TechnoBB – Page 17

The 5 Best Apps For Android TV

Android TV is a new media platform for video and gaming that runs either on a set-top box, or integrated into newer TVs. With Android TV, you’ll be able to access popular video apps, games, and other Android apps that have been optimized for a big screen experience. Here are five great apps that are a must for any Android TV user.

1. Vevo

Vevo has one of the most impressive collections of official music videos as well as live performances, news, and a community of music lovers. You can explore old favorites or search for recommended artists and performances from friends or music critics. Curated playlists, channels, and HD music videos ensure that Vevo delivers a great music experience.

2. VLC

The legendary media player VLC is of course also available for Android and Android TV. If you ever have a pesky video file that won’t play in a standard player or you just have a huge collection of varying formats, you can be sure that somehow, someway VLC will play it. It’s essential for anyone with a large video library but is also useful for just about anyone who wants to easily play videos.

3. Madefire Comics & Motion Books

If you’re a fan of comics, Madefire is for you. Featuring archives of classic comics as well as a steady stream of brand new content, Madefire also has comics that include sound and motion for a more modern, interactive experience. Many of the biggest publishers in comics have made their content available on Madefire and it even features daily free comics.

4. PBS KIDS Video

If you have youngsters and want to keep them entertained with a touch of education, the PBS KIDS Video app is perfect. With the app, you can access hundreds of free PBS Kids shows that are fun, informative, and made specifically with kids in mind. The app is easily navigable so kids of nearly any age can use it and the content is screened and safe.

5. Netflix

The king of video streaming, Netflix is also a must have for Android TV if you’re a subscriber. You can access millions of TV shows, movies, and new content streamed instantly to your Android TV. With a huge user base, Netflix sees constant updates and the interface is smooth and intuitive. Video quality is great and loads fast. There’s a reason so many people use and adore Netflix and it’s especially at home on a TV.

Top Five Best Bookmark Managers

Bookmarks might seem like an odd relic of the early days of internet browsers. If you liked a site, you could quickly add it to your bookmarks to quickly visit anytime you used your browser. Although they’ve been around for a while and even replaced in some ways by mobile apps and more advanced browsers, the fact remains that good old fashioned bookmarks are still one of the best ways to organize, save, and revisit your favorite links on the web. Rather than fully replacing bookmarks, smartphones, tablets, newer browsers and apps make saving and using them easier and more convenient than ever. Here are some great bookmark managers to try out.

1. Pocket

Pocket lets you save links to content from nearly any device from smartphones to PCs and then access them again from any device using your master Pocket account. From browser extensions that lets you save to Pocket with a click, to apps for nearly every mobile device, Pocket’s support for a wide range of browsers is unmatched.

2. iCloud Bookmarks

For heavy users of all things Apple, the iCloud bookmark manager is great for keeping everything synced up. From your iMac, to iPhone to browser, iCloud lets you easily save, organize, and access bookmarks on any of these platforms and devices. It’s definitely recommended if you’re an iCloud and Apple fan.

3. Xmarks

Xmarks is one of the best bookmark managers if you use multiple browsers on multiple platforms. You can access everything from your Xmarks account via a web interface that stores all bookmarks you’ve ever saved on any browser. It’s great if you like to use different browsers on different computers but want to easily access a large collection of bookmarks. There are also mobile app versions with Xmarks Premium.

4. Delicious

Delicious is a combination of bookmark manager and social networking service. It has a unique feature that lets users share and rate bookmarks so you can quickly see what’s of interest to friends and other users and check it out for yourself. It’s also a top rate bookmark manager with web access to all of your bookmarks.

5. Google Bookmarks

If you’re looking for a spartan bookmark manager, Google Bookmarks is a very simple but effective one. With Google Bookmarks, you can save, label, and add notes to links on the web which will be automatically stored in Google’s cloud and tied to your Google account. You can then easily access them anywhere you can access your Google account via web browser. If you don’t want too many confusing bells and whistles, this bookmarks manager is a real humdinger.

How To Adjust Battery Saver Mode in Windows 10

One new trick Windows 10 has up its sleeve is Battery Saver, a special low power mode which disables background apps, screen brightness, etc. to maximize the amount of time your device’s battery remains functioning. This is more suited to tablets and smartphones that rely heavily on portability and having sufficient battery life though there’s no reason it won’t work on a laptop as well. Of course there are tradeoffs with using Battery Saver in that you’ll see lower performance and background tasks will not run in other apps. You can adjust some of Battery Saver’s features and decide how much is disabled when it is running. Follow these steps to adjust the settings for Battery Saver mode.

1. Launch the Settings app, then click System.

2. Now click the Battery tab. There will be an entry called ‘Battery Use‘, click it.

3. Below, you will find another entry called ‘Change battery saver settings‘. Click it to begin adjusting Battery Saver mode.

4. Here you will find all the options available to adjust how Battery Saver works. First is a bar that you can set to tell Battery Saver when to begin operating. The default is set to start Battery Saver at 20% remaining battery power, but you can adjust this to any percentage. You can disable push notifications from apps while in Battery Saver and also choose whether or not to dim the screen.

