SmartScore NoteReader
Company: Musitek
Price: Free (in-app purchase)
Optical Character Reading (OCR) software is tricky. Although it’s come a long way from the unreliable and inaccurate offerings of the 1980s (when it first became available for personal computers) if it doesn’t present you with a usable digital representation of your (scanned) hard copy which is also 99% accurate, it really has little more than curiosity value.
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MyMac contributor Jackie Richards died recently. She was a close friend to Suzé, Nemo, and many of our friends and family members. Jackie contributed to more than 20 of our articles and podcasts, including a major two-part feature on Adobe InDesign.
Jackie was the original geeky lady. She purchased and devoured techie gear sooner and more intensely than anyone we knew. We first met Jackie after she retired, and she was going strong up to her last mouse click, digital photo edit, audio stream, and iOS app digital art creation.
Gaz and Guy are in rare form this time around…or maybe not, who can tell? They go into some of the buzz surrounding various governments talking about safe keys to private messaging because we all know that there’s no way if they could do it that no one else could…right? Right?
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Guy’s App Pick : Audio Hijack Pro 3 from Rogue Amoeba. $49 or $25 upgrade. If you work with audio on your Mac in any way, this should be something you have. Awesome new interface
Gaz’s Pick: Argh it’s a Microsoft product, but just hang on a minute you might find this quite useful 
People’s Pick: Allister Jenks Enter MailSteward. I pointed it at my four email accounts that are configured in OS X/Mail and said get me everything before 2007. Done. “I found 147 emails, 32 duplicates.” And there they were. Listable, searchable and looking like real email again.
VisionTek High Power Seven Port USB Charging Hub
Company: VisionTek
Price: $49.99 US
The VisionTek High Power Seven Port USB Charging Hub (which I will hereafter refer to as the “VisionTek Charging Hub” for brevity) is a small 0.9” x 1.8” x 4.3” silver anodized aluminium rectangular hub with a press on/off power switch, a sensibly diffused orange LED on indicator and seven powered USB charging ports. It is built solely for the purpose of plugging in your USB chargeable devices such as mobile phones, tablets, music players, Bluetooth earpieces/headphones, satellite/GPS navigators and any other USB chargeable items you may have. If you prefer a “sync and charge” hub then VisionTek have that covered too with their VisionTek Charge & Sync USB 3.0 Seven Port Hub
The LEGO Movie Videogame
Company: Feral Interactive
Price: $29.99
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It was hard to ignore The LEGO Movie in 2014. The film, as of this writing, has grossed over $257 million dollars in the U.S., and over $211 million dollars in foreign markets. The song Everything Is Awesome almost became the theme song for 2014, much like the music from Frozen was the year before. And as soon as the first trailers for the movie were released, I knew it was only a matter of time before there would be a video game based on the movie.
Best 2015 New Audio Gear – RIVA Turbo X Speaker and thinksound rain2 In-Ear Headphones – Nemo Memo
RIVA Turbo X Premium Portable Bluetooth Speaker
Riva Audio
$349 U.S.
rain2 In-Ear High Definition Headphones
thinksound
$100
The best new audio gear is produced by small, independent companies that develop innovative approaches to the sonic experience.
RIVA Turbo X Premium Portable Bluetooth Speaker is the size of a small loaf of bread, but weighs a lot more and sounds great. Its rectangular edges are rounded and contoured, with magnificent attention to detail in the physical product. Design is stellar, and functionality is effortless. The unit is available in either all black or all white.
Gas is away this week so Jodi Spangler from Lakeshore Mac steps in to talk about the types of scams some people try to pull on her clients. Gas
did phone in a Gaz’s tip so officially the is STILL a GMen show!
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Guy’s App Pick : MyFitnessPal Free!
Gaz’s Pick: Well although I’m not here I thought I’d send in the fact that I’ve been using the Apple Maps App, and as Guy is recording this show it should be helping me drive home after guiding me to the places I’ve visited in Belgium. There again I might be having a rant so watch this space
Jodi’s Pick: Vidgets: This free iOS 8 App takes advantage of Notification Center and actually gives it some functionality. Once you install it from the App store you can quickly and easily choose functions like weather, barometer, battery usage, memory usage, altitude, sunrise, sunset and much more. What ever you select within the App becomes available in Notification Center with a quick downward swipe. Even from the lock screen. Get it here:
People’s Pick: Erick Diaz B
Chrome Remote Desktop released yesterday for iOS. Universal app. Free remote connection to mac, pc, Linux. You install an extension in chrome on the computer, allow it to control it, set a passcode or password and you have unlimited computers as far as I know. Works perfectly. And it’s free.
Seagate Wireless Plus
Company: Seagate
Price: 500GB ($150), 1TB ($160), 2TB ($200)
People love their iPads, iPhones, iPod touches, and will most likely love whatever new iThings Apple comes out with in the future. They’re fast, efficient, portable, capable of nearly anything you might want a desktop or laptop computer for, but there’s a basic need in which they’re sorely lacking. No, it isn’t multiple user support, or better multi-tasking, or its lack of a usable file system (though it sure would be nice if they included some of those). It’s storage. Seagate has something that will give you that storage and a lot of it!
