iPhone Life - Best Apps, Top Tips, Great Gear

I recently added a dashcam to my car, so I'm running out of USB ports. Fortunately, Moshi sent me the QuikDuo Car Charger (starting at $24.95) to try. I tried the higher-end model, which has a USB-A port and a USB-C port. The entry-level model has two USB-A ports. The USB-C option is great for my iPhone as I can use a USB-C to Lightning cable for fast charging (up to 50 percent in 30 minutes!). The other USB-A port is fine for my dashcam, which runs off microUSB.

Apple has once again set the standard for wireless earbuds with the AirPods Pro. Consequently, the market has followed with competitors approaching the market to either compete against Apple head-on, or flank Apple with low-cost alternatives. This article examines two sub-$100 AirPods alternatives that deliver adequate sound quality at less than half the cost of Apple's Airpods Pro.


The iPhone is an ideal platform for listening to online radio stations. In this article, I explain everything you’ll ever need to know about all this. You’ll learn how radio stations can be listened to on even non-jailbroken iPhones, without any hacks to play stations in the background; I also present a very thorough comparison of currently available third-party radio software.

First and foremost, let’s take a closer look at the built-in, out-of-the-box radio support.

1. Built-in capabilities: QuickTime

All versions of the iPhone (and, of course, the iPod Touch – from now on, I refer to all these as “iPhone”), under OS3, already have support for playing back some (not all!) possible radio stream types.

Erase data after 10 failed passcodes

By Anonymous (not verified)

You can set a passcode on your iPhone or iPod touch to keep your data secure. To do this:

  1. Go to Settings >General >Passcode Lock and enter a four-number passcode. (Please make it a little more challenging than “1234.”)

If security is very important to you, you may want to set the “Erase Data” option. When set, this option wipes your storage memory clean after 10 consecutive failed attempts to enter the passcode. To activate this:

  1. Go to the Set Passcode screen as described above.
  2. After you have entered a passcode and confirmed it, a second screen labeled “Passcode Lock” appears. Slide the “Erase Data” button to the on position

Activate multiple keyboards

By Anonymous (not verified)

 You can have more than one keyboard layout active on your device at any time. So, for example, an international executive who did business in the U.K. and Russia could keep an English and Russian (Cyrillic) keyboard active and switch between them when composing notes and e-mail messages.

To activate different keyboards:

Here's a tip that you might not use too often, but that's useful to have if you have to get through an audiobook quickly, say, for a class or work assignment. Did you know that you can speed up the playback tempo in your Audible app on iPhone? You can also slow down the narration speed, although I've never needed to use that feature. Read on to learn how to speed up or slow down the narration speed in the Audible app on your iPhone. 

I’ve long been complaining about the lack of any “find in page” functionality in most mobile Web browsers. Now that I’ve played a bit with JavaScript scriptlets, I can proudly present a working solution to this problem.

All you need to do is, independent of the Web browser you use, add the following favorite:

If you've been having trouble with pop-ups on your iPhone whenever you try to browse online, you're probably hoping for a way to block pop-ups on Safari. Luckily, your iPhone does have a way to disable pop-ups in Safari so that you don't have to deal with these annoying interruptions anymore. Conversely, you may want to enable pop-ups on your iPhone if the pop-up blocker for Safari is stopping pop-ups you actually need. Let's get started learning how to disable and allow pop-ups in Safari on your iPhone so you can browse the web in peace. (Note that this article doesn't cover how to disable in-app rating requests on the iPhone; you will need to do that in the App Store settings.)

A couple days ago I posted about "crap apps": entertaining and completely useless apps A couple days ago I posted about "crap apps": entertaining and completely useless apps that in some cases make a lot more money for the developer than serious apps. Now the Wall Street Journal has an article on what might be called "ad apps": apps whose main purpose is to promote a product.

If you're getting ready to trade, give away, or sell your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, you're probably wondering how to erase your iPhone, then restore your iPhone to factory settings, so all your data and settings are deleted. If you want to know how to factory reset an iPhone, there are two methods for accomplishing this. If you have a computer available, you can factory reset your iPhone with iTunes or the Finder. If you need to know how to reset your iPhone or iPad without a computer, you can still factory reset your iPhone from the Settings app. If you're wondering how to delete everything on your iPhone, it doesn't matter which model you have. A factory reset for an iPhone works the same way, whether it's an older generation like an iPhone 4, 5, 6, 7, or a newer iPhone 8, X, or 11. Ready to learn how to wipe an iPhone or iPad and completely reset it? Let's get started! 

There are two ways to set a custom image as the wallpaper of your opening “unlock” screen:

  • Go to Photos, display the desired image, tap on the lower-left options button, and select “Use as Wallpaper” from the pop-up menu.
  • Open the Settings app and select General >Wallpaper.

Either of these methods allows you to use any photo or image on the iPhone/iPod touch as wallpaper. Follow these steps to add a wallpaper folder, so you don't have to look through all your photos to find an image:

Yesterday I wrote about a FAIL where movies for many iphone users are not playing. I do not have a the full answer as to why it’s not working, although it seems that the .flv (flash version) of the video is playing instead of the h.264 (apple version).   As of this writing, it still does not work for me; even after a few reboots.  However, I did find a way to get video to work.

I represented iPhone Life magazine at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, and there was plenty of news to report for iPhone and iPod touch users. The following are notes from the event, plus brief reviews of some of the gadgets we were able to get our hands on after CES was over.

High-tech headwear

At least two vendors are trying to integrate headphones or speakers into something you already wear.

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