Extra battery hours for your iPhone have arrived in the form of USB Fever’s 3000mAh addon, but with a price. Aside from the $60 price tag, the addon is a hefty pack of its own that will upgrade your iPhone from a relatively slim device to one of sizable girth and proportion.  As a person who charges his phone daily before hitting the hay, this addon would be more of a nuisance than anything really effective. However, on long car rides or plane trips, when your only comfort may reside in the full season of 24 you have on your phone, the extra battery life is a blessing.  So, if you need the extra juice and don’t mind being asked, “is this an iPhone with the 3000mAh battery pack in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?,” you got the right product .

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Section: iPod + iTunes , iPod touch , iPhone , iPhone , iPhone SDK & Apps Popular blog publishing software, WordPress, has recently released version 2.0 of its software. However, it has been released as a separate application, like what was done with Tweetie 2 , so don’t bother checking for an update to your already-downloaded WordPress app. WordPress 2 brings an impressive redesign and a bunch of new features, as follows: A new, more efficient user interface that makes it faster to switch between comments, posts, and pages. Various user interface refinements and bug fixes New Comments interface, with Gravatars and the author URL shown in the comment list Passwords are now stored in the keychain Posts are now automatically saved and restored if network connection is lost during publishing Added persistence, so the app re-opens in the blog you last used Added an interface for manually entering the XMLRPC endpoint for non-standard setups Fixed rotation-related visual glitches Fixed errors where malformed XML prevented access to XMLRPC endpoint Fixed edge case where local drafts were sometimes not saved Fixed the order of photos so that they’re displayed in the order they’re uploaded WordPress for iPhone is an open-source application, so many of the new features are courtesy of developers who have contributed to the project. Make sure you check WordPress 2 out on the App Store , as it’s a free download. Also, check out the rest of the release notes on WordPress 2 at the WordPress for iPhone blog . Full Story » | Written by Patrick Lutz for Appletell . | Comment on this Article »

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Section: iPod + iTunes , iPod touch , iPhone , iPhone , iPhone SDK & Apps Are you familiar with Habbo Hotel ? The company behind the sensational virtual world, Sulake , Inc., has created a similar pocketsize virtual world for mobile devices known as Bobba (or Bobba Bar for the iPhone version). Bobba has already been out on various smartphones for a few months now, and the company is now focusing on bringing the popular virtual world to the iPhone and iPod touch. The 1.0 version of the app has already been submitted to Apple for review, and should make it into the App Store any day now. So, what exactly is Bobba Bar? If you’re familiar with Habbo Hotel, then you should have a good idea. The two are almost identical, of course with some exceptions. The main difference between the two is that Bobba Bar focuses mostly on bars, cafes, and other food and beverage establishments, while Habbo Hotel is more of a virtual hotel. With Bobba Bar, you have to sixteen years old or older. The available screenshots suggest that Bobba Bar is going to be a very impressive iPhone “game,” and is likely going to make good use of the iPhone’s graphics engine, as it does on the other smartphones on which it’s available. Bobba will be a free download from the App Store, although I speculate it may make use of in-app purchases in future updates (think coins in Habbo), and will be released as soon as Apple approves it. Product [ Bobba Bar ] Full Story » | Written by Patrick Lutz for Appletell

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Printing giants, Xerox have announced a new conducive silver ink that can result in development of  electronic circuits on materials like plastics, film, and textiles. So if you think about it, apart from printing your  own circuit boards (imagine the fun), you will also be able to wear your electronics! The silver ink which has been christened “silver bullet”, melts at  140 degrees Celsius which is quite an achievement since metal usually melts at 1,000 degrees or higher and plastic itself melts at 150 degrees. Xerox have been able to strike the perfect balance and hence are optimistic about their discovery. Xerox has been researching this technology since 2001 and hope to utilize it for manufacturing cheap  electronics circuits, (RFID) tags, flexible signs among other things.

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The sexiest all-in-one computer has long been the iMac, and last year’s 24-inch model was a beauty. But oh my Lord, the new 27-inch machine induces crazy lust. Look at the size of that screen! I just returned from the Apple store with one. I went to buy the new Magic Mouse. They were out of

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  Now just don’t rant about the government and that awful R word (recession for the uninitiated). Instead get the Recovery.org”  Layers App  for the iPhone and get a real time view of all the places where the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act has been wasted invested. The “Recovery.org” Layer is an augmented reality (AR) based application, which is capable of pinpointing in real time and space all the businesses, that were financed by the US Government using the tax payers money.  So how does it work? Download the application from the iTunes store for free, load it on your iPhone and then go for a walk in a big city or a business district. Then search for "recovery" or "sunlight" within Layer to find this layer and you should be able to view all the businesses that benefited from your hard earned money! Quite an interesting application though we don’t know if to call it innovative or just plans sadistic!  If you fancy some more AR love, then do check out some of the applications covered by iSmashphone here .

