Don't like the iPad's Music app- Here are two alternatives

Don't like the iPad's Music app? Here are two alternatives
Not a fan of Apple's iPad Music app with its awkward interface and tiny controls? Relief is at hand! Here are two iOS music players that offer some clever advantages over the built-in app.Bongiovi DPSDesigned by Bongiovi Acoustics, the free Bongiovi DPS app provides a clean interface and user-friendly controls.The app presents you with the usual ways to access your music -- albums, artists, playlists, genres, podcasts, audiobooks -- all icons easily accessible from the home screen. Tapping on a particular icon, such as albums, shows you a list of all albums. Tapping on an album shows you all the tracks and their running times. And from there you can tap on any track to ramp up the music.By default, the app fills the screen with large cover art of the album. But you can tap on a track button in the upper right corner to see all the track names with artist, album, and time, making it easy to jump from one song to another. The play screen displays the usual buttons and controls large enough to easily tap on, unlike the tiny ones in the iPad Music app. You can also swipe the screen to move from track to track.Bongiovi DPS even takes the sound quality a step higher. You can set up certain audio profiles for your music, choosing among specific brand earbuds, built-in speakers, external speakers, and docks. Each profile is supposed to give the music a bit of oomph by tying it into a specific device. Some profiles are accessible for free; others require you to upgrade to the app's paid version.After you select a profile, a B button on the play screen lets you increase the volume and bass of your current song. Enabling this option did bump up both the volume and quality of the music. So that benefit alone makes Bongiovi DPS a better choice than the iPad Music app.The basic Bongiovi app is free but comes with advertising at the bottom, which I found fairly unobtrusive. But if you want an ad-free experience and the extra audio profiles, you'll have to shell out $2.99 for the upgrade. Bongiovi DPS is also available for the iPhone and iPod Touch.Since downloading Bongiovi DPS, I've switched to this one as my core music app. I like the interface, the sound, and the ability to access podcasts and audiobooks as well as albums. This app's a winner for me.Track 8's music app provides a Metro flair to the iPad.Screenshot by Lance Whitney/CNETTrack 8Cooked up by Ender Labs, Track 8 provides a Metro flair by borrowing the look and feel of Microsoft's Windows 8 Metro music player.The home screen offers options for artists, albums, and playlists. You can also swipe the screen to see your recent history and your most played albums. Tapping on an album's thumbnail displays a list of its tracks. Tapping on any track starts up the music.The play screen is well laid out. It displays the album art and a list of all songs, so you can easily switch from one track to another without having to change screens. The usual play, pause, back, and forward buttons are included. The slider bars for volume and track location are a bit small but still quite usable. My only gripe here is that you can't see the length of a track until you actually start playing it, but that's a minor quibble.Related storiesHow Apple screwed up the iPad music app with iOS 5Deck: An iPad music app for people with big fingersHow to view full track titles in iPhone iOS Music appYou can also search for a particular track. Tapping on the search icon lets you type the first few characters of a song, with Track 8 chiming in with a list of suggestions.Though I'm still on the fence about the Metro look and feel, I like the design of this app.It seems well suited for a tablet, offering a fluid touch-screen approach. By default, the actual artist appears in the background of an album. You can also change the background colors and wallpaper.Track 8 offers access only to your albums, not your podcasts or other types of audio. But you can create a playlist of podcasts and other audio content in iTunes, and the app will pick that up.Overall, Track 8 is clean and simple and a nice change of pace from other complicated music players. The app will set you back $1.99.

Skype for iPhone- It's official

Skype for iPhone: It's official
In terms of navigation, Skype's VoIP app for iPhone looks more like your traditional iPhone app than it does Skype 4.0 for Windows. For many who already prefer Apple's sleek interface archetype, that's a triumph, but those who enjoy Skype's branding may feel disappointed.Skype's screens are well organized and use the iPhone's ability to add filters, for instance, to sort your contacts alphabetically, or by who's online. There's chatting as well, though Skype's flagship feature is its VoIP calling that's free to other Skype users and an inexpensive per-minute fee to landlines. Calls on Skype for iPhone work only if you're in range of a Wi-Fi network, so your call quality will in part be at the mercy and strength of wireless networks nearby--calls will not work over the cell phone network on the iPhone (but chatting will.) Assuming your connection is solid, you can dial a number or quickly call a contacts stored in your address book.iPod Touch users will need earphones with an embedded mic to talk. During a call, you can mute the line, go on hold, or put the call on speakerphone. In the My Info window, you can follow a link to buy more SkypeOut credit online.Taking a photo from within Skype to serve as your avatar image, or pulling a picture in from the camera roll are two iPhone-only features that makes use of the phone's hardware attributes. Another imperfect, but still neat, feature is the ability to accept incoming conference calls. While you won't be able to initiate a call, we're told, you will be able to jump on one if a buddy invites you in. We hope the next version includes placing conference calls from the iPhone. Skype bypassed a few more features in its maiden iPhone voyage. SMS, setting up a conference calling group, purchasing SkypeOut creditdirectly, and being able to field a second incoming Skype call are a few. File transferring and getting Skype voicemail native on the phone are two more. We expect to see at least two of these added in the next version, but we'll hope for more.Skype versus the competitionHere's the big question on our minds: will Skype's iPhone app replace competitors like Nimbuzz and Fring, which focus on cross-network IM but also include VoIP calls with Skype pals even though they've been available for the iPhone for months? Kurt Thywissen, the principal engineer for Skype for iPhone, thinks so. He says what the other apps use is a workaround that requires them to channel calls through a server and transcode audio, resulting in poorer-quality calls than Skype can do in its own app. He may be right, but those who IM more than they vocalize probably won't ditch the likes of Fring too soon. They might, however, let Skype handle the calls and let another app take care of the multinetwork chatting.Inside Skype for iPhone--photos