5. There is also a list of apps that you can add to. Any app in the list will be allowed to run fully, with notifications and background tasks even when using Battery Saver mode. This is ideal for certain apps that take high priority or that you will use very often and don’t want to have disabled during Battery Saver mode operation.

6. To turn off Battery Saver mode entirely, you can uncheck the box next to ‘Turn battery saver on automatically if my battery falls below:‘.

7. You can also disable the other features by unchecking the boxes next to their entries or remove an app from your list of apps that run unrestricted during Battery Saver mode.

That’s all there is to it. It’s worth experimenting with various settings to see how they affect battery life and find a balance that works for you.

Block Spam, Telemarketers and Identify Unknown Numbers With Truecaller

Although there are wonderful benefits to using smartphones, everyone has encountered the annoyance of spam, telemarketers, and calls from unknown numbers. At best these are minor inconveniences that are the cost of modern communication. At their worst, they can constitute harassment, loss of privacy and even render your phone unusable. Truecaller is an app that can help dramatically when it comes to screening, blocking, and tracking unwanted calls and spam text messages. It’s available on all major platforms, including Android.

If you’ve ever received a call from an unknown number, it’s natural to want to look it up and see if it is a legitimate contact or a telemarketer. Because there are so many numbers out there, it’s impossible to screen them all and it is always possible that you are receiving a legitimate call from an unknown number. It is also far more likely that it’s a telemarketer or wrong number. With Truecaller, you can simply go through your call history and tap a number to instantly search through a database and see relevant information on the number and check its legitimacy. When you receive a call, you can also quickly swipe the number and Truecaller will perform a search on it to see if it’s legitimate or who it is.

As a preemptive measure, you can also search for known local spammers and telemarketers and block them from calling you beforehand. Truecaller hosts an extensive database of known spam and telemarketing numbers both globally and for your local area and they can be set to be automatically blocked. If you do receive a call from such a number, the call notification will instantly show that it is not a trusted contact and even its status as a spammer, telemarketer, etc. You can also contribute to the database by reporting spam numbers.

Truecaller partly works via crowdsourcing contact data from its users so it is not foolproof and there are some privacy concerns. When you first load the app, it can pull contact data from Facebook and your phone and uses this with its own contact list database. The app promises that it does not upload your data so that it’s searchable by others but the fact that it accesses so much contact data could be a concern for some.

Source: TrueCaller On Google Play Store

Get Apple Watch Style Notifications on Your iPhone Lock Screen

If you’re the owner of an Apple Watch and have gotten used to the style of notifications, you might be pleased to hear that you can achieve a very similar effect on the iPhone now. With WatchNotifications, a tweak available on Cydia in the BigBoss repository, you can change your iPhone lock screen notifications to be nearly identical to those on the Apple Watch. To access Cydia, you’ll need to have jailbroken your iPhone which is thankfully available on the current firmware.

The notifications feature large bubble icons that alert you to the specific app the notification is from as well as a slick box with the actual information as well as the time it was received. If you prefer to have your interfaces the same across many devices, this is an easy way to unify the look on both the Apple Watch and your iPhone. WatchNotifications is not free but only costs $1.00 on the Cydia store.

Once you’ve downloaded the tweak and paid to unlock it, you can easily toggle the effect on or off from the standard Settings app. You can also disable the shadow beneath the app icon if you prefer that. That’s all there is in the way of customization but everything works well and as intended so there’s really not much need to change anything.

If you’re just fine with the way notifications look on your iPhone then there’s not much here for you. For others though, little changes in the look and feel of things can make a big difference and for only a dollar, it could be well worth it if you just can’t stand the minor difference from Apple Watch notifications. It’s at least nice to be given the option and opportunity to change the look via jailbreak tweaks which offer a flexibility of choice that Apple rarely does.

Hide OneDrive Photos From Appearing In Windows 10 Photos

Microsoft’s OneDrive cloud storage is enabled by default in Windows 10. It automatically uploads your videos and photos to the cloud and all content is also viewable through the Photos app in Windows 10. While for some, this might be a wonderful and convenient feature, others might have some privacy concerns with having all of their photos and videos readily available through the Windows 10 Photos app. It is extremely easy to disable this feature however, so if you have any concerns, just follow these steps to hide photos and videos.

1. Launch the Photos app in Windows 10.

2. Click the menu button on the top left (three horizontal lines). Then click ‘Settings‘ on the bottom left next to the gear icon.

3. Under ‘Sources‘, you’ll see an entry called ‘Show my photos and videos from OneDrive‘. There is a toggle switch below which is ‘On‘ be default. Switch it to ‘Off‘ to disable showing photos and videos in the Photos app.

Now when you use the Photos app, your OneDrive videos and photos will not automatically show up. This does not affect your uploading files to OneDrive or downloading them back, it simply stops them from being viewable by default in the Photos app. If you prefer that they do appear, simply go back to the toggle switch and put it back to ‘On‘.

Thankfully Microsoft has included this feature in the Photos app and will not force all users to allow their photos and videos to be fully viewable in the app. It’s always nice to be given the option whether you choose to use it or not. When the final release of Windows 10 finally rolls around, it’s likely that there will be even more flexibility, features, and control with both OneDrive and the Photos app. For now, this is a simple workaround that should keep most users happy.