Tag Archives: wifi

OpenSignal For iPhone Maps Nearby WiFi Hotspots & Ranks Cellular Networks By Coverage

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Despite the availability of network monitoring apps for iOS, the platform has never had something as comprehensive as Android’s OpenSignal. The previously covered Signals 2 works only on jailbroken devices, and doesn't deal with Wi-Fi networks at all. OpenSignal, on the other hand, offers a  speed test, and has the capability of mapping out signal strength for both cellular and Wi-Fi networks. After a long wait, now you can have all these amazingly useful features on your iPhone, as the developers of OpenSignal have just released an iOS variant in the App Store. The app lets iDevice owners sniff out Wi-Fi networks in their vicinity, and also helps them in deciding which cellular network provides the best coverage in their area. Read More

Chainfire’s Hotspot Control Removes WiFi Tethering Restrictions From Unrooted Android Devices

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Native Wi-FI tethering support has been a feature of Android since version 2.2 (Froyo), but it is disabled or hidden from the Settings in many devices, thanks to their manufacturers or the carriers that sell them. On certain devices, the feature automatically gets disabled if no SIM card is present in the device. There have been several solutions out there to bring this functionality back to such devices, but almost all of them require root access. If you’re unlucky enough to have this feature disabled on your Android device and don’t want to root it to get it back, Chainfire has a solution for you in Hotspot Control. Just released on Google Play Store, it is a tiny app that allows you to easily toggle Wi-Fi hotspot mode on your unrooted Android device on which the native feature is present but hidden or disabled by the device manufacturer or your carrier. Read More

xCloud Syncs Files Between PC, Mac, Android & iOS Over Cloud & WiFi

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Dropbox was once considered the cutting edge of cloud services, but now it seems every other company in the tech industry is hopping on the cloud computing bandwagon. The latest entrant in this field xCloud. No, it's not another cloud storage solution with unlimited storage, but rather a files synchronization app that lets you sync your files between a desktop PC and an Android or iOS mobile device. Though, what's special about the service is that you can perform syncing over your local Wi-Fi network as well, bypassing the need to upload files to the cloud first. So basically your PC itself works as a cloud storage for you, letting you access the stored content from anywhere you find internet connectivity. In addition, you can send Wake On LAN commands through the mobile device to access the storage remotely if your PC is in sleep mode, provided your motherboard supports this option. It’s dead simple to configure and even simpler to use. Read More

Set Your iPhone To Auto Enable WiFi When Launching Certain Apps

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iOS’ most endearing trait might be its slick interface, but the platform is great at facilitating users in their everyday tasks as well. This is evident from the 50MB download cap for each app installation over mobile data in the App Store. Most of us have limited data plans and with the kind of internet speeds offered by 3G and LTE, one might easily forget to switch to a Wi-Fi connection before starting a heavy download or a long video streaming session. Also, if you don’t have a mobile data connection, there is no point in launching apps like Mail and Facebook without first activating your Wi-Fi. Carnitine is a new Cydia tweak that has been designed with all these scenarios in in mind. It allows you to decide for what apps you want to enable Wi-Fi for upon their launch. You don’t have to manage an extensive lists of apps for this purpose, as Carnitine lets you configure everything on the go. Read More

How To Fix The Limited Wi-Fi Connectivity Issue On Microsoft Surface

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After a long development cycle and some cheesy advertisements, both Windows 8 and the Surface RT tablet finally made their way to the consumers on October 26th 2012, apparently to mixed reaction from critics and users alike. Rather than encouraging the UI overhaul, various users have found the latest version of Windows to be schlocky and flawed. According to some recent reports, a number of Surface users (including ourselves) have been facing limited Wi-Fi connectivity issues since day one. The tablet sometimes shows ‘Limited Connectivity’ error in network status, thereby leaving you unable to use the internet unless you reconnect to the Wi-Fi router or access point. Although Microsoft has released an update to combat this issue, a lot of users are still facing the same conundrum. On the bright side, however, the issue can be easily fixed by following a few simple steps. Read More

