On June 6, Apple announced the latest incarnation of its OS X operating system: 10.7, more commonly known as Lion. Also announced were the imminent release of iOS 5 for Apple’s mobile devices and, hand-in-hand with that, the iCloud.

Folks who’ve been handy with Apple’s products for a few years now might recognize the source of this “new” service as MobileMe (née .Mac), the yearly membership with an email address, online storage, and push syncing for your mobile devices.

But iCloud is more than just a name change. Apple is revamping the service to expand its offerings and its reach. MobileMe used to cost $99 a year to subscribe. iCloud will be free to anyone using iOS 5, that is to say, anyone with an iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch capable of running the new software when it comes out this fall.

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Droid vs. iPhone, is there a winner, can there be a winner? I have the luxury of both phones, which I use daily both for personal things and for work. This will not be a whose carrier is better comparison. If I was to do that I would just say AT&T is the worst provider I have ever had to use in Manhattan and that would be the end of it, oh look I did I said it anyway.

Getting back to the heart of the matter: what is bad about the Droid and what is bad about the iPhone. You may be asking yourself why just the bad stuff? I think if you want fanboys to fawn over either device you have a lot of sites extolling their values all over the internet. So lets start.

iPhone: No removable battery Battery life Closed source architecture No tethering * Single carrier Lack of Google Voice

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Sharing folders for your iphone

If you did not hear, apple released the MobileMe iDisk App, of course you will need a mobile me account. OSX users really should have one, let me list the benefits:

- get an new email address ( you choose what it is ) belonging to the .me domain
- can set up galleries through iphoto and upload your pictures to it for anyone to see.
- get a website that you can manipulate with iWeb.
- get 20 GB of space to share between your website/pictures/email or whatever else you want
- get access to a backup application tht will backup whatever files you want to the iDisk ( after it is set up)
If you have an iPhone you can track it if it is ever lost

And the best part? Its all in sync and push enabled (Email , contacts, calendar)

When you have MobileMe installed on OSX or Windows, goto your settings/control panel and make sure you are logged in and iDisk is set up. You should see it under devices in finder or under my computer in Windows.
So either use Itunes to search for the MobileMe IDisk app or use your iPhone/iTouch device to install the device (app store).
Its a great tool to keep your files accessible to you wherever you go.

I love my Iphone, it is the greatest phone i have ever had, and I’ve had quite a few.  Its a computer in your pocket, it also happens to be a phone. The variety of applications are great , and there is no end to them it seems. So we hit the darkside of our technological future. Battery life, quite honestly, as good as it is , it is still abysmal. I want a product that I can use for a week, not a day.

This is where 3rd party vendors come in. While there is a plethora of battery products out there for the iphone, the best I have found is Mophie. I ordered the Juice pack air and I love it. Yes, it makes the phone heavier, but it doubles the battery life of the phone. On a busy day I need it. There have been a a few heavy use days when i actually had to recharge both phone and battery. Which bring me to my next topic.

The battery pack doubles as a protective case, it also uses the new European charging standard for phone plugs (micro usb)*.  The case acts as a passthrough and you can sync your phone to Itunes with no problem. It also has a small recessed switch at the bottom. The Iphone actually uses more power when it charges, so leaving it on all the time would drain the battery. When it is fully charged , the battery pack will start vibrating alerting you to shut it off.

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