Macally PowerLink is Flash drive, Sync Cable, Emergency Juice for iPod, iPhone

You know how it is: you're camping in the wild, and your iPhone suddenly runs out of juice, just as you get bored stiff with the music selection you've got aboard it. Previously you'd've had to carry a bunch of stuff around to sort this out, but Macally's PowerLink has come to the rescue. With USB plug on one end and 30-pin iPod connector on the other, it acts as a sync cable, but also has a battery inside to give you a squirt of extra power if you're in a pinch. It also packs a 2GB flash drive, but you'll need to get mp3's off that via iTunes, sadly. No info on how long the battery lasts, but as a 3-in-1 gizmo it's pretty useful. Out "soon" for $49.99. [OhGizmo]

credit - gizmondo.com

Nielsen: iPhone In Fourth Place Among Smartphones, First In Customer Satisfaction (Not For Long)

Michael Arrington

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Nielsen Online is publishing stats about the mobile industry in general and the iPhone in particular today. They note that Apple still trails HTC, RIM and Palm in the smartphone market (that’s likely to change rather suddenly over the next few months), but leads the pack when it comes to user satisfaction (they clearly didn’t poll users today).

2/3 of the 2.3 million US iPhone users are men, say Nielsen. 55% are under 35, whereas only 34% of all mobile users are under that age. Most iPhone users make over $75k per year. Most iPhones are also used with email, wifi and as a MP3 player, too. Basically, the typical iPhone user is a young, wealthy, male tech geek type.

More stats below.

What’s in store for the iPhone 3G?
- Nielsen Mobile reports that 3G networks can improve data transfer rates by about six times over 2G and 2.5G networks, on average
- Although some consumers may be frustrated at the mandatory in-store activation of the new iPhone, just 15% of current iPhone owners say they bought their phone online, compared to 68% who said they bought theirs in a store.
- 30% of smartphone users are likely to upgrade their device in the coming year

How many iPhones are already out there?
- Nielsen Mobile estimates that there are 2.3 million US mobile subscribers using an iPhone
- The iPhone accounts for 1% of all embedded mobile phone users in the US

How is the iPhone faring?
- HTC (25.2%), Research in Motion (23.4%), and Palm (19.3%) continue to lead the smartphone industry in market share, with Apple (11.6%) trailing in fourth place.
- Apple iPhone users report the highest overall satisfaction scores among major smartphone manufacturers
- 8% of recently acquired devices by AT&T subscribers were Apple iPhones

Who is using the iPhone already?
- Two-thirds (67%) of US iPhone users are male (compared to 48% of all mobile subscribers)
- 55% of iPhone owners are under the age of 35 (compared to 34% of all mobile subscribers)
- iPhone users tend to be more affluent with 63% earning above $75k (compared to 38% of all mobile subscribers)
- 24% of iPhone owners are Hispanic
- 9.7% of streaming video users and 4.9% of mobile internet users own an iPhone

What features do they use?
- 75% use the phones MP3 player
- 68% use the Wi-Fi functionality of the phone
- 76% send e-mail over their phone

How do iPhone users consume mobile media differently?
- 37% of iPhone users watch video on their phone (making them 10 times as likely as the average mobile consumer)
- 82% access the internet over their phone (making them 5 times as likely as the average mobile consumer)
- 17% stream music over their phone (making them 7 times as likely as the average mobile consumer)
- 20% play online games on their phone (making them 9 times as likely as the average mobile consumer)

Business or Pleasure?
- 15% say their company foots the bill
- 24% say they use their phone for business, but pay the bill themselves
- 61% say they are a personal user

credit - techcruch.com

iPod Touch 2.0 Firmware: It's Official

Forget the earlier sneaky download, the iPod Touch 2.0 firmware is now officially available from Apple. It'll cost you $9.95, HERE. Though the splash page is there, the iTunes link doesn't seem to be quite up and running yet... you can probably expect some trouble like this in the early hours. [Apple]

Native Orb App Brings Live TV to Your iPhone

The OrbLive streaming media app is for everyone who is sick of waiting for a Sling Mobile client on their iPhone. As you may (or may not) know, Orb pulls files off your PC and streams them to any device with an app or web browser capable of accessing the Orb interface. From there you can stream music, video files, and if you have a TV tuner card, live TV. While Orb was previously accessible via Safari, this new, official app is supposed to be an easier, more intuitive way to get your media on the go. It does require a jailbroken iPhone, however. Check out the video of the client in action. [Orb via Register Hardware]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EW7Q51Ma22o

NBC Streaming Full Episodes of 30 Rock and the Office to iPhones (for Free, No Ads!)

Even though there's no love lost between NBC and iTunes, that doesn't mean NBC doesn't love you! At least if you've got an iPhone or iPod touch. They're streaming full episodes of 30 Rock and The Office to iPhones (and touches) in QuickTime, for free, with NO ads. They work, nicely, but the major catch is that if you exit Safari, you've gotta re-DL all over again, and the files are huge, so is this Wi-Fi only, really. This looks weird for NBC, but it's really not.