SoftPerfect WiFi Guard Protects Your Network Against WiFi Thieves

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WiFi allows us the freedom to move about while using the internet on our portable devices, without worrying about the Internet connection being disconnected within the range. Though it does't come without a price. On one hand, WiFi gives us great mobility, but on the other hand, there's the problem of people stealing your WiFi data by free-riding over your network. You can avert this by setting a password on your connection; however, if someone manages to guess or hack your password, they can still log in. Since you cannot strictly define the perimeters of WiFi signals, if stationed near a Window or an external wall of your house, it becomes very easy for people to catch its signals. This can increase your internet bills and effect its performance for you, if they are using huge amounts of bandwidth. SoftPerfect WiFi Guard is an application for Windows that scans your network and displays a list of all the connected computers. It pings all devices connected to the network and shows everything that returns a ping. Moreover, if an unknown device connects to the network, you are immediately alerted through a notification on your screen. Read More

Enable AirDrop Over Ethernet On Unsupported Macs [Tip]

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AirDrop is OS X’s native utility for sharing files between Macs over Wi-Fi. You can find a lot of apps that add this same functionality, but the default utility does it best (and for free). Unfortunately, not all Macs support AirDrop (the earliest Mac models that support it are Late 2008 MacBooks, Late 2012 MacBook Airs, early 2009 iMacs and Mid 2010 Mac Minis). MacBook Airs and Mac Mini’s that are more than two or three years old do not support it. However, since apps you download from the Mac App Store allow you to do somewhat the same thing, there is a workaround for some of the unsupported Mac models. With the slight limitation of being connected with an Ethernet wire, you can enable AirDrop on an old Mac by running a simple Terminal command. Read More

DataMan: Get Alerts For Wi-Fi & Data Usage On iPhone

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You just have to take one look at the outrage caused by AT&T’s data throttling rule for FaceTime, to know how seriously people take data usage on their iOS devices. More and more Wi-Fi hotspots have become publicly available in many parts of the world, but you can never rely solely on Wi-Fi, and having a data connection still remains important if you want to stay connected all the time. However, data usage doesn’t come cheap, no matter what carrier you are currently on. Unless you have an unlimited data package, you are sure to keep wondering about the remaining data limit for the current month. Although some carriers offer a few easy ways for users to keep track of their data usage, most of them don’t have any such option. DataMan is an iPhone app that does not depend on the carrier, and generates its own data and Wi-Fi usage stats for users. Not only that, you can also use DataMan to set up alerts at different levels of usage. The app will send you alerts whenever you cross any of the predefined data thresholds. Read More

WiFi Shoot! For Android Allows Photo & Video Sharing Over Wi-Fi Direct

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No matter from whatever perspective you look at it, the emergence of Android as one of the top-notch contemporary mobile operating systems is, to say the least, quite encouraging. Although each subsequent iteration of Google’s mobile OS is known to bring some innovative and user-friendly features to the table, none has managed to get as much attention and admiration as Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. Included within this ground-breaking version of Android were a couple of very handy wireless file sharing methods in the form of Near Field Communication (NFC) Beam and Wi-Fi Direct. For those unfamiliar with the latter, it can, at best, be described as a super-fast version of Bluetooth file transfer wherein you don’t require any Wi-Fi router or Access Point (AP) in between to share data from one Wi-Fi Direct compatible device to the other. Instead, it’s direct device-to-device file sharing at super-high speed. So far, we haven’t seen too many apps taking advantage of said feature, but thanks to the developer community, one of the first-of-its kind solutions has finally arrived, and it’s quite a useful one, too. Currently in beta, WiFi Shoot! puts the aforementioned Wi-Fi Direct feature to good use, allowing Android users to wirelessly share photos and videos with each other. Read More

Keep Wifi Alive Makes Sure That Your Windows Phone Remains Connected To The Internet All The Time

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Quite like iOS, Windows Phone also disables Wi-Fi if your phone remains in sleep mode for more than a few minutes. While this measure is useful for battery conservation, it can get a bit annoying if you have a download going on in the background, or if you don’t want to miss an important push notification. For iOS users having jailbroken devices, Insomnia is one tweak that never lets the WiFi go to sleep. Finally, the Windows Phone 7 community has got exactly the same option, thanks to Keep Wifi Alive. This new Homebrew will keep your WP7’s Wi-Fi connection active for as long as you want. The app takes advantage of the fact that the Mango platform does not kill the WiFi connection, even when in lockscreen, as long as you are streaming some audio file from the internet. So, Keep Wifi Alive streams a blank audio file continuously, making sure your connectivity is never lost. Read More

