iTunes now lets you specify a preference for 1080p high definition video content from anything downloaded through the iTunes Store.
The default video setting prefers 720p though, here is how to change that to true 1080p HD:
If you’ve ever had to explain to someone that iPhone visual voicemail does not literally mean video voicemail, you know the potential disappointment that comes with it. What the user probably envisioned was the ability to record a quick video message and leave that as a video voicemail for the recipient to watch when they receive it. But it turns out that the iPhone can send video messages, they just aren’t going to be labeled as voicemail or sent through FaceTime, and in some ways this makes them even more flexible.
Here’s how to record and send a video message from the iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch:
From the receiving users perspective, using “Message” will act closer to what a video voicemail may be like, with the recipient getting a notification alert informing them a video has arrived. These come in like a standard MMS, though there’s a small video icon in the lower corner to demonstrate that it’s a movie, and when tapped it plays the video. This is best with iMessage, so be sure iMessage is set up and configured for all users to get the best results.
You can use email as well, though the video message will just be lost in their standard emails and it won’t arrive as a thumbnailed alert as the messages protocol does.
Is this video voicemail? Not quite, but it’s pretty close. Hopefully a future version of FaceTime will allow for video answering machines and voicemail boxes, but until then, using iMessage gets the job done and should satisfy most users.
MKV files are usually high quality videos compressed within a Mastroska container format. Typically you’ll encounter these with Bluray rips or video exported from an HD stream, and you might have discovered they won’t open in a standard movie player app. Not to worry though, MKV files can be played on a Mac easily, you just need to download a free application or codec that supports playing the high quality video format.
The most straight forward way to burn an ISO from a Mac is using Disk Utility, but you can also burn ISO’s and disk images directly from the command line with the help of a tool called ‘dd’. This works for Mac OS X and Linux, but we’re going to be focusing on the Mac here.
This dd burn function will work to burn an ISO to any target volume, be it a disc, hard drive, USB drive, memory card, DVD, or whatever other media you point it at.
The iPad 3 has been benchmarked to reveal tech specs of 1GB of RAM and an A5X 1GHz processor. The RAM is double that offered by its predecessor, and the CPU appears the same as that found in iPad 2’s A5 chip, suggesting the only major changes to the processor are in graphics capabilities.
Benchmarks were ran by Tinhte.vn, who managed to get their hands on a new third gen iPad a bit early and used the popular benchmarking app GeekBench. The new iPads score of 756 is roughly the same of an iPad 2, though Geekbench does not seem to adequately test the graphics processor on either chip, thus performance of graphics intensive activities like gaming and photo or video manipulation are yet to be determined.
The A5X processor is a dual-core CPU that includes quad-core graphics capabilities. The boosted graphics and increase in RAM are necessary to work with the high resolution Retina display included on the new iPad.
The third generation iPad is available in stores this Friday, March 16.
Want a free instant macro lens for your iPhone camera? Carefully apply a tiny drop of water to the lens, flip the iPhone over, and voila, you can suddenly take extreme close ups of just about anything. I know that sounds a little weird, but it works, and the results are fairly impressive.
If you like free online learning tools, you’ll enjoy Khan Academy’s new iPad app. Khan Academy is a popular educational service that aims to offer a free world-class education to anyone by way of over 3,000 video courses. These videos and lectures cover everything from biology, chemistry, physics, humanities, world history, finance, programming, computer science fundamentals, K-12 mathematics, and much more.
All Khan Academy videos are hosted on YouTube, so why have a dedicated app? The apps primary benefit is each video becomes downloadable, allowing for offline viewing. Considering how easy it is for online distractions to interfere with learning, that’s a significant plus. Other perks to using the app are subtitles, a progress log, and soon the app will include exercises too. Other than the ugly pea-green interface elements (please, just make them gray), the app is quite nice and well worth the free download.
Khan Academy app is currently for iPad only, but if you like free education, don’t miss the official iTunes U app either, it works with iPad and iPhone and offers tons of coursework as well.
Apple has updated Safari to version 5.1.4, and although the version number signifies a minor release the update includes several notable performance enhancements and bug fixes. From the average end-users perspective, an 11% boost in Javascript performance and improved handling of Safari extensions will be most noticeable, though the update includes many more changes and bug fixes which are listed below.
Safari 5.1.4 is available for Mac OS X 10.7 and OS X 10.6.8, and is a recommended update to all Safari users. Users can download the latest version via Software Update from the Apple menu or from Apple directly.
The official change list is as follows:
If you use Safari as your default web browser, don’t miss it.
SoundCloud is a popular online music and audio sharing service where a lot of bands and musicians will post their music for others to listen to. Frequently they’ll include a download link to songs, but depending on the posters account, they often have download limits that can be quickly maxed out on popular songs. The easiest solution of course is to just buy the song, but that’s not always an option either, so that’s where this bookmarklet comes into play.
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Now that the Mac has native Emoji support, you can set up text substitutions to automatically convert specific text to emoji when typing shorthand, abbreviations, or emoticons. Here’s how to configure the text-to-emoji conversions:
Battery life has been an ongoing issue for some iOS 5 users, particularly those with iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S. The recent iOS 5.1 update aimed to fix that with “improved battery life” mentioned in the release notes, but just how improved is it? With casual use since the update was released, the consensus at OSXDaily suggests the improvement is substantial, and thus if you haven’t updated your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch to iOS 5.1 yet, it is highly recommended to do so now.
