As powerful as iPhone and iPad are, they are not with their flaws. Apple may be finally addressing some of the hardware issues that iPhone 4 owners have faced since its launch day but the software side needs some attention too. While iOS 4.2 will start shipping in November, Apple does plan to fix iPhone 4′s proximity sensor bug and other issues with iOS 4.1.

First of all, a lot of bugs have been fixed … Proximity sensor bugs, Bluetooth bugs, iPhone 3G performance bugs. All the bugs that we’ve been nailed on. We think we’ve nailed a lot of them.

Steve Jobs promised. It is not clear whether this new update will fix the major issues that have come up for older iPhone owners after upgrading to iOS 4. In the meantime, Apple is already looking ahead to iOS 4.2. Multitasking, folders, and wireless printing are all coming to iPad in November.

Here are just a few features that Apple iPad owners can expect to get their hands on with iOS 4.2:

• printing over wireless network
• wirelessly streaming videos to Apple TV
• the all new Game Center
• better email organization
• keyboard enhancements
• enhanced enterprise integration

Unfortunately, not all Apple devices will get a software upgrade. Old Apple TVs won’t be getting an upgrade but they can be used to rent movies:

there will be no software update to bring the new features to older Apple TVs. Older Apple TVs will continue to work as they have been working up to this point, and they will continue to be able to purchase movies and TV shows even though the new Apple TV is rental-only.

Apple should have brought multi-tasking and other useful features much earlier to iPad (the same goes for fixing iPhone 4 issues). Better late than ever at this point. The company does have very strong product offerings at this point. It will be interesting to see how its rivals will try to compete.

What’s your favorite new Apple product?

Steve Jobs knows how to deliver and do it big. Apple’s latest event was full of surprises (and a few disappointments). Apple iPod had been upstaged by iPhone and iPad for quite some time. The new iPod Touch got FaceTime, a retina display, and a decent camera. Apple wants iPod Touch owners to use their device as a mobile gaming device. iPod Touch’s A4 processor should make playing more sophisticated games possible. Besides, Game Center (another new service by Apple) will allow gamers to play against others around the globe using their iPod Touch.

Apple iPod Touch 4G is expected to sell like hot cakes, but consumers will want to give Apple TV and iPod nano a look too. We all knew Apple was going to get in the “social” business soon. Ping is a social music network that lets iTunes users to connect with artists and their friends and discover new things (and find new friends in the process). The interface may be buggy at this point, but that’s understandable for a first generation social network.

The Apple TV announcement was perhaps the most disappointing part of yesterday’s event. The device has been upgraded and has a lot of merits. But it has ways to go before it reaches what some of us expected of it prior to yesterday’s event. This Apple TV will have a tough time dominating the set-top box market.

Apple TV may be underwhelming but the company announced so many new products and services that should keep Apple fans happy for quite some time. The new iPod Nano and iPod Touch will make iPod relevant again. Ping is quite an impressive (but buggy) concept at this point. We did not hear any announcements about the next generation iPad or the other iPhone that Apple is working on. We suspect Apple has chosen to keep its cards close to its chest at this point.

We are never going to get Apple to admit that some things went wrong with iPhone 4′s design/development process. The issue of death grip threatened to become a major disaster for Apple early on. Apple bounced back from it by throwing together a conference and blaming everything but its design team. Apple may have not admitted iPhone 4′s design flaw, but it did get rid of one of the top people behind iPhone 4 team. It seems the company is ready to start shipping new iPhone 4 models with better antennas. According to multiple sources, iPhone 4.1 will start shipping right after September 30th. That’s the last date of eligibility for those free bumper cases for iPhone 4.0 owners.

Telcel’s director of value-added services, Marco Quatorze discussed this news just recently. While Apple has spent a lot of money giving away free cases to its customers, it seems to have found a way to solve its antenna issue just before the start of the holiday shopping season. This is a rumor at this point, but all signs points to an upgrade being in the works as far as iPhone 4 is concerned.

