
Apple sets out to prove that there is an app for just about everything
Since the birth of the App Store, Apple has oft stated “there is an app for just about everything.” Now, it seems they have come up with a great way to prove their claim.
Apple has added an “Apps for Everything” section to their website, complete with a wide range of selections from Apps for Cooks, to Apps for Managing Money, to Apps for Moms and Dads. Each section is then broken down into different tasks or activities that are associated with the group, and highlighting a particular app for that item, complete with screenshots and a link to the App Store.
Based on recent trends, including our own “5 Apps” series, it’s easy to see that breaking down the massive list of apps available in the App Store and grouping them by different occupations or activities is a great way to bring otherwise hard-to-find apps to the spotlight. It’s good to see that Apple has come up with a nice, clean way to do this on their own website, and I’m sure it will serve as a great resource to users who are looking for the perfect app.
Five Apps for the Gastroenterologist
Sometime this summer a wiseacre commenter (we get a few) suggested we do a “Five Apps” for a variety of somewhat offbeat topics. One wasn’t so far-fetched however: gastroenterologist. One could say that a gastro doc has about the same needs as any doctor, of course, and that’s an easy out. So here are 5 apps that are great for gastroenterologists and possibly any medical specialist… Coming soon: 5 apps for the lemur owner.
Epocrates Rx – This free app looks up drugs and is updated weekly. Epocrates [iTunes link] has already been available for other mobile platforms for a while, this is a must-have for physicians, I would think. There’s also a Pro version that is designed for medical professionals, and it requires a yearly subscription fee to work. It’s $99 for one year, which is pretty reasonable for what this does — which includes an amazing pill ID tool.
Win a copy of Zoom Lens for your iPhone
I checked out Zoom Lens [iTunes link] over the weekend, and I’ll say that as far as zoom tools go, this one is great. A simple interface, simple use and the images look pretty good. Of course, you’ll be less impressed when you view them on your Mac, because Zoom Lens, like all iPhone apps of the same nature, just crops the image, really. It’s what you find on consumer cameras as “digital zoom” — not much more than a zoom & crop in Photoshop or iPhoto, really.
But Zoom Lens does give you an interface that looks as though Apple made it themselves. Who knows? Maybe some day the iPhone will have a true zoom lens, although the optics would be tricky… Anyway, the best part is you have a chance to win Zoom Lens for yourself! It only works on the iPhone, of course, and we can only give codes for the US (no Canada, sorry!). But read the rules below and enter by leaving a comment before October 1.
Glimpse a before/after shot of the app in action on the next page.