iPhone4idiots

The title says it all. I get asked at least four times per week the past month about jailbreaking the iPad 2. It can’t be done and anyone that claims they can do it for you is full of crap. Well, unless you happen to know Comex or Geohot. Sadly, many “news” blogs put out articles on a weekly basis saying that an iPad 2 jailbreak might be coming any day. They are just trying to get views as nobody knows other than about a dozen people worldwide. For those wondering why it’s taking so long since Comex posted pictures of a jailbroken iPad 2 over a month ago it just isn’t easy. Yesterday Musclenerd put out the two tweets shown here. See Apple is getting better at making their devices harder to jailbreak. Couple that with the tweet from Comex implying he’s not interested in working on that jailbreak at the moment and we may be waiting a good bit longer.
Update 5/2/2011 – Great news! GeoHot is going to start working on iPad 2 jailbreak! I say one month tops!

The death of books is coming as clearly as the death of newspapers. An Association of American Publishers study found that E-book sales totaled $90.3 million in February which was more than either hardcover or paperback. This was up 202% from the previous year. The growth rate shouldn’t slow down anytime soon as more and more kindles and iPads are sold. I’ve mentioned before how I think this is a good thing. Why waste time going to the library when things can be found and downloaded online? For those with poor eyesight the E-book offers a way to easily increase text size and font. Yes, there will come a time in our lifetime where finding books won’t be so easy. Every Kindergarten student in one Maine school district has been given an iPad 2 as they were deemed, “more important than books”. Been to the public library lately? Many are starting to offer iPads and Kindles for checkout while shelf space for paperbacks and hardcovers disappears. Yes, I think in twenty years it is likely our children will have little physical contact with what we used to call books. Hardcovers and paperbacks won’t be found in our schools and if a universal format for E-books can be found as opposed to telling our children to go read a book teachers might be saying go look at a pdf.

So Apple has lowered the price of their premium video editing software, Final Cut Pro, to $299. While this has excited numerous people, I’m still trying to figure out all the bells and wistles in iMovie. My guess is the vast majority are the same. Well one fun little feature I played with over the weekend was playing video backwards (the reverse effect). Most of this video was shot with my iPhone 4 which when plugged into my Mac opened iMovie to transfer the video right in.

HBO, everyone’s favorite premium channel released a YouTube video promoting their app coming May 2 to stream content to iPhone, iPad and Android base devices! The Soprano’s, Entourage, Curb Your Enthusiasm, True Blood, movies, documentaries and much more. IMO, HBO has more quality content than any other channel. While the app is free you must be and HBO subscriber to get the service and it will only be for United States residents – sorry Canada & UK. The app will provide streaming access to every episode of every show! It’s not clear how quickly new episodes would become available, but my guess is fairly quickly. What is clear is HBO is doing its own thing and will not be coming to Netflix anytime in the near future. What’s positive to me is that an additional channel is going to be streaming to iOS devices soon.

So one question that keeps coming up in the Forum is, “How do I download direct to my iPad?” Well karma points to user louholmes for pointing out that Downloads Lite for iPad does it quite well. Yes, it’s free and this works for files on FileServe as well. So if you’ve been asking how to do this just watch the video.

It’s been awhile since I’ve found a free game that I thought was quality. Well, Contract Killer by Glu, is exactly that. It is a first person shooter game with pretty good graphics. There are 17 story missions and as you complete them you earn cash to buy one of twenty weapons and ammo. You also may purchase medkits to restore your health during missions as your targets and their bodyguards shoot back. In each of five different 3D locations you are on top of a roof looking down at the street. You find your target and then zero in on him with the scope Continue Reading…

When I was in South Africa for the World Cup last summer Sony had a huge tent setup to show off their latest 3D technology. It was pretty cool, but I left knowing it was a long way off. They showed clips from games the previous day but the clips were only a minute long. Having the cameras and software required to broadcast a live sporting event in 3D is not happening anytime soon. Besides the cost, the consumers will have to have televisions and glasses ready to watch. Heck, HD still isn’t broadcast all the time and I thought that would have happened years ago. Given this, I was pleasantly surprised with the quality of the following YouTube video showing off glasses free 3D in both an iPhone 4 and iPad. So when will you see 3D on your iPad? Watch the video and let’s discuss. Continue Reading…

Almost 18 months ago I did an app review on Super KO Boxing 2 which I thought was the best boxing game for the iPhone at the time. It reminded me of Nintendo’s classic game, Mike Tyson’s Punchout. So a week ago while checking the Apple App Store I was excited to see Mike Tyson – Main Event. This free app is from Rock Software, not Nintendo. While it’s worth downloading since it’s free, despite its age Super KO Boxing 2 is a superior game in almost every way. Continue Reading…

Time Warner’s TWCable TV app has dropped several channels after some programmers demanded it. While I wish Time Warner would show some guts and tell them if they don’t like it they can remove their channels altogether from their cable network, that likely isn’t a smart business decision. This is yet another battleground in old media versus new technology. See you already pay Time Warner for access to programing through their cable lines into your home. However, the law is not clear on whether or not you can stream this content to your iPad. Apparently, your cable bill isn’t paying for programming to your home, but only programming through the cable lines? The greedy programmers want another cut from either you the consumer or Time Warner. To me this like saying you have to purchase separate contracts to watch television on your Sony versus your Vizio since they are different hardware. It’s a joke. Here is a list of the companies trying to screw you and the channels that have been removed. Continue Reading…

New versions of Redsn0w and PwnageTool have been released by the Dev Team that provide an untethered jailbreak for all devices that work on 4.3.1 EXCEPT the iPad 2. To be clear while this WILL NOT jailbreak the iPad 2 (or Verizon iPhone 4), it will jailbreak any other 4.3.1 iOS device including the ATT iPhone 4 like the video shows. Having an iPad 2 I’m really bummed about that, but a jailbreak for the iPad 2 will come at some point. If you need to unlock wait another day as ultrasn0w needs to be updated before it will work. Also, if you need to unlock you have to use PwnageTool (Mac only) to jailbreak your iPhone because it preserves the baseband. MuscleNerd tweeted this should be done in 24 hours. You can run this over an existing sn0wbreeze or greenpois0n jailbreak as well. Please watch the video to see how simple this is and let me know what you think of the new intro I created for the video. Comments and views on my videos are one way you can support this site. Step by step instructions are listed at the end of this post.

Step 1 Install the latest version of iTunes and backup your device.
Step 2 Install 4.3.1 firmware (a suggest restore as new)
Step 3 Download Redsn0w 0.9.6rc9 for Mac here. OR Download Redsn0w 0.9.6rc9 for Windows here.
Step 4 Download the Apple 4.3.1 firmware for your device here (its almost 700MB)
Step 5 Place both Redsn0w folder and ipsw firmware file on your desktop. Double click the Redsn0w folder to unzip it and then open and drag the Redsn0w app onto your desktop. Now you have the unzipped Redsn0w app and ipsw file on your desktop you are ready to go!
Step 6 Double click Redsn0w, click the browse button and select the ipsw firmware you downloaded in Step 4. Be sure the “Install Cydia” box is checked.
Step 7 Attach your device to your computer via USB, close iTunes and turn your device off.
Step 8 Click the next button (You will need to hold the power button in for 3 seconds, and then press in the home button while still holding the power for 10 more seconds, and then release the power button while continuing to hold the home button for 30 more seconds) This puts your device in DFU mode and starts the jailbreak. If you do it wrong don’t worry it doesn’t hurt anything. Just try again.
Step 9 Let Redsn0w do its thing. When done you should find Cydia on your device. You are jailbroken!