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Welcome to Tech-Knowledgy, where your tech questions are answered!
Q. I just read your blog on RunPee, but when I went to the app store it wasn’t there. It sounds like such a great app! Where’s RunPee?
A. You’re correct, RunPee isn’t in the iTunes App Store any more. I checked on the developer’s website and learned that ownership of the app is being transferred, but the app is due to be back in the iTunes App Store and Android Market in July. The good news is that the app will be back with new features, such as a synopsis of the first five minutes of a movie in case you’re running late. RunPee website
Unfortunately, some apps are pulled from the App Store. This can happen for a variety of reasons, including transfer of ownership of the app, conflicts with iTunes’ policies, or the developer stops supporting the app so it fails to work with updates to the operating system.
So if you see an app you are interested in, grab it, especially if it’s free. You don’t even have to keep it loaded on your iPhone, you can always have the app reside in iTunes until you want to use it and sync it to your iPhone later. That way you can avoid being frustrated if the app disappears from the App Store later.
Q. Help! I tried to rent a movie from iTunes I could watch on my flight. I pressed Download on my iPad but when I got on the plane the movie wasn’t on my iPad. I have a Verizon 3G iPad and I had 4 bars of coverage for two hours before I got on the plane. Where’s my movie? Did iTunes rip me off?
A. Sorry you are having problems downloading the movie you rented from iTunes. Apple restricts downloads over 3G to 10MB of data, which is too littleFTP download a podcast, much less a movie.
You should be able to download your movie over Wi-Fi, unless your hotel Wi-Fi has restrictions on its Wi-Fi, which many do.
When you are home, go to iTunes and try to download the movie to your computer or over your home Wi-Fi network directly to your iPad.
If you are still having problems when you get home, contact Apple via email. Their customer service is great so you should have no problems then.
Enjoy your movie!
Q. I just got an iPad and want to use it as a Kindle. Does it cost anything for the app? I got a 3G iPad but I got the lowest data plan, 250MB for $15. Should I have gotten more data? Does it use data to read a book? Can I read a book on the airplane or do I have to be connected to the Internet to read a book? Can I read a Kindle book on my iPad if I travel to a foreign country or will that cost me a lot of money?
A. Congratulations on getting your iPad! Good news, the Kindle app costs nothing on the iPad (or for any other device), so download it today. You will only use data when you download Kindle books to your iPad, not when you read your books. If you are concerned about going over your data limit, you could wait to download your Kindle books when your iPad is connected via Wi-Fi. (See, Mind the Cap!)
You can read your Kindle book when you’re not connected to the Internet, so you can read it on an airplane, so long as you have downloaded it before takeoff, and you can read your book in a foreign country even if you have data roaming turned off and are away from Wi-Fi.
Your data plan is 250MB per month and you should figure the average Kindle book to be about 1MB, which would be a lot of books downloaded over 3G each month before you run over your data limit. But if you are concerned, make sure you only download books when you are connected to Wi-Fi.
Your data plan is monthly, so if you find yourself going over or close to your limit each month, you may consider increasing to a $25 plan for the next month.
Q. I heard that Verizon is ending unlimited data plans next month. I don’t want to change to Sprint, but I want to keep my unlimited data. What should I do?
A. You heard it right, Verizon will no longer be offering unlimited data plans beginning July 7. Good news for you though, Verizon is going to allow current Verizon customers with unlimited data plans to keep their unlimited plans after July 7. But you need to stay with your unlimited plan. If you switch to a different data plan, you won’t be able to switch back to unlimited.
As of now, you won’t really have a reason to switch data plans. Verizon plans on offering 2GB of data for $30 per month, the same price as it currently charges customers for unlimited data.
So rest easy, you can keep your unlimited data plan with Verizon. That is, until further notice.
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Did you miss out on grabbing the RunPee app? Do you use your iPad as an eReader? As a movie screen? Do you have unlimited data? Let us know in the Comments section below!
* Image by Jeff Hitchcock
** Image by Remi Vincent
Hi Carolyn,
I still don’t fancy an Iphone or Ipad. I did consider an Android, mainly because I can get one cheap! I read an article about a Windows program that control a smart phone, that looked cool. It could use bluetooth as well. I have never used that either but I think the thing needs to be near my laptop,. The article is here:
http://downloads.zdnet.com/abstract.aspx?docid=2944659&tag=nl.e530
Hi Mike, Yes, there are apps that will let you control your laptop from your cell phone (Android and iPhone have them as well). Be careful, though. If you can control your laptop remotely, some hacker may figure out how to do it too!
If you can get an Android for cheap, that is definitely worth considering. With all of the apps out there, you will probably enjoy having a smartphone a lot, even if you don’t use it as a phone much! 🙂
Thanks for your visit and your comment.
Thanks for the great info. I didn’t know that about the i-Tunes movie downloading limits via 3G! Guess I have only downloaded via wi-fi so not run into this problem. Will need to make sure my downloads for our next trip are done before we leave.
Hi Carol, Yes, the 10MB download limit is for all iPhone/iPad downloads over the 3G network. So if you’re on the go and want to update an app or download a video or podcast that’s over 10MB, you won’t be able to do it until you’re connects to a Wi-Fi network. Not many app updates are over 10MB, but some are.
I am curious to see with iOS 5 coming in September and everything moving to iCloud, whether the 10MB limit is raised. While the 10MB limit can be very frustrating, you don’t want to exceed your monthly data limit by downloading a movie over 3G.
Thanks for your visit and your comment!
Hi Carolyn,
It’s very interesting what you’re writing about renting movies on iTunes. I’m living in Norway, and I have been wanting to rent the movies that you get access to in the US. It’s not that hard really, I just have to do what one of my friends have done, and get myself a US account… but it’s too bad that we have to “cheat” in order to get access to the same movies 🙂
Jens
Hi Jens, I completely agree with you. I used iTunes a lot when I lived in the UK to rent US movies that hadn’t yet come out in UK cinemas yet. I also enjoyed buying tv seasons for the shows I missed.
I have heard of people who are outside the US buying US iTunes gift cards to get a US iTunes account. That may be an easier way for you to get a US iTunes account. That doesn’t work for iTunes in all countries, but it could be worth it to try getting a gift card and establishing your US iTunes account.
Good luck!
Hi Molly, Welcome to The Wonder of Tech! I’m so glad your brother referred you here and that this post made your day. Feel free to browse through the other articles to find more helpful information. 🙂