Transfer Files From Mac To iPhone Over Wi-Fi Without Using iTunes

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The iPhone is easily one of the best things that Apple has ever made, but there are certain things you have to accept about an iPhone. One of them is that you cannot use the iPhone as a mass storage device. You literally have a considerable amount of storage on your phone that you will have to fill with audio, video and image files. iTunes does have a file sharing option, but since you can only authorize 5 systems to sync with your phone, it is far from a universal solution. There are, however, apps available to make this file transfer easier, and if you’re a Mac user, File Storage Companion is an app that, coupled with its iOS client File Storage, lets you transfer files from your Mac to your iPhone over Wi-Fi. The Mac app is free and available in the Mac App Store, whereas the iOS counterpart costs $1.99. The iOS app isn’t just a means of transferring files, but is also a fairly good file viewer that can create directories (folders) and open zipped files. Read More

Automatically Enable Your iPhone’s Wi-Fi Upon Launching Certain Apps

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With the advent of 3G and faster data speeds, the reliance of users upon Wi-Fi might have diminished slightly, but a vast majority of apps that require internet connectivity are still predominantly run on Wi-Fi. An iPhone isn’t exactly useless without internet, but it isn’t too awesome, either. There are a lot of iOS apps that need a good internet connection in order to function properly, and some of them won’t even start if you are not connected. Look at the Facebook app for instance. You can launch it without a data connection, but it won’t do any good and you will not be able to see anything inside the app. For such apps, the new Cydia tweak named (rather dramatically) Thor is the perfect thing to have on your jailbroken iPhone or iPad. The tweak lets you define a set of apps, and whenever any of the chosen apps is launched, your Wi-Fi connection will be switched on automatically. Read More

Cisco DataMeter For Android: Monitor WiFi/Mobile Data & Get Speed Test Results Of Nearby Hotspots

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One of the world’s leading network solution providers, Cisco, has been catering to the network management needs of worldwide users for quite some time now. The company is no stranger to the mobile world either, since it has plenty of nifty apps available across the stores of both popular mobile platforms, Android & iOS. In November last year, we reviewed Cisco Connect Express that let Android and iOS users remotely manage their Cisco routers right from their mobile devices. Cisco DataMeter, currently in beta, is the company’s latest venture in terms of mobile apps that allows Android users to monitor and take control of their cellular and WiFi data usage. However, that’s not its only feature – the app has some very handy options that can help you with keeping a close tab on your device’s data usage habits. To summarize the app’s list of features, you get a built-in data monitoring, estimation and projection tool, WiFi speed test tool, test results of nearby Wi-Fi hotspots, graphical analysis of data usage, and plenty more. Read More

AutoSync Automatically Enables Account Syncing When WiFi And/Or Power Is Connected [Android]

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An Android device can hold multiple online – mail, social and third-party app – accounts, and keeps them in sync with their respective services. What’s even better is that users have considerable control over this sync feature. For instance, you may disable syncing a specific account, opt to exclude syncing certain aspects of a selected (mail) account, specify the auto-sync frequency of certain accounts, or disable the entire automatic syncing feature with a mere tap. The catch with keeping the auto sync option enabled for a prolonged time period is that, not only can this hog your device’s battery resources, but also eat up precious data bytes, which is something that limited data plan users can ill-afford. Of course, you can manually control the sync feature as per requirement, but why go through all the hassle when you have AutoSync at your service. This miniscule yet handy Android app presents you with as many as five different predefined conditions under which the auto sync on your Android device will be automatically activated. Read More

