Samsung devices may dominate the Android market, but that doesn't mean everybody loves TouchWiz, the user interface on all of their smartphones and tablets. It's difficult to modify, comes with lots of bloatware, and isn't much to look at, to say the least.
As great as Google's own Play Music app is, your MP3 library is restricted to Google's own app. There are much better music players that give Google Play Music a run for its money, but duplicating music files on your device for this reason alone is a waste of storage space.
Google announced Android L to the masses at their I/O event, and with it they introduced their new "Heads Up" notification system. These notifications are part of the new Material Design UI and are sure to change the way we interact with notifications on our devices.
It's the biggest day of the year for all things Google. Their developer conference, dubbed Google I/O, gives us a peak at what the guys at Mountain View have been working on over the course of the past year, and this year, Android was center stage.
What happens when you accidentally delete a photo or video from your iPad or iPhone? How do you get it back?
Having an open-source platform like Android is great, allowing manufacturers and developers the ability to make their own skins and apps to truly customize the end-user experience. The only downside is that when an update comes to vanilla Android, many of us are left in the cold, unless you have a Google Play Edition HTC One.
Something pretty awesome happened over the last couple of days. George Hotz, better known as Geohot, the infamous hacker known for jailbreaking iOS and exploiting the Sony Playstation 3, has brought joy to owners of just about all Android smartphones and tablets, especially those on AT&T and Verizon.
I dabble in video editing, and when working on even the shortest of motion graphics clips, the exported files take up quite a bit of space. For all of you heavy Mac users out there, I'm sure you know my pain.
Unlike the Galaxy S4 and other Samsung devices, the Nexus 7 doesn't have a Clear All option in the recent apps menu. It's a highly requested feature, as it cuts down the time required to go one-by-one swiping each individual app (you can't swipe away multiple ones at the same time).
For those of you who've already gotten Beta Preview or Developer Preview access to Mac OS X 10.10 Yosemite, I highly recommend installing it on a separate partition on your hard drive.
When Google first introduced Android 4.4, the most glaring user-facing change was a new trend towards transparency. The stock launcher, originally exclusive to the Nexus 5, had transparent status and navigation bars and its app drawer added a touch of transparency.
When theming Android, it's the little touches that complete the look, making your device yours. If you're rooted, you probably know by now that there's virtually nothing you can't change the look of on Android.
With its growing popularity, it's clear that the Chromecast isn't going away anytime soon, with options for casting games, cloud files, music, and much more. But not all content providers are in a hurry to add support for the device, and SoundCloud is one of them. While My Cloud Player is by no means an official SoundCloud app, it comes pretty darn close.
When I'm showing off my HTC One, the first thing I do is unlock my device and say, "OK Google". It may earn me a weird look or two, but in the end people are amazed by the voice recognition and automation of the Google Now Launcher.
Many of our everyday apps include a menu tab or search bar, like Chrome and Twitter. In fact, a lot of times those are the first things we go for, as search is universal in most apps, and app settings are just about always accessible through the menu.
The fact that we own a Nexus means we get to experience the Android interface exactly as Google intended it. But that doesn't mean we can't make a UI tweak here and there, does it?
These days, our smartphones carry some very sensitive data. From banking app passwords to personal photos, there are many things on your Nexus 5 that you might not want other people to have access to.
The folks behind StumbleUpon have created a video service that is just as awesome at introducing you to new content as their website service is.
Videos are great for catching fleeting moments, and photos are insanely easy to share with anyone, but how can you get the best of both worlds?
We've all walked into a restaurant with the best of intentions only to order something absurd, like a cheese-injected burger topped with bacon on a brioche bun. It's delicious for the few minutes it takes to eat the thing, and then you're left with a bellyful of regret and an inability to directly look at the numbers on your scale. Turns out that getting yourself to make healthy choices isn't as hard as one might think.
If you've followed our guide on unlocking KitKat's real full screen capability using the immersive mode mod, then your status and navigation bars will be hidden when not in use, giving you a more expansive full screen experience.
Sometimes, stock just doesn't cut it. When you're sick of the limitations in Sense on your HTC One, a new ROM can be a ray of sunshine. By installing a custom ROM, you can add or unlock new features in Sense, or you can get a pure Android experience instead. It's all up to you.