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Section: Mac + Computers , Desktops , iMac , Originals Apple’s discussion forums have begun to flood with threads by users complaining of poor performance on the company’s new 27-inch iMacs , which were introduced to the public last week. Several different performance issues have been reported, such as the inappropriate spinning down of the hard drive and corrupted Snow Leopard installations, although one issue seems to be most common—poor Flash performance (particularly video playback). The Flash issue may seem insignificant and easily fixable, but there are much more serious problems facing the new 27-inch iMacs as well. People have been claiming that there’s a bug forcing the hard drive to spin down, that there’s a corrupted build of Snow Leopard preinstalled on the new iMacs, and that the problem is even dealing with bad permissions. Of course, these issues aren’t going to affect every single user of the new 27-inch iMac, so some will be luckier than others. Regardless, the issues seem quite significant, and definitely require Apple’s attention. The company has yet to make a statement or even acknowledge the issues, but is likely studying them at this point to ensure it comes up with proper solutions before taking any action. Read [ discussions.apple.com ] Product [ iMac ] Full Story » | Written by Patrick Lutz for Appletell . | Comment on this Article »

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Filed under: Odds and ends , Steve Jobs , Apple Update: As our loyal commenters have pointed out, Gizmodo (which was among the first sites to report that Clow was changing roles) has followed up with an internal email from Clow where he says Miller’s promotion does not imply that Clow is stepping away from his own leadership role with the company, including “keeping an eye on Apple.” — When many people think of Apple, they think of the ad campaigns that the company has used over the years: The original “1984″ Super Bowl ad that introduced the Mac to the world The “Think Different” campaign that coincided with the return of Steve Jobs to the company The iPod dancing silhouettes “There’s an app for that” — the iPhone ads “Hello, I’m a Mac. And I’m a PC.” — the Get A Mac ads Apple’s advertising agency is TBWA / Media Arts Lab, and the person who has been the creative force behind all of these ads is a man by the name of Lee Clow . The 66 year-old Clow has decided to step down as chief creative officer at the agency, although he’ll remain chairman and global director of Media Arts Lab and fulfill other roles within TBWA. Clow’s replacement is no stranger to Apple. Duncan Milner is currently the executive creative director on the Apple account and is considered by many in the advertising industry to be the perfect replacement for Clow, a close friend of Steve Jobs. Apple’s ad man changes roles, but another Apple fan will take his place originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Apple’s ad man changes roles, but another Apple fan will take his place originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds .

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Section: Mac + Computers , Laptops , Peripherals , Reviews Provides: Notebook elevation and cooling Developer: NZXT Minimum Requirements: Notebook with USB ports Price: about $45 Availability: Now When you hear NZXT, you think gaming hardware, and rightfully so. But they make more than PC cases. This time, I took a look at the CRYO S aluminum notebook cooler. This notebook cooler/stand is made out of one super thick (3mm) piece of aluminum. It has a nice brushed black aluminum finish with some slots cut out, some grill work, and some rubber details to keep your notebook in place. Underneath the slab of metal are two 120mm fans. These are powered by either USB or an AC adapter. On the back are the dial for fan speed and a two port USB hub. The CRYO S will easily hold any notebook up to 15 inches. NZXT makes a larger model for, you guessed it, larger notebooks. Despite having two fans constantly spinning away, the CRYO S is notably quiet.  That’s thanks to how big the fans really are.  They’ll definitely be keeping everything except the hottest of the hot nice and cool.  The use of aluminum is appropriate as well.  I’m not certain how much it really helps to also dissipate heat, but it certainly can’t hurt.

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As another week passes, the seams of Apple’s App Store have been stretched even further with a deluge of new releases. Digging through the latest apps, I’ve selected four fresh picks for you to check out. It’s Halloween and so my top pick for this week is Alive 4-ever, a top-down zombie shooter with plenty of guts and gore to go around. I’ve also been checking out TowerMadness Zero, NASA and WordPress 2. Alive 4-ever ($1.79) As it’s Halloween, I thought that at least one of my top picks this week should be themed for the occasion. Despite the clumsy sounding name, Alive 4-Ever is a surprisingly polished top-down shooter. The plot is simple and disgustingly cliché: for whatever reason, a zombie apocalypse happens, you take to the streets to rescue other survivors. The game takes its inspiration from some of the best zombie titles out there, including Resident Evil and Left 4 Dead. There’s a battalion’s worth of weaponry on offer, including zombie-slaying classics like the AK-47. Plus, if you’re after more firepower you’re able to purchase bigger, stronger, faster guns in the shop after each level. There’s also a Bluetooth multiplayer mode, allowing you to jump into the action with three other friends. Alongside guns, zombies and survivors, the game throws in experience points too. Completing a stage earns experience points, these precious points go towards upgrading your character. In effect, you’re able to become the ultimate undead-destroying warrior. TowerMadness Zero (Free) Earlier this month, our own Alfredo Padilla took a look at 49 different tower defense games for the iPhone .

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