Data Master For iPhone Calculates & Projects Your Cellular/WiFi Data Usage

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If you rely on a limited cellular data connection on your iPhone, chances are that you often have to worry about refraining from overusing internet on your iOS device, and things tend to get tricky if you don’t keep track of your exact data usage. However, managing data usage on iDevices is never a simple task. Not unless you have got Data Master, anyway. This amazing app records all the stats related to both cellular and Wi-Fi data on your iDevice. Users can define the price and data limit of their package, and the app will project everything automatically, telling you about the amount of data you should use each day in order to avoid getting a huge bill at the end of the month. Data Master comes with a pretty awesome calculator as well, letting you determine the Megabytes that will be eaten up if you stream videos, or share pictures over Facebook or do any other task online for a particular amount of time. Read More

Signal Displays WiFi Connection Strength & Stats In The Menu Bar [Mac]

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A while back, we covered Network Strength (reviewed here), a free Mac app that shows the Wi-Fi signal strength as a percentage in the Menu Bar. Additionally, the app tells you the Ping time, local and public IP and the noise level. Signal is a free Mac app that is similar in concept, but differs slightly in the stats it reports. This app shows connection strength as a series of vertical bars and gives you information about the router you’re connected to, including the signal quality, strength, noise level and signal to noise ratio. The app icon changes to show when you’ve lost connectivity or when there is an error in the connection. Read More

Air Projector: View iPhone Photos & PDF Files In Any Desktop Web Browser Over WiFi

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Getting photos out of your iPhone is a fairly easy task. You don’t even need to launch iTunes to access your images. Nevertheless, you still have to use a cable, which is why there are still plenty of apps that make this task even easier. Air Projector is an iOS app that serves a similar purpose, but not just for extracting images. Using Air Projector, it is possible to display photos and PDF documents on any desktop computer without even transferring the data to it first. The app streams your media and documents to a web browser of your choice. The app doesn't even need a desktop client as everything is done over Wi-Fi and HTTP. Read More

AutoProtect Bypasses iPhone Lock Screen Passcode When On A Specific WiFi Network [Cydia]

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If you are even remotely concerned about your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad's privacy, lock screen passcode is the most rudimentary measure that can (and should) be taken, and previously reviewed Cydia tweak, CleverPin, makes that passcode intelligent enough to automatically disable itself whenever the device is connected to a trusted WiFi network, for instance, the network at your home or any other location where the chances of your privacy getting violated are minimum. The tweak also offers some other useful options (like defining a time period during which the passcode will be disabled), but you have to pay $1.99 to get it. Meet AutoProtect, a new Cydia tweak that provides the same functionality for free! The tweak will take into account your current Wi-Fi network, and if it is one that you have already specified, the lock screen passcode will get bypassed automatically. Read More

SimpleWiFi Adds A Slim WiFi Toggle & IP Address To iPhone Notification Center

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For all the SBSettings users, many of the tweaks available in the Cydia store are useless or redundant. You want to toggle off Bluetooth, Wi-Fi or your data connection? SBSettings can do that. You want to view your iDevice’s IP address or other network info? Just swipe across your phone’s status bar. However, this doesn’t mean that a tweak that performs one of these tasks is completely worthless. There are certain scenarios when SBSettings cannot come to your rescue. What if you are using an app in full screen mode? SBSettings can’t be launched there. Notification Center, on the other hand, is truly universal and can be launched from anywhere in iOS. This is what makes SimpleWiFi a useful tweak. It is basically a Notification Center widget that provides its users with a toggle for Wi-Fi, and displays the current network’s name along with your iPhone’s IP address. Read More

Song Exporter Pro: Transfer iPhone & iPod Touch Songs To Your Computer Over WiFi Without iTunes

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If you are new to iOS, using iTunes can prove to be a nightmare. There are a host of errors you might run into, or you might accidentally lose some of your data in the name of “syncing”, if your device has ever been associated with another computer and iTunes library. Even if you do manage to tame the wild beast that is iTunes, it still won't let you extract and transfer to your computer, the music that is already on your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad. There are many apps and services that let users do just about anything to bypass iTunes, and Song Exporter Pro is one such useful app. If you have a lot of songs on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, this app will let you download them to your computer, given that both devices are on the same WiFi network. What's even better, is that you can do this on any computer, irrespective of OS, drivers or in the absence of iTunes, since all transfers are handled through the browser. This is as simple as it gets. More past the break. Read More