MacRumors does not fully buy this story. After all, Apple may be just stopping the free case program as it sees no issues with iPhone 4′s design:

The veracity of Quatorze’s claim is unknown, as it is unclear whether a carrier executive at his level would even be privy to such information, and it is possible that he may simply be mistaken in his understanding of Apple’s September 30th expiration date for the free case program.

One should not expect Apple to publicly admit there has ever been anything wrong with iPhone 4. It will be interesting to see how early adopters respond to this move. Apple has had issues with early adopters in the past (especially when reducing its prices). How is the company going to convince people to become early adopters of its products when it is giving the shaft to early iPhone 4 owners?

Apple gets a lot of flak for being stubborn and not admitting its mistakes. No one can question the fact that the company cares about the experience it offers to its customers. Releasing iPhone 4.1 will upset a few iPhone 4 owners, but it is the right move in the end.

Sleep aid apps can help put your body in the right cycle and even put you to sleep when you are stressed. If you are suffering from insomnia or just want to get a more quality sleep each and every night, these 6 iPhone apps can help:

Sleep Cycle Alarm Clock: a well known iPhone application that analyzes your sleep patterns and wakes you in the lightest sleep phase. It monitors your movement and finds the best time to wake you up.

Proactive Sleep Alarm Clock: an alarm clock on steroids. It helps you track sleep amount, time of sleep, difficulty falling to sleep, and sleep efficiency. It gives you personalized tips about your sleep.

Sleep Machine: it’s essentially a 4 in 1 app. It’s an alarm, a clock, a sleep timer, and an ambient sound player. Has plenty of ambient sounds that can relax you and put you to sleep.

aSleep 3 for iPhone: another super sleep application for iPhone. Can be used as a timer, an alarm clock, and a night clock. It has plenty of fun sounds to relax you. It can kill your snores too. Watching chromotherapy can help put you to sleep too.

Pure Sleep Premium: has plenty of ambient sounds that you can take advantage of to reduce your stress and put yourself to sleep (without any medication). It can be used as an alarm clock too.

Sleep Analyzer: keeps track of your sleep noises during the night and helps you find out why you are not getting proper sleep each night. Just put your iPhone next to your bed and set a decibel threshold. The app only records sounds that exceed that threshold and shows you your disruptions the very next day.

Did we miss anything?

Long before Apple started the iPhone revolution, Apple iPods were king. We all remember the good old days when the click-wheel feature in iPod was considered something very special. These days, all we hear about are touch-screens, multi-touch, cameras, and tablets. iPods have become somewhat stagnant, and, dare we say, irrelevant. Consumers may be more interested in buying multi-purpose devices these days. That does not mean Apple is ready to give up on iPods just yet. The company is planning to unveil those new iPods on September 1st and iPod Nano is expected to get a major upgrade.

Courtesy of Geek.com

From the images and product info linked to the Internet, it seems the new iPod nano will have a touch-screen display and a square-shaped design. Could iPod nano get WiFi capability? Apple did add camera to a select few iPod models a while ago, so that is not impossible. Apple is planning to bring its apps to all its devices. If Apple TV is getting applications, so could iPod nano.

There is no question iTV and iPod Touch with retina display will steal the spotlight at the upcoming Apple event. Other Apple iPods are never going to be as relevant as they used to be just a couple of years ago. In fact, iPod classic seems to be on its last leg. There is not much Apple can do with iPod Classic’s design. With all the shiny and touch-capable devices Apple is introduces, the demand simply won’t be there for the good old iPod classic units.

Apple has had quite an astonishing year in these tough times. It has successfully made Apple iPad one of the best gadgets one can buy this year. The company has gotten over iPhone 4 issues (or it seems like it). The new Apple TV, iPod Touch video, and iPad nano (which is what iPod nano seems to be) will give Apple fans plenty of options ahead of the holiday season.

BoxWave Apple iPad Headrest Mount: very helpful if you have a few kids sitting in your backseat and want to entertain them without actually handing over your iPad. It does keep your iPad safe and sound when you are driving.

