Hasta La Gadget!

It’s springtime, and flowers are starting to bloom just like deals in a Cheap Geek column. Please enjoy this garden of savings.

1. You may not believe this, but Staples, the place that gives you a great price on paper clips as long as you buy a crate of them, is delivering a super price on an HP Pavilion notebook. And you don’t have to buy more than one! With instant savings you’ll pay only $549.98. BOnus deal: If you also buy an HP Deskjet printer (certain models only), you’ll get a rebate that covers the cost of the printer.

2. You rarely see a deal on gift cards, so I’m presenting this special offer on iTunes cards because it’s such a curiosity. Shop at Best Buy, and you can get three $10 iTunes gift cards for $25.00. That’s $5 of music free, an especially good deal if you buy it for yourself.

3. What is it about iPod and iPhone earbuds that make them so, well, crappy? If yours kick the bucket, as mine recently did, replace them with a set of Shure SE110 Sound Isolating Stereo Earphones, which are going for a low $65.95 (with free shipping) from Buy.com.

It’s finally here, and even a few minutes early. Skype for iPhone is now available in the US iTunes store, free of charge. We’ve heard great thing from the folks in Japan who’ve been fiddling with it for the last twelve hours, and so far it’s sounding pretty good for us, too, with only minor hiccups. Not sure if it’s a glitch, but despite what we heard earlier, we seem to be able to dial out while on 3G and not over WiFi (at least running OS 3.0 beta). Hit up the read link for quickest route to the app store page, and let us know what you think. Betcha wish you could ditch that AT&T voice plan now, huh?

Update: We’re getting reports the app is crashing for jailbroken iPhones — and possibly non-jailbroken ones as well. We just got our first denial when dialing out over 3G via a popup notification, but it only happened once and we were back to old habits one call later. We did experience a brief period where no sound was coming through, but that might have something to do with using OS 3.0 and was remedied by restarting the phone.

Update 2: So far, it looks like dialing over 3G’s only working for those with OS 3.0 beta, but unfortunately all of us in that situation are now suffering from frequent crashes and loss of audio. Things seem to be going smoothly for those running the latest non-beta firmware, but the calls only work over WiFi. That said, when using the app as intended (non-beta firmware over WiFi), audio quality was surprisingly good, far better than any third party apps we’ve used.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

Filed under: Cellphones

Skype for iPhone now live in US originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This article was written on September 26, 2007 by CyberNet.

It’s been about a day since Amazon launched the Public Beta of their DRM-Free Music store called Amazon MP3, and so far the reviews are extremely positive and users are happy with the ease of use, and the prices. Their slogan is “Play Anywhere, DRM-Free Music Downloads” but they should have added “for cheap” on to it. Prices for these DRM-free songs range from 89 cents to a maximum of 99 cents while iTunes charges $1.29 for their DRM-free music.  Most full albums range in price from $5.99 to $9.99, although there are some sold for $4.99 and under. Amazon may have actually caused Steve Jobs to get a bit concerned because now iTunes has a real competitor! A little healthy competition for Apple may actually be good.

DRM-Free means that once you download a song or album, you can play them on multiple devices like your computer (PC or Mac), your iPod, Zune, iPhone, BlackBerry, and the list goes on. Amazon’s library includes over 2 million songs by 180,000 artists with 20,000 major and independent labels. On the downside, while this may sound like a lot of songs, it’s really not. Most big name labels aren’t a part of this like Sony, and given that content is king, they’ll need more music.  If Amazon were able to ink a deal with some of the other companies, this would be huge.

When you click on a song or album, you’ll be able to preview the music (30 second clip) before buying. On the same page, you’ll also be able to rate the song, read customer reviews, leave feedback about the service, or view your recent history which shows your recently viewed products and recent searches. And of course there are advertisements and other product offers from Amazon. Below is an image of what the Amazon MP3 downloader looks like:

While I worked my way around the web today getting reactions from people, I saw comments like “the experience is fantastic!” or “Wow, this is amazing.” Their MP3 Downloader allows you to easily add the music you’ve downloaded to iTunes and Windows Media Player which leaves me wondering if iTunes will be able to remain the top digital music store for long?

Source: Amazon Earworm’s Blog

Image Source

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Related Posts:

• Amazon Uses TurboTax to Dive into Software Downloads
• Facebook as an iTunes Competitor?
• Apple Drops iTunes Plus Prices to 99 Cents!
• Why DRM-Free Is The Way To Go
• Amazon MP3 Downloader Available for Linux

March Madness: when being a work-from-home blogger pays off. Here are the apps that will help you squeeze every last drop of goodness from the NCAA Tournament, along with the week’s other app highlights.