Alpha Glass Privacy Screen Protector for iPhone 6
Company: Otterbox
Price: $34.95 USD
Apple’s iPhone 6 is a beautiful engineered and designed communication and entertainment device. Users want to protect it so they take the time to purchase cases to protect their investment. The one thing that worries a lot of iPhone users is the durability of the iPhone’s screen. How strong is it and how resistant to everyday wear and tear?
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Survival Straps – Energizer or Exposé?
Having trouble sleeping? Feeling stiff from too many hours sitting in front of a computer? How’s your energy level these days? What if I told you everything will be better if you tie a piece of parachute cord around your wrist and wear it as a bracelet for a few days?
Fire HD 7 Tablet
Company: Amazon
Price: $139
When the first Fire Tablet came out, I was an early adopter. I purchased the initial one within weeks of its release, hoping that it was the new competitor that would give Apple a run for their money in the tablet space. And for the first couple days, I really though the original Fire was it. It wasn’t.
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The Case Show! Well, kinda. In answer to Neil’s question last week, FaceBook and Twitter weigh in on the case question for smart phones. Also, is Apple’s software getting worse? Apple also stopped the Single of the Week promotion, and Tim, David, and Owen discuss this and many other topics.
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Airport International LE Classic
Company: ThinkTank Photo
Price: $420 U.S.
When shopping for a camera bag, it’s important to give some thought to how you’ll use it. Just as you don’t need a $5,000 Nikon DSLR to take good pictures of your nephew’s birthday party, neither do you need a $400 rolling camera suitcase if you’re just traveling short distances and not carrying a pile of gear.
OWC Express 2.5″ Portable USB 3.0
(Black version OWCES2.5BU3B, Silver version OWCES2.5BU3S)
Company: OWC
Price: $27.99 Silver,$22.25 Black
With USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt ports available on recent computers, using an external storage device is becoming a very attractive option for a bootable drive. In this review we explore the OWC Express 2.5″ Portable USB 3.0 external enclosure as an option to install a bootable SSD to a 2012 Mac mini.
Brother HL-3170CDW Color LED Printer
Manufacturer: Brother
Price: $279.99
Internet: $200
This innovative printer employes Light Emitting Diodes in place of a laser in the Xerographic process. Although Brother makes no such claims or promises, this new technology should lead to lower power consumption over a longer useful in-service lifespan. The 23ppm print speed and a print resolution of up to 600 x 2400 dpi give very credible results on inexpensive copy paper. This is not to say that the print quality rivals that of a good ink jet printer using photo quality media. But for business reports, casual brochures and other communication with a limited life span this may be the perfect choice.
SuperDuper!
Company: Shirt Pocket
Price: $27.95
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Super Duper! is the highly acclaimed program that allows you to easily create bootable backups. The straight forward user interface makes it easy for novice to professional to automatically create a cloned backup of your computer.
Peter Jackson couldn’t do it, Tolkien himself couldn’t do it, but Microsoft could and did. They stopped the Hobbits…temporarily anyway. Guy and Gaz finish their discussion on the best time to buy Apple stuff and so much more.
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Guy’s App Pick : ArtText 2 by Belight Software $19.99
Gaz’s Pick: Diptic both in the Mac and IOS App stores, basically create one image from multiple images within a set of frames. £0.79 with in app purchases for IOS not required and not bad prices to be honest.
Mac
iOS
People’s Pick: Rob Rait
Serial Podcast. This is like a serialised docu-drama about a murder 15 years ago where the narrator of the podcast is investigating the circumstances of the case. Still ongoing so I’ve no idea whether they’ll find the convicted perpetrator innocent or not. Gripping stuff
This is the podcast that has had the media going on about the re-birth of podcasting. Apparently it was the fastest growing podcast on iTunes ever.
8-Bit Toast Wood Case for iPhone 6 Plus
Company: Toast, Inc.
Price: $44.00
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At a recent tech industry trade show, I came across the company Toast, and Matias Brecher. I vaguely remembered a Kickstarter campaign from 2012 with the project being a slim wooden case for smartphones. That was Matias Brecher’s, and the Kickstarter funding was a success. With the amount of tech news I take in on a daily basis, I forgot about Toast. So when I finally saw the wooden case in person at the trade show, the fit and finish, I knew I had to try one.
Crüsta case for iPhone 6
Manufacturer: Amzer
Price: $45.00
Crüsta
To case or not to case, that is the question. We love our iPhones but there are two distinct camps when it comes to protecting them versus carrying them around naked. Prior to the iPhone 6, the thick, blockish form factor was easy to grip but the 6 and 6 Plus are sleek, thin, and rounded. They seem almost slippery by comparison. Cases are rapidly appearing to aid those who are concerned about accidental damage.
Tim and David discuss CES, the new Micro-Computers, lasers, and EL Wires. Listener Neil Worton asks what you do with your smart phone: to case or not to case? And do iOS developers who don’t advertise or market their apps have any case to complain about low sales?
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