Padholder iPad Holder: lets you use your iPad hands free (or close to it). At the very least, you can use it to go through your maps while driving.

Car Cup Holder Mount: if you are too uncomfortable with mounting your iPad on your windshield, you can use this product to do the job using your car’s cup holder.

Car Air Vent Mount for iPad: mounts your tablet in your car on your vent. Useful for those who want to use their iPad as their navigation device. I have to admit, using this mount is a bit risky especially if you love hitting the brakes hard from time to time.

Car Dash Beanbag Gooseneck Mount: a heavyweight beanbag base with a flexible gooseneck suction mount that can be used in your car or even on a plane. The choice is yours.

Stay tuned as we add more iPad mounts to this list.

When it comes to picking up new apps, many iPhone and iPad owners rely on the reviews they get to read on iTunes. Not every app developer company offers a free version of its products, leaving consumers with the task of searching for reviews and feedback from other iPhone owners. Unfortunately, not all these reviews and positive recommendations are legitimate. While not every reviewer can be bought, there are people who will sell their souls just to get their hands on new shiny apps (and get a percentage of their sales). Developers understand the power of getting early positive reviews posted on iTunes. Some are willing to let “real users” do the job for them. Others try to buy positive reviews.

Reverb Communications, a California-based PR agency, recently got into hot water with the FTC for posting fake reviews to iTunes. The positive reviews posted looked as if they were from regular consumers. In reality, there were nothing more than paid endorsements. Reverb Communications may have settled its case with the FTC, but there is no question the issue of fake iTunes reviews is pretty widespread.

Reverb and Snitker did not disclose that they were hired to promote the games and that they often received a percentage of the sales. These facts would have been relevant to consumers who were evaluating the endorsement and deciding whether to buy the gaming applications.

This is pretty similar to the practice used by some iPhone review sites that charge for their work. The FTC has been getting tough on bloggers and affiliate marketers in the past few months. Getting paid for work is not a major issue as long as these companies disclose their relationship with app developers.

Unfortunately, it is very difficult to identify all fake reviews on iTunes. The same issue is going on at Amazon. The iPhone app review business is not lucrative for everyone, which is why some bloggers and marketers are willing to risk getting spanked by the FTC for short-term gains. The good news is a lot of these folks are not smart enough to take precautions to avoid getting caught.

Apple can probably learn a few things from what Amazon has done with its review system. As more people get their hands on iPhone and the platform becomes more mature, it should be easier for app shoppers to identify those fake positive reviews and buy apps that are worth their price.

In your opinion, are fake reviews a big issue in iTunes? Could you share any examples?

*photo courtesy of stock.xchng

Whether you are an aspiring consultant or an experienced professional looking to become more productive using your iPhone, these 10 consulting apps could help:

TDF Tracker: a powerful iPhone app for freelancers that can keep track of your time, expenses, and mileage. Makes it easy to enter information and keep track of these important aspects of your business.

NAVIGON MobileNavigator North America: as a consultant, you may have to travel to areas that you have never planned to in the past. Thanks to NAVIGON GPS apps, you’ll never be lost while doing it.

QuickVoice2Text Email: a powerful application that gives you the ability to send text messages to others using your voice. Great for taking voice memos.

Smart Plans 4: an all in one application for freelances that lets you keep track of your tasks, manage your projects, plan ahead, and manage your contacts.

iThoughts: a mind-mapping application for iPhone that helps your divide and conquer the most complicated challenges ahead of you. A great tool to organize your thoughts with.

GetPaid! – PDF Invoice & Time Sheet: an intuitive application that creates invoices and time sheets for you easily on the road. Lets you bill your customers and manage your payments.

Quickoffice Connect Mobile Suite: gives you the ability to manage all your Office documents on your iPhone. It works with cloud-based services too.

oDesk for iPhone: oDesk is a powerful website for finding work and outsourcing work. It’s the perfect service for freelancers. With this app, you can keep track of your team members easily.

Econtact Pro: it’s a manual transcription business card scanner that lets you store and manage your new contacts on your iPhone without having to worry about errors. It’s not a free service, but it’s pretty cheap for what it does.