Over the years, we've probably all complained at some point about Android's lack of an "Undo" feature. When you're typing something out, there are times when you might want to go back a step.
As I begin my move across the country, I find myself dodging all kinds of Craigslist scams, particularly in the apartments and housing classifieds. Fortunately, I've discovered a little trick that will tip me off to a scam before I lose $1,000 in a fake security deposit.
If you've haven't had your fill of Apple's security issues in recent weeks, Siri is now the latest to join the slew of problems with the most recent version of iOS (7.1.1).
Sometimes, ceiling fans just don't cut it. They spin meekly, barely generating any air flow to cool down your sweltering room. Or, when turned up high, they can wobble wildly, shaking and vibrating as if the ceiling is about to come crashing down. If this sounds like your ceiling fan, chances are the solution is a simple as flipping a switch.
I'll be the first to admit how horrible my memory is, whether it's remembering to take out the garbage or paying a bill on time. That's why I regularly utilize the stock Reminders app on my iPhone; it's definitely compensated for my memory deficiencies.
Update: April 24, 2014 Looks the the one day availability was a precursor to a wider launch, as now anyone can buy a pair of the Glass Explorer Edition without needing an invite. Check out Google's Glass Shop for some easy ordering, still with the $1500 price tag.
It appears that the next iteration of KitKat, Android 4.4.3, is fast approaching. If the past is any indication, today's update to the Nexus 5 software changelog on Sprint's website tells us a new version of Android will begin rolling out within 24 hours. Sprint has broken the news of a forthcoming Android release twice in the past. With 4.4.1 and 4.4.2, a mini-changelog was posted on the Sprint website about a day before Google began pushing updates to its Nexus devices.
When it comes to smartphones, we can sometimes get a little carried away with the "smart" aspect of it all. Things like apps, games, and softMods take center stage, and we can almost forget that the device also functions as a phone.
When it comes to blocking unwanted calls, your Android device comes stocked with a native blocking feature that allows you to reject certain phone numbers. That being said, the native blocking feature on the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 isn't the prettiest or the smartest, with its non-obvious setup and lack of features.
Multi Window, a feature that was greatly improved with the release of the Samsung Galaxy Note 3, is still quite limited on the older Note 2, allowing only the use of a few stock applications to multitask with.
Popcorn Time is an app that streams movies directly from torrents on to your computer, and it's seen its fair share of publicity, being lauded as a free Netflix alternative and chastised as an illegal file-sharing network.
HTC's recent release of a new flagship phone brought tons of fanfare along with it. Dubbed The All New HTC One, the M8 edition of the popular One series phone also marked an update to the HTC Sense UI. Manufacturer skins like Sense can be a bit of a polarizing subject, especially amongst Nexus owners who are used to experiencing Android's interface exactly as Google envisioned it.
Google released its long-awaited Google Now launcher a couple months ago, allowing users to access Google Now with the simple command of the voice. As great as the feature is, it requires that our screens be on, unlike the Moto X's "active listening" service that operates with Google Now, activating through a screen-off state.
There is and always will be a staunch anti-microwave camp, but they're a fact of life. The whole point of a microwave is convenience, right? But it's not so convenient when you pull out reheated leftovers and discover that your food is only partially warm.
Figuring out someone's password, pattern, or PIN isn't very difficult—simply watching over their shoulder or following the oil marks left across their screen is enough to figure them out and bypass whatever lock screen security they have.
While you may suck at Instagram, it's likely that you manage multiple Instagram accounts, whether strictly for personal use or for managing blog and business pages.
When our Nexus 7s upgraded to KitKat, one key piece of functionality was lost in the mix—Flash support. Of course, even before that we never had official support on the Nexus 7, but hacks seemed to do the job just fine. As it stands now, Google remains on the warpath against Flash, opting instead for HTML5 use, specifically in Chrome (where Flash never worked anyway), and of course Adobe stopped supporting Android long ago.
Some of my favorites hacks are the ones that speed up the process of accessing my favorite and most-used apps. So, in this softModder guide, I'll be showing you a super fast way to open those apps straight from your Samsung Galaxy Note 3's lock screen.