Every user is going to notice different gains depending on their device usage and general battery health, but overall the improvements seem to be most noticeable on cellular iOS devices, particularly iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, and iPad 2 3G models. The assumption is that some of the potential location services issues has been resolved, though its certainly worth mentioning that users of the standard Wi-Fi models and iPod touch also report a nice boost, even if it doesn’t seem to be quite as dramatic (likewise, the original drain problem usually wasn’t as bad either).
Monitoring Your iOS Device Battery Life
To get a good feel for the improvement and to monitor battery drain, it’s best to have made note of the prior usage history and then compare it to the iOS 5.1 battery usage, but those who have already updated won’t be able to do this obviously. Nonetheless, it also helps to turn on the “Battery Percentage” indicator and make a mental note of usage data too. Here’s how to do both of these in iOS:
The percentage indicator displays alongside the battery icon in the upper right corner of the screen:
Update iOS, Calibrate the Battery, and More
Update to iOS 5.1 and hopefully any lingering battery drain problems will be resolved once and for all. Don’t forget to calibrate an iOS devices battery about once a month by letting it charge to 100% and then running it down to 0% before recharging again, that helps keep the battery in good health. It’s also a good idea to disable battery draining services you don’t use often, be it Bluetooth or Push Notifications, and you can check out some general iOS 5 battery life tips we have discussed before for more on that.
On a side note, if you’re unable to download and update iOS 5.1 try the DNS change we discussed recently, it should resolve that problem immediately and allow you to update without the network errors.
Did iOS 5.1 help your iPhone and iPad battery life too? Let us know in the comments.
Modern versions of Mac OS X include a nice new ability to be able to duplicate and paste files exactly. Basically this means that if a file is owned by another user, Duplicate Exactly and Paste Exactly will preserve the files original ownership and permissions, rather than copy the file with the current user becoming the new owner.
This is a useful feature for administrators, network admins, file sharing, and multi-use Macs, but it has other helpful purposes as well. Let’s cover how to use the Duplicate Exactly and Paste Exactly features in Mac OS.
This weeks Mac setup comes to us from Raphael C, who uses his Apple gear for iOS and web development. It’s a fairly simple setup, which is perfect for getting things done without too many distractions. Here’s the hardware in use:
T220 DisplayRaphael points out that the iPhone 3G is mostly around for nostalgia, although it probably continues to have use for testing purposes.
This is a great setup that closely resembles my own, and if you frequent our weekend Mac setups posts, you’ll notice a strong trend of laptop based workstations, where the primary machine is a MacBook Pro or MacBook Air connected to an external display and a keyboard and mouse. Other than the obvious portability aspect, the major advantage to using a Mac laptop is the ease of which a dual-screen setup is immediately possible just by connecting an external display. Maybe it’s just our readers who are inclined to do this, but speaking from experience, it’s a great way to boost productivity.
Send in pictures of your own Apple & Mac hardware setups! Email to osxdailycom@gmail.com and include some brief details of the hardware and what it’s used for.
Savvy iOS developers and hackers should get a kick out of this; you can enable hidden debug settings in some iOS apps by using a profile…
By downloading a few mobileconfig files, you can enable hidden debug settings for Messages, Bluetooth, and FaceTime that log activity and events for each protocol. What you do with that information is entirely up to you, but there’s definitely some room for learning and exploration here.
Spotlight is the powerful built-in search engine on Mac. Not only will it find just about any file or folder buried on your file system or attached drives, but it also doubles as a fantastically quick application launcher, dictionary lookup tool, and so much more.
If you aren’t using Spotlight on a regular basis yet you really should start doing so, and perhaps it’s just a matter of learning some great tips and shortcuts to help get you started.
With that in mind, here are 13 (11 original keystrokes + 2 bonus) helpful keyboard shortcuts and tricks to assist you in getting the most out of the excellent Mac search feature.
iOS 5.1 was released a few days ago but some people are still having problems when trying to update. The download can time out, not start at all, or sometimes throw an error message saying “Unable to Check for Update. An error occurred while checking for a software update.” or “The network connection could not be established.”
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iTunes now allows you to convert higher bit rate songs to three options: 128 kbps, 192 kbps, and 256 kbps. Enabling this option lets you save storage space on an iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad by compressing the music stored on the device. While intense audiofiles and those who want the absolute highest audio quality of their music will probably not want to use this feature due to the compression, most of us can’t tell the auditory difference between how a 256kbps AAC file vs a 192kbps ACC file sounds, thus it makes sense for many users to use. To use this feature, you’ll need iTunes and an iOS device, here’s what you’ll need to do:
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You may have noticed that with new versions of iOS on iPhone and iPod touch, the behavior changed for how to access the lock screen camera compared to iOS earlier versions. That camera change actually happened with iOS 5.1 and has carried forward to iOS 6, iOS 7, and iOS 8, and it has has caused some confusion as to how it works compared to earlier versions.
