iPhone News, Hacks and Guides | Adam Weiner

AT&T Delivers Incredible Customer Service

Adam Weiner — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 03:32:08 +0000

My fiance and I are planning a wedding, and there’s lots of arrangements to be made. Unfortunately these arrangements took many hours of phone time, and my fiance racked up some serious minutes on her cell phone bill last month (we both have iPhones with AT&T service). She went more than 500 minutes over her plan, and after everything was said and done, we were left with a bill totaling to almost $500!

I’m not one to worry about pennies, but this puts a hurt on us! We could go out to a couple really nice dinners on our honeymoon for this amount of cash. So inside, I accept the fact that we will probably have to fork out the dough to AT&T. Now, I know AT&T has had a multitude of complaints since the launch of the iPhone, notably with it’s network issues and poor customer service. I have never personally experienced any issues with poor customer service, so I suggested that my fiance call AT&T. I told her to be honest, tell them we are planning a wedding and trying to save money for a honeymoon. I recommended that she ask to upgrade her plan to unlimited minutes (she was currently on a 900 min/month plan), and pretty please could they make it retroactive?

Well, my friends, ask and you shall receive! They knocked out her ENTIRE bill, accept the normal $118 that she would have owed without the overages. Bravo, AT&T. Bravo. You’ve just given me a reason to stay with you for years to come.

TrueHDR iPhone App Doubles Quality Of Native iPhone 3GS Camera

Adam Weiner — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 02:31:00 +0000

Some iPhone 3Gs owners are unhappy with the image quality of the native camera. Part of the problem is the 3Gs’ auto-focus feature. Say you want to take a picture, you will need to touch an area on the screen to re-focus on it (unless you’re ok with the camera’s original focus area). So ultimately we are only able to focus on one specific area to photograph.

In rolls TrueHDR (iTunes link), which enables you to take two photos and merge them. In the first photo, you focus the camera on the lightest part of the image. On the second photo, you focus the camera on the darkest part of the image. You are then presented with both images, and the option to “merge” them. What results is the image of the darkest area, combined with the image of the lightest area. The result is images with much higher color saturation, without looking edited. Note that the app is only fully functional on the iPhone 3Gs. Here’s some screenies:

Image taken with original iPhone 3Gs camera

Same image but taken with TrueHDR

As you can see, the image on the right has much deeper color saturation, because we combined both the light and the dark images. I’ve been having a ton of fun with this app, well worth the $1.99 price tag.

iPhone 3.1.3 Update

Adam Weiner — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 04:41:19 +0000

Apple released an iPhone firmware update today, 3.1.3. For those of you jailbroken/unlocked, wait for The Dev Team to update their software before you upgrade your iPhones and iPod Touches. There is word that the current RedSnow will work for the iPhone 2G as long as you point it at the 3.1.2 IPSW.

Stay tuned and I’ll update as soon as the new firmware is jailbroken and unlocked.

The Apple iPad Is Upon Us

Adam Weiner — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 03:42:26 +0000

The Apple iPad is upon us. The “crossover” of computers; bridging the gap between the iPhone/iPod Touch, and laptops/desktops. Apple’s next brainchild of technological wizardry. According to Apple: “[The] iPad is the best way to experience the web, photos and video. Hands Down.” Let’s hope they live up to their claim.

Apple iPad Specs can be found from The Official Apple Site. They are currently releasing a version with wifi connect only, with a 3G enabled device coming one month later. Word has it that AT&T will be the provider for the Apple iPad 3G connect. Surprise, surprise.

I haven’t had the chance to get my hands on one so far, but my only qualm so far is NO FLASH. But that’s not such a horrible thing. Today’s web is congested with flash sites that use heavy bandwidth, and aren’t visible in all browsers. This is pushing developers to lay off the flash on new website design. I wouldn’t be surprised if Flash worked its way out in the next five years, with a constant dwindle during its decline.

Enough of my rambling, I’ll update as I learn more about Apple’s new iPad, and am waiting for the first jailbreak!

iTunes 9.0.3 Update Safe For Jailbreakers & Unlockers

Adam Weiner — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 00:17:03 +0000

Apple released an iTunes update today, version 9.0.3. This update is completely safe for jailbroken and unlocked iPhones. Both synching and DFU mode are still supported on jailbroken iPhones.

IN THIS UPDATE:

Fix for bug where iTunes wouldn’t remember stored passwords.
Fix for iPods that are having problems syncing smart playlists and podcasts.
Fix for bug where occasionally iTunes doesn’t recognized a connected iPod.
Fix for minor stability and performance issues.

Gingers DO Have Souls

Adam Weiner — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 02:16:31 +0000

Wow, who could’a thunk. I guess gingers DO have souls. Sheesh. I kinda feel bad for the guy. But come on, South Park makes fun of EVERYONE: all races, colors, ethnicities, religions, etc. That’s why the show is so great.

Installous Shuts It’s Doors For Cracked iPhone Apps

Adam Weiner — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 23:21:43 +0000

One of the major sources of cracked iPhone apps are installed through an app rightfully named “Installous.” If you don’t know about it, than that’s probably a good thing, But it seems that Installous has closed it’s doors. Another cracked app gateway called AppTrackr appears to have popped up in it’s place. We’ll see how this unravels.

For those not up to date, the guys behind Installous have been fighting legal issues and it looks like they are loosing the battle. Ultimately the users need to support the devs by buying the apps. Most are under $10. I remember paying $9.99 for Pac-Man on my old RAZR. I understand if some want to “test” the apps before officially purchasing, but I think the developers should be paid for their work.

Best Free iPhone Instant Messenger

Adam Weiner — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 06:34:21 +0000

There’s a slew of instant messaging apps available on the App Store, both free and paid. While many of the paid apps offer tons of useful features, I think Palringo Lite is one of the best free apps available. It will give any of the paid apps a run for the money. It supports the following services: Facebook Chat, MSN, ICQ, Yahoo, Google Talk, AIM, iChat/MobileMe, Jabber, and Gadu-Gadu. It supports picture and audio messaging, as well as location support. Push notifications allow you to receive messages even after you close the app. I think the only thing it’s missing is video chat, which would be practically impossible with the iPhone’s rear-facing camera.

Some screenies:

Report Poor AT&T Service With Their Official iPhone App

Adam Weiner — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 05:03:03 +0000

Are you tired of getting shitty service from AT&T? Well let them know by downloading AT&T’s “Mark The Spot” app from the App Store. Although I don’t have too many problems with AT&T’s service, I know plenty of you do. They’ve created an iPhone app that allows you to send a notification to AT&T to alert them to dead spots, dropped calls, and failed data transfers. This app is especially useful if you have specific “problem areas” where you constantly get sub standard service.

Customize iPhone Wallpaper With BossPaper

Adam Weiner — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 02:15:03 +0000

For you jailbroken users out there, check out BossPaper, developed by TheBigBoss himself. It’s available on Cydia for free. It’s an easy app to customize your wallpapers, and allows you to select specific images to cycle through. This is so far the best way to mimic OSX’s native ability to cycle through images you choose as wallpaper. It’s also very easy on the battery. Also allows you to hide icon labels, along with some other nifty features.