Remember back in June when Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone 4 and the revolutionary FaceTime ability? Perhaps if you're detail oriented you'll remember that Jobs also stated that Apple would be shipping 10's of millions of FaceTime ready devices. How will he make this happen?
Fortune has a broke down report on how Jobs might make his promise a reality in spite of critics who scoffed at the number proposed. I'll give you a hint, it isn't exclusive to Apple handhelds...
Apple's event today wasn't filled with too many surprises. The iPod Touch was beefed up in features that included many of the predicted and leaked abilities that were floating around. Mimicking nearly all of the features of the iPhone 4 makes me wonder now more than ever if the Touch is specifically designed for those who don't want an iPhone.
Adding FaceTime and Retina Display to the Touch gives it both of the best features from the iPhone 4. The speedy A4 chip will make the two devices close to equal in processing time, something that the iPhone previously ousted the Touch in considerably. So what's the difference?
Unless you've been underneath a rock for a few weeks you're aware that Apple will be holding their annual September event this Wednesday. With such an event so close, you can pretty much find a rumor for any wild idea you could think of. We figured here at iDB we'd toss around some ideas and let you add your own.
I'll start with the casualties:
Those of you who purchased an iPhone 4 and are using it on an unofficial carrier were not able to activate FaceTime. There is now a fix for this. It's called MiTime and from what I read, it's working well.
MiTime is an app/service for activating FaceTime on phones that are operating on unofficial carriers. It should work worldwide and will use two text messages to activate. You must be able to receive an international SMS message to get activated (see here if you can receive international SMS).
Surprisingly, we didn't get an invite for this, but TechCrunch did, and according to it, Apple will be holding a "special event" on September 1st, at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theater in San Francisco at 10 am.
The invite comes with the image above, which strongly indicates the event will most likely be focused on music. Let the speculations go wild! What are they going to unveil? My guess is we're going to hear about the new iPod Touch with a nice Retina Display and a front-facing camera for FaceTime. Apple will also probably unveil a cloud-based version of iTunes...
There are a few jailbreak apps on Cydia that let you use FaceTime on 3G: 3G Unrestrictor, My3G, and FaceBreak. If like me you're on an unlimited data plan, data usage is not a problem. If however you are on a capped data plan, using FaceTime over 3G could take you overboard.
A few days ago, I made a FaceTime call over 3G for 10 minutes to figure out how much data FaceTime uses on 3G. As you can see on the image above, I sent about 15 MB of data and I received about 12 MB. I think I sent more than I received because I was moving around a lot.
Total data usage for a 10-minute FaceTime call on 3G: 26.5 MB. That's about 2.65 MB per minute.
Obviously your mileage may vary but these numbers shouldn't be too far from what a FaceTime call over 3G will cost you.
FaceBreak is a new jailbreak application that allows you to do FaceTime on 3G. It is very similar to 3G Unrestrictor and My3G, except it only works with FaceTime.
It is available for $1.49 from the Cydia Store. It is cheaper than 3G Unrestrictor and My3G, but again, it doesn't do as much. If you only need FaceTime to work on 3G, then FaceBreak is your best bet. If however you need a mod to allow other apps to run on 3G, then you'd be better off going with My3G.
Have you tried FaceBreak? How do you like it?
Face Time Mod is a new jailbreak app that changes the FPS (Frames Per Second) during your FaceTime calls to optimize the video quality depending on your Internet connection. This allows for better quality video if your wifi connection can handle it. In the same way, it will lower the quality of the video if you're running FaceTime on Edge using My3G for example.
By default, the original FPS is a minimum of 15 and a maximum of 15 as well. Face Time Mod brings the minimum down to 6 FPS and the max to 30 FPS.
There is one big downside to this app though: both iPhones must have Face Time Mod installed for it to work.
Face Time Mod is available for free in Cydia under the http://repo.modyouri.com repo.
What do you think of it?
Today I want to post about an issue I recently had when trying to FaceTime with Tina. Everytime I tried to initiate a FaceTime call, I would get an error message saying "FaceTime Failed - Tina is not available for FaceTime". What was strange with this issue is that she could initiate the FaceTime call and reach me, but I couldn't.
So really I thought the problem was from me since I was the one not being able to reach her. This drove me nuts for days. I even went as far as restoring my iPhone, thinking it would fix the issue. It didn't. The solution was in fact much simpler. Ironically, the issue didn't even come from my iPhone, but from hers.
I found the fix somewhere deep inside Apple's support pages. Apparently the problem arises if you ported an old number to your iPhone 4, or if you recently changed your number, which was the case for Tina's phone.
According to Apple, some of the symptoms are:
When you are calling someone on FaceTime, the number on their screen is not your number. People are unable to initiate a FaceTime call with you. After installing a new carrier settings update, FaceTime does not activate.The fix is really simple:
In Settings > Phone, turn FaceTime OFF and turn it back ON again Go to Settings > General > Reset > Reset all settings DoneImmediately after performing this on Tina's phone I was able to initiate a FaceTime call with her.
Hopefully this will help other people stuck on this issue.
It was only a matter of time until you would be able to use FaceTime on 3G... Say hello to My3G. Developed by the same people who brought us MyWi, My3G is very similar to 3G Unrestrictor except it has support for FaceTime.
Here are the features as described in the app description:
In-App popup request to enable/never ask for My3G to be enabled for that app In-App indicator when My3G changes the network from 3G to WiFi Ability to select which apps are My3G enabled and not. Default Apps - no configuration for the most popular apps! SBSettings Toggle! You can temporarily enable My3G for all apps or toggle back using your defined Apps list Dynamic enablement - Higher successs rate (near 100%) then 3G Unrestrictor (which does one off solutions for apps). My3G enables 3G indicators more dynamically.My3G is available from both Cydia and Rock. The Rock version will cost you $3.99 while the Cydia version via ModMyI repo will cost you $2.79.
[9 to 5 Mac]
Most of you who jailbroke their iPhone 4 using JailbreakMe lost their MMS and FaceTime capability. I just found out about a fix thanks to Krapps and Branden3112.
To fix your MMS and FaceTime issue, simply follow these steps:
Go to Cydia and add this source: http://iphonedelivery.advinux.com/cydia/ Once this source has been added, install "iPhoneDelivery" from it. Reboot your iPhone Go to Settings > Phone > Turn FaceTime ON Done!Thanks Branden for the trick!
This is not an "official" fix from the Dev Team but I tried it myself and I can tell you it works. The Dev Team is still working on a fix that will most likely be available via Cydia.
If you use JailbreakMe now, you shouldn't have any problem as it's been updated to fix the issue. If you can't wait for the official fix and if you don't want to try this unofficial fix, you can always restore, and jailbreak again with the updated JailbreakMe.
Those of you who have installed JailbreakMe on their iPhones might be running into some problems, specifically MMS and FaceTime completely disappearing from the device. Obviously this is not normal but Comex is working on it. I am sure he will fix this in the next few hours. In the meanwhile, sit back and enjoy your newly jailbroken iPhone.
I will keep you posted as soon as JailbreakMe is updated and fixes this issue with MMS and FaceTime.
UPDATE: This has been fixed. More info here.