Hasta La Gadget!

Is there anything more troubling in this modern world than having to use a credit card to pay for overpriced coffee? Thankfully, Starbucks is making life easier for iPhone, iPod touch, and BlackBerry users, releasing an app for those platforms that will let customers pay for their caramel macchiatos with their mobile devices at 6,800 standalone locations and 1,000 Target-based locations.

The Starbucks Card Mobile App is currently available as a free download from the Apple and RIM app stores. Beyond the aforementioned payment functionality, the app also lets users check the balance and add more money to the card (via credit card or Paypal), locate a nearby store, and check up on their Reward status.

Users pay by opening the app and waving the on-screen barcode across the store’s countertop scanner. According to Starbucks, more than one-third of the coffee giant’s customers own a smartphone, a number that, at least anecdotally, seems a bit low.

AirView is a free iOS app that lets you send video wirelessly between iOS devices, and from iTunes to iPhones and iPads.

The app does this by tapping into Apple’s AirPlay, the technology introduced in iOS 4.2 that lets you send music and movies from your iPhone to compatible devices. Up until now, “compatible devices” has meant either the AirPort Express router, the AppleTV v2 and a handful of third-party stereos.

Run the AirView app on any iOS device and it will then show up on your Wi-Fi network as a new destination for video, just like any other, and you’ll be able to choose it in the pop up list in iTunes or another iOS device. This lets you stream from iTunes to an iPad (previously impossible), or to send a movie from your iPhone to your friend’s iPad when you go visit.

It works perfectly in testing, with one big caveat: the app is for video-only. You can’t stream audio (although movie audio is transmitted, of course). This means you can’t use an old, broken iPod Touch as a makeshift AirPort Express. Not yet, anyway.

It’s worth grabbing this one now, as you never know when you may need it, it’s free, and it’s only 400k in size.

Also worth a mention is AirFoil, a well-established Mac (and now Windows) application from Rogue Amoeba which lets you stream any audio from a Mac (not just from iTunes) to an Airport Express or iOS device. That costs $25.

AirView product page [iTunes]

See Also:

• The Hidden Secrets of Apple's AirPlay
• AirPlay Can Stream to Apple TV From Any iOS App – Not Just iTunes …
• 3 Secret Apple TV Features Steve Jobs Hasn't Told You About …
• AirPlayer Lets You Stream Video From iOS to Mac

Microsoft releases OneNote app for iPhone, free for a ‘limited time’ originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Jan 2011 22:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We know exactly what Canada’s Rogers is thinking right now: “c’mon, T-Mobile, you guys are leaving money on the table!” Though Rogers and its Fido subsidiary are charging CAD $50 to unlock an iPhone, T-Mobile’s Dutch division is now willing to do it gratis, citing the fact that multiple Dutch carriers now offer the iPhone and they no longer feel the need to keep it SIM-locked. Refreshing attitude, isn’t it? As of January 12th, newly-activated iPhones on T-Mobile Netherlands are unlocked automatically; existing customers can call into customer service to get an unlock now, or wait until February for a do-it-yourself method. Of course, the irony is that when a carrier treats you that well, you don’t really want to leave — but this’ll be a great option for folks that do a lot of roaming and don’t care to go the ultrasn0w route.

[Thanks, Gijs]

T-Mobile Netherlands starts offering free iPhone unlocks originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Jan 2011 17:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s been a long time coming, but it’s starting to look like things just might be starting to maybe, possibly line up for the white iPhone 4. We saw some inventory shots from Vodafone Germany ourselves yesterday, and now Mac Rumors has turned up a shot of it own that appears to show both 16GB and 32GB versions of the phone in Best Buy’s inventory system in the US. What’s more, these listings also show a specific in-stock date of February 27th and, for what it’s worth, the model numbers match those that first turned up in Best Buy’s system when it was originally taking pre-orders for the difficult-to-manufacture phone. Of course, we still won’t be fully satisfied until we start seeing some actual boxes with white iPhones in them, but here’s hoping we won’t have to wait too much longer for that to happen — Apple still hasn’t pushed back that “spring 2011” date, after all.

[Thanks, Micah ]

White iPhone 4 purportedly turns up in Best Buy’s inventory system, launching February 27th? originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Jan 2011 16:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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