AsteriskVM: it’s a visual voice-mail application that connects your iPhone to your Asterisk phone server. Saves you time when checking your voice-mail messages.

Being a freelancer is tough enough, so you want to get as much help as you can to manage your career more effectively. The above apps should help with that.

Credit: Macrumors

We are only days away from Apple’s planned event on September 1st. For months, we have known that new iPod Touch models would be getting video-recording capability. The next generation iPod Touch will have a front-facing camera too. Many experts expected Apple to introduce iTV at this event, but the change in date (from Sep 7th to 1st) seems a bit curious at this point. We still expect to hear some news about Apple TV at this event, but fans may have to wait a bit longer to get their hands on these devices.

Apple iPod Touch is not the only device that will be getting an upgrade. The camera and the rumored new shiny design for iPod Touch are nice, but Apple has not forgotten about iPod nano fans. As the above picture indicates, Apple may be going back to square-shaped iPod design after all.

The nano 6G case features an open strip on the rear – perhaps for a camera or built-in clip – as well as what appear to be volume buttons and a larger button on the top side while a Dock Connector and headphone port are along the bottom.

Apple iTunes may get a major overhaul in the near future too. The software has gone though many updates in the past few years. It seems Apple may finally be ready to bring a web-based iTunes to the market. It will be more about a social (and not streaming) experience. Nevertheless, it’s an exciting move by Apple (if the rumors are true).

music sources tell me they’re expecting a lightweight, Web-based version of the iTunes store. The new version would be designed to sync up easily with the rest o the Internet and make it much easier for customers to share their musical tastes (but not songs) with friends.

Apple may not have everything in order to allow streaming music from the cloud, but this web-based iTunes should still work for those of you who just want to purchase music or share your favorite songs with your contacts. Then, there is this:

In theory, Apple could make it possible for you to move a copy of a song you bought on your iPhone onto your laptop without having to manually connect the two devices.

Apple has been planning for this move for quite some time. There is no better time to get started with this move than now.

Regardless of how one feels about jailbreaking and those behind it, there is no question that iPhone Dev Team has contributed a lot to the iPhone community. The team has been constantly providing hacks for iPhone updates to help those who want to try cydia applications or do other things get around the limitations Apple has put on iPhones. Unfortunately, Apple is hell bent on stopping the practice altogether. It has tried and failed in its legal efforts, but it may add a kill switch to stop jailbroken iPhones from operating the right way. While iPhone Dev Team has not given up on jailbreaking, it does not intend to play the “cat and mouse” game with Apple no more:

it’s a few weeks later, and Apple has closed the jailbreakme.com hole.  They’re shipping devices with FW 4.0.2/3.2.2, impervious to this particular jailbreak.  So now, people will begin to ask: will there be a jailbreak for devices that shipped with 4.0.2/3.2.2, out of the box? No, there won’t be.  FW 4.0.2/3.2.2 was *only* released to fix the jailbreakme hole.  With FW 4.1 still in its beta stages, it makes no sense to escalate the “cat & mouse” with Apple for FW updates that only fix the jailbreak holes.

Unlike what a few other sources have reported, the team has not given up on the practice altogether. The war against Apple has not ended, but the company is making life more difficult for jailbreakers each day.

If the cat & mouse game escalates too quickly, especially during beta FW periods, nobody but Apple benefits.  For this reason, there won’t be a 4.0.2/3.2.2 jailbreak specifically during the period where 4.0.2/3.2.2 is the latest public release.  At best, some future 4.1x FW jailbreak *may* be compatible with 4.0.2/3.2.2 (but don’t count on that).

Should you jailbreak your phone? There is no reason not to. But everyday that passes by, it becomes more difficult to do it with peace of mind. We still do not know what Apple intends to do with its kill switch and how it will be implemented. Having your iPhone warranty cancelled and your device disabled by Apple is not something anyone looks forward to. Apple won’t give up on its quest to stop all crackers anytime soon though.