“iPod” collection
Discover essential software tips, hardware reviews, and troubleshooting guides for the Apple iPod series of portable media players. This collection focuses on device synchronization, battery maintenance, and integrating audio hardware into your modern digital home.
HTD Tech Briefs
View all →June 10, 2013
Apple WWDC 2013 – HighTechDad’s LiveStream
In anticipation of the Apple WWDC 2013 event, I thought that I would test out something new by trying to cover some of the event via a live stream. Note, this is completely an experiment. You probably can get faster live stream feeds from some of the other major sites or directly on the WWDC event page (provided you have…
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March 13, 2013
How To Fix a Broken iPhone Home Button – A Free & Easy Software Fix
Yesterday I received a panicked call from one of my daughters - "Daddy, my iPhone's home button is broken!" Tears and wailing ensued. But, as with any broken gadget, I was up for the challenge, knowing that I could either replace the iPhone home button myself or figure out some other way to breath a few extra days or weeks…
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February 5, 2013
How To Change Your iOS Device’s Root & Mobile User Password After Jailbreak and OpenSSH Install
As many of you may know, the latest untethered jailbreak tool for iOS called Envisi0n was released to the general public yesterday (2/4/13). As a consequence, the Cydia installer which manages all of the repositories for 3rd party app that you can install on your jailbroken iOS device was pretty much hammered. Things are coming back to normal now (but…
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January 28, 2013
Apple Posts iOS 6.1 Release – Here’s What’s New & How to Update!
After releasing iOS 6.1 beta 5 to developers this past weekend, Apple released iOS 6.1 to the public today (Monday Jan 28, 2013). Updates can be obtained directly via your iOS update or via iTunes. You can also download the .ipsw directly from Apple. Details on these processes are below. So what is new in this iOS release? Honestly, there…
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January 9, 2013
iOS Apps & Backups are Hogging Up Your Hard Drive – How To Easily Free Up Disk Space
I don't know about you but I am always looking for ways to clear up my laptop's precious free hard drive space. I have tools that clean caches, temporary files, language files, logs and files in my trash. But I never seem to get ahead of the game. I probably never will but a periodic cleaning is always an important…
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June 11, 2012
HighTechDad’s Father’s Day 2012 Reviewed Gift Buying Guide
Rev up those Father's Day gift engines, it's that time of year again! Yeah, I'm a bit late in getting together my list of products that you might want to consider for your dad for Father's Day, but you will still have a few days to get those gifts (or write up a nice IOU card). Anyway, this is a…
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May 1, 2012
Take a Piano With You Wherever You Go With The Line6 Mobile Keys For PC, Mac & iOS
When I was young, I played the piano. I was ok at it, did plenty of recitals and learned enough over 5 years to be able to still do some sight-reading even now. My middle daughter, who is 10 now, is quickly surpassing my skills, although for a while, I was able to sight-read some of her pieces so that…
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March 5, 2012
A Theater in a Box – BenQ JoyBee GP2 Portable Projector for iPhones, iPods & other Devices
I would hazard to say that most of us have big screen TVs in our home. Mine is pretty darn old actually, a 60" DLP HDTV, that, while it has withstood lengthy hours of entertainment, could start to have issues any day. I have been considering when that day comes and what I will do. Part of me thinks I…
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November 29, 2011
How To Configure Location-Based Reminders on the iPhone with iOS5
I kept hearing about how with iOS 5, you could set up Reminders that would trigger when you arrived or left a particular location. It's a pretty neat concept. You can program in an address, like your work, and set up a series of to-dos that magically remind you when you are geographically near that location. Or perhaps, you are…
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November 14, 2011
Count ‘Em – 22 Pockets in a Lightweight Vest – Scott E Vest
I'm writing much of this review on an airplane right now. And I'm wearing a Scott E Vest (SEV) Classic Men's Travel Vest. Just a few minutes ago, I lost my free drink ticket in one of the 22 pockets in the SEV lightweight vest. I did manage to find it a few minutes later, buried deep in one of…
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October 28, 2011
How To Fix Applications Crashing After Upgrading to Apple iOS5 on the iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch
The upgrade to Apple's iOS 5 is a few weeks behind us now and most people are up and running on it. And, now the iPhone 4S is out in the market and more people are migrating over from older iPhones to the new iPhone 4S. I haven't heard of too many issues as part of the upgrade process, though…
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October 17, 2011
iOS 5 Tips: Cell Data for Purchases, Custom Vibrations and Hourly Weather
Last week I talked about a few new tidbits and tricks in Apple's new version of its mobile operating system, iOS 5 (enable Emoji keyboard, get the camera button to appear in the lock screen and how to launch the new built-in dictionary). I have 3 more pretty cool little tips and tricks this time around, namely: cellular data for…
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