Madness ’09: There are a flood of bracket tracking apps, most of which are horribly ugly and hastily constructed. Madness ’09 is one of the few that’s actually nice to look at, and it also pipes in live scores, stats and game previews/recaps from ESPN.com. Well worth the buck.

ESPN Tournament Edition Cameraman: There is still no Photo Hunt app that’s erotic enough for my liking, but in honor of The Most Wonderful Time of the Year, the Cameraman folks have released a college-hoops-themed Photo Hunt with ESPN. Well, I guess Larry Bird’s legs were kind of erotic in his Sycamore days. $1

FanFinder Sports Bar Locator: This app ties into the database of sports bars maintained by Sports Fan Live to help you find the local alumni haunts for your favorite tournament teams. Because it’s always more fun to get wasted with the home team fans while you watch. Free.

Boxee Remote: If you use the media center software Boxee on a home theater PC, this free remote app will be handy for text input and navigating menus without having to figure out a mouse/keyboard setup. Useful for Apple TV folks too, I imagine, since text input with the Apple Remote is a bitch. Free.

Locavore: There is no larger trend in food than “eating local” right now, but since its main tenets are increased deliciousness at a lower price (and enviro impact), it’s a trend that I have a hard time being cynical about. This app will not only help you find nearby farmers’ markets, but judging from your location, will tell you which fruits and vegetables are currently in season in your area. Cool. $3

How To Text a Girl: If there’s one thing a girl will love, it’s a canned, slightly suggestive SMS sent from an iPhone app. Trust me. $1

This Week’s App News On Giz:

• How To: Fake the iPhone 3.0 OS On Your iPhone Today

• Click here to read Hands On: Metal Gear Solid Touch iPhone App

• iPhone’s First Turn-by-Turn Navigation App XROAD G-Map Yanked from App Store

• Boxee Gets iPhone App Remote Control With Funky Trackpad Interface

• Why iPhone In-App Transactions Could Be a Disaster

• First iPhone 3.0 Apps Show Off New Functionality

• iPhone App Store Revamped For Content Subscriptions, Game Add-Ons, In-App Purchases

• Sound Curtain Noise Masking iPhone App Hands On

• Pin Up Weather For iPhone Delivers Sexytime Forecasts Rated PG-13

This list is in no way definitive. If you’ve spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our Favorite iPhone Apps Directory and our original iPhone App Review Marathon. Have a good weekend everybody.

The App Store loves novelty camera apps, but some (below) are more useful than others. This week, we also found a video streamer, a price-shopping helper and eight extra mouths for your mouthy self.

iPet Photo: Whether your cat or dog is turned on by monkey sounds, bird sounds or the sounds of other dogs, this camera app draws their attention for a quick snap. I tried it on my dumb cats, and it works fine, especially on the dumber of the two. Costs a buck.

Air Video: I had this local wi-fi video streaming app up and running in no time flat, serving up a MPEG4 video from MacBook Pro to iPhone in seconds. As you might have guessed, it does require a bit of Mac or PC software running, but it’s pretty unobtrusive. Nice way to watch movies when you should be doing something else. File compatibility is a little thin, but there’s a “convert” function I didn’t get a chance to test fully that might be very effective. Good way to spend $3.

PriceOfUnit: For nerds with a grocery fetish (like me), you can comparison shop the price-to-quantity ratios of everything from olive oil to pet food. It’s a little rough around the edges, but a good thing to have if you really want to gauge the value of your condiments. And it’s free.

MouthOff: A well designed novelty app that gives you an assortment of moving cartoon mouths, this moves the cartoon to mimic you actually talking, by reacting to the pitch and volume of your voice. It’s surprisingly well synced, though some mouths (green monster, gold-toothed pimp) are cooler than others. (That dog face reminds me of the Ballchinian from Men in Black.) One dolla make you holla… literally.

ReplayCam 25shot!: It’s no Cycorder, but this subtle multiple-shot camera app lets you make temporary videos, and save frames as stills. It will even save all the shots in a pretty 5×5 grid, assuming your subject is pretty enough to be looked at in a 25-shot matrix. It’s $2. (Macworld reviewed it in greater depth.)

This Week’s App News on Giz:
• Amazon Kindle Is Now an iPhone App

• Watchmen Getting an iPhone MMO Game

• Cydia Opening Paid App Store for Jailbreak Apps

• This iPhone App Will Result in At Least One Accidental Shooting

This list is in no way definitive. If you’ve spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our Favorite iPhone Apps Directory and our original iPhone App Review Marathon. Have a good weekend everybody—your regular iPhone Appster, Johnny “Egypt Me” Mahoney will be back from Cairo next week.