They're putting their shows out online in a million different ways (you can even download 30 Rock, The Office, Conan and Leno direct to your desktop now) and more than happy to pipe 'em to you, as long as it's in a controlled sandbox of some sort. NBC Direct requires a walled-garden player install with loads of DRM, and they wanted copyright controls from Apple and Microsoft to give just two examples, not to mention Hulu. It's sorta surprising that the QuickTime feed for iPhone is unprotected, but theoretically it's restricted to two devices. You know, if they'd just relax a bit, overall, they'd be in a good place online. [Silicon Alley Insider, Thanks Peter!]

Turn Your iPod Touch into an iPhone

The iPhone and iPod touch are almost indistinguishable devices except for one major difference—you can make calls from your iPhone, and you can't from your iPod touch. For the privilege of making phone calls with your iPhone, you have to pay $100 more upfront to Apple for the device itself, plus a minimum of $60/month to AT&T for the next two years. Let's say you didn't need that kind of firepower from your iPod touch, but that you would like to use it make a phone call every now and then. You can, and today I'm going to show you how to make VoIP phone calls from your iPod touch or iPhone using a freeware application called SIP-VoIP.

What You'll Need

1.) A jailbroken iPod touch or iPhone. If you haven't already jailbroken your device, don't worry—it'll just take 45 seconds.

2.) iPhone headphones with mics don't work with the iPod touch, so if you're using an iPod touch you'll need a Touchmod mic. The Touchmod mics come in a variety of flavors, from the simple dongle that plugs into the syncing port to the headphone-and-mic combo that works much like the iPhone headphones. The hardware will set you back somewhere between $50 and $60.

3.) The freeware SIP-VoIP application. Read on for details for installing SIP-VoIP below.

UPDATE: Just today (4/15) it looks like another VoIP app for the iPhone has emerged called Fring. Fring promises to work with both Skype and SIP accounts, but like SIP-VoIP it's still young and not entirely perfect. I haven't tried it yet, but it might be a viable alternative to SIP-VoIP, and can be installed just as easily.

Install SIP-VoIP

Assuming you've got the hardware you need and you've prepared your device, now it's time to install the VoIP application. If you don't yet have a mic, you can test that SIP-VoIP is successfully making calls before you purchase it.

I'm going to cover two different ways of installing SIP-VoIP. The first and easiest method is with Installer.app, the program that is automatically installed when you jailbreak your iPod. The second method is more difficult, but it's good to have around in case you run into errors (which I did).

Method 1 - Install SIP-VoIP with Installer.app: First, since SIP-VoIP isn't found in Installer.app by default, you need to add the Touchmods repository to Installer. To do so, launch Installer and head to the Sources tab. Now tap Edit -> Add, and type http://touchmods.net/rep.xml into the Add Source dialog. Hit OK, and Installer will refresh your sources, this time including your new Touchmods repository.

Now go to the Install tab and find the entry labeled Touchmods. Inside you'll see an app called Touchmods SIP-VoIP. Go ahead and install SIP-VoIP by tapping the entry, tapping the install button, and then verifying that you want to install this application from an "untrusted" source.

This is by far the easiest method for installing SIP-VoIP, but I had trouble with the latest version of SIP-VoIP (version 1.2) on my iPod touch, so I had to install a previous version (1.1). Since you can only install the latest with Installer, I'll also demonstrate how to install older versions of SIP-VoIP. I'd recommend trying it the easy way first, then moving to the following method if you have trouble. If you're taking the easy route the first time around, skip to the Set Up an SIP Account section below.

Method 2 - Install SIP-VoIP over SSH: To install previous versions of SIP-VoIP, you'll need to first install OpenSSH through Installer.app (you can find it under Install -> System). Now you'll need to connect to your iPod using a desktop FTP client that supports SFTP connections (like FileZilla for Windows or Cyberduck for OS X). This will allow you to browse and copy files to your iPod like you would if you could access the disk as an external hard drive on your computer.

To connect to your device from your computer, you'll need to know your iPod touch's or iPhone's IP address. You can find this by opening the Settings app, tapping Wi-Fi, and then tapping the blue arrow next to the network you're connected to.

Now that you've got that, start up your FTP client of choice, enter the IP address as you server, and use root for your username and alpine as your password. Once connected, navigate to the Applications folder (just above the root folder). That's where your iPhone and iPod touch keep all of their applications. From here it's a simple matter of dragging and dropping the appropriate SIP-VoIP app to the applications folder.

For this article, I'm using the 1.1 version of SIP-VoIP, which you can download here. Once downloaded, unzip the file and then drag and drop the SIP-VoIP.app file to your Applications folder. Finally, restart your iPod or iPhone and the new app should show up on your home screen.

Set Up an SIP Account

Unfortunately the SIP-VoIP app doesn't work with the most popular VoIP app Skype (it uses the SIP protocol), which means you'll have to set up an account with another service to use the app. Luckily there are tons of options out there that can work with SIP-VoIP. I used a service called FreeCall, so that's what I'll highlight in my examples, but the Touchmods blog lists a handful of alternatives.

If you want to follow along exactly with my settings, head to the FreeCall signup page and register for an account. After you register, you'll need to buy some minutes for your call time. FreeCall is an international service, so when it asks for your cell phone (to which it sends an SMS confirmation), you'll need to include your country code; for example, it would look something like 0015555551234 if you're in the US. The minimum purchase with FreeCall is 10 euros, which amounts to around $16. Once you've purchased some calling time with FreeCall, it's time to enter your setup configuration in SIP-VoIP and start making calls.

NOTE: If you don't want to spend money off the bat, you might want to try signing up with a service like Gizmo5 (formerly Gizmo Project), which offers a small amount of trial credit.

Set Up SIP-VoIP to Make Calls

Finally, we're ready to set up SIP-VoIP with the SIP provider you registered with above. Launch the app from your iPod touch or iPhone's home screen, then tap on Settings in the bottom right corner. You'll see a very rudimentary form where you'll enter the settings for the SIP account you set up above.

If you used FreeCall like I did, enter your FreeCall username and password in the first two fields (other services will use the number they've assigned you as the username), then sip.voiparound.com in the field labeled SIP-Server (see screenshot). There are more fields, but for FreeCall that should be all you need. Hit Save to save your settings—you may have to hit return on the iPod's keyboard to dismiss it and see the Save button—and then tap the dial tab to head to the dialpad.

Before you make your first call, you have to connect the application to the SIP server, so click the button labeled "connect to sip server" in the lower left. If all goes well, it'll connect without a hitch. (This is where I ran into some problems with version 1.2 on the iPod touch. 1.2 connected without issue from my iPhone, but I kept getting connection error messages with 1.2 on my iPod touch. If you're having similar problems, installing version 1.1 may help.) If it connected successfully, all you've got to do is dial your number (country code included, depending on which service you go with) and hit the call button.

I actually stumbled onto a video on YouTube of a precocious kid using a Touchmods mic with SIP-VoIP and FreeCall. There are several of these videos on YouTube—I particularly like this speaker phone setup. Check out his video below to get a better look at what the final result is.

Set up Inbound number

Your FreeCall account only handles outbound calls, but you're not out of luck if you want to add inbound functionality to your iPod touch. You can register your FreeCall SIP account with other services, like IPKall, to get a free phone number that will ring your iPod touch. (The only catch is that you're limited to a state of Washington area code). I won't go into details on setting up an inbound number, but you can find more details from this post at the Touchmods blog.

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The SIP-VoIP app has been in development for a while, and though it's still not much to look at, it seems to be improving over time. The iPhone and iPod touch 2.0 firmware will officially hit the streets sometime in June with support for third party apps through Apple, so who knows what kind of VoIP apps we'll see when that time comes.

Whether or not we'll ever see Skype or another VoIP app officially supported for the iPhone (Apple says they'll allow VoIP over Wi-Fi), SIP-VoIP is already there. My experience with it has been hit-or-miss, and it's got miles to go before it's the friendliest app around, but whether you'd like to make international calls for cheap or you just want to want to reach out and touch someone from your iPod touch, the folks at Touchmods and SIP-VoIP are already providing the tools to do just that.

No, you don't get visual voicemail, text messaging, or a built-in camera, but you do get to make and receive phone calls from your iPod touch—which in itself shows a lot of promise.

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The  Touchmods  Mic  For  Sip-Voip  Phone  Itouch  Iphone

Courvoisier Branded iPhone and iPod Make Us Talk Like the Ladies Man

Hello callah. This here is the ladieth man. Today we have an extra special thurprise for you, Courvoisier branded iPhones, BlackBerry 8800 and iPods. You thee, I want to do something thpecial for the ladieth of the world, which is why I'm working with Complex Magazine to auction off these fine thpecimens on eBay come May 19. And if there's one thing the ladieth man likes, it's Courvoisier. If there's two things the ladieth man likes, it's Courvoisier and iPhones that look like they're made by Colorware. Oooh, ith's a lady!

[Complex]

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radJacket CHARGE Case Keeps iPod Touch Juiced, Protected

Gnarly, 80s surf name aside, the radJacket CHARGE (not my capitalizing) is pretty cool, as iPod cases go. As well as keeping your Pretty safe from keys, bag- and pocket-umska, the case acts as a charger, giving your iPod Touch a whopping 46 hours of music, 12 of video and 10 of web browsing, on just a three-hour charge. See it in pieces after the jump.

So far the radJacket CHARGE is Japan-only but it HAS to come over here (those were mine, btw.) [Pocket-lint]

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Install Mail, Notes, Maps and other iPhone Apps on Your iPod Touch

The Simplehelp weblog details how to save $20 and roll a DIY install of the once iPhone-only applications Mail, Google Maps, Stocks, Weather, and Notes on your iPod touch. The method itself is completely painless. First, you'll need a jailbroken iPod touch (don't worry, it'll only take 45 seconds). Then you just add a new source to the Installer.app repositories and proceed to install any of the iPhone or pre-1.1.2 iPod touch apps your heart desires. If some of that went over your head, don't worry—Simplehelp's guide is detailed and well illustrated.

How to install the iPhone applications Mail, Notes, Stocks, Weather, and Maps on your iPod Touch

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