9 home theater apps to improve your big screen with a small screen

Dim the lights, check the polarity of your speakers, or just find the right time to run for a bathroom break with these indispensible, inexpensive home-theater apps.

Customizing your home theater is a blast. But what do you do once you’ve already mounted that ultra-thin flat-screen, installed that nuclear speaker system, and hooked up the Blu-ray player that does everything but your taxes? Chances are, your wallet’s lost a few pounds by then; so if you’re not done optimizing your home theater experience, you’ll want a slightly cheaper alternative going forward.

Well, there’s an app for … you know the rest. Let’s try to get through an app-related article without using that particular cliché. That being said, home-theater applications have progressed far beyond the “Wow, I can use my phone as the remote” stage. Apps can now enhance your home theater experience in a ton of creative and useful ways. And the best part is, they usually won’t set you back more than a few bucks. Here’s a list of 9 apps that are great utilities for any home theater system.

RunPee (free) for iOS, Android, Windows 7

Besides being a great conversation piece, the RunPee.com app is actually very useful. Look up whatever movie you’re watching and the app will identify several spots where the action lulls and you can sneak in a bathroom break without missing much. Granted, if you’re all alone there’s something called a pause button, but if you’re the owner of a swanky new home theater system, odds are you’ll be hosting a room full of moochers from time to time.

Home Theater Glossary ($0.99) for Android

This app is a simple glossary of home-theater keywords, with each defined in layman’s terms, rather than in techy talk. Whether you’re trying to educate yourself before making a major purchase, or you want to impress your friends with your technical lexicon, this app is for you.

Dijit (free) for iOS, Android

Remember when you used to watch MTV Cribs and gawk as celebrities whipped out their home-controlling remotes? They’d turn on the lights, close the curtains, and fire up the flat-screen, all with a couple of taps on a touch screen. Nowadays, all you need for that kind of omnipotence is a smart phone and an empty bank account. Dijit’s free universal remote app, hooks up to home theater equipment and appliances alike, so you can control your home from the palm of your hand.

IMDB (free) for iOS, Android, Windows 7

If an actor or actresses’ name is on the tip of your tongue and you’re wracking your brain trying to remember, fret not. You can pull up their life story in seconds with IMDB’s free app. You can also screen your movie choices by browsing user-ratings and message board chatter. What cinephile wouldn’t want a movie database at their fingertips?

 

Audiocalc & Videocalc ($3) for iOS

A duo of apps that essentially function as one, Audiocalc & Videocalc let you optimize your audio and video systems so that you hear every decibel and see every pixel properly. Whether you’re trying to assess your amp power, or figure out where to place your projector, these apps have you covered. At $3 apiece, it’s slightly cheaper than hiring an installer.

i.TV (free) for iOS

i.TV is one of the dozens of apps that offer mobile TV Guide services, but it simply does it much better than most. Its easy-on-the-eyes interface and streamlined usability are features that set it apart from the throng of apps looking to fill this particular niche. Oh, and its best feature of all? It’s free.

HTCables ($0.99) for iOS

Another education-based app, the job of HTCables is to guide novices through the process of optimizing their home-theater by choosing the right cables and connections. Cables are typically inexpensive, but choosing the wrong types can diminish your viewing experience. HTCables provides descriptions of most major A/V cables, lists of recommended devices for each, pictures of available products, and links to purchase them – all for just a buck.

Speaker Pop ($5) for iOS

Speaker pop is a palm-sized polarity tester that will let you know right away whether or not your speakers are wired correctly. The app is useful for both business and pleasure and works by listening for a “pop” sound from the speaker and running a subsequent DSP analysis. Yet another way to make sure you’re getting the most out of your A/V equipment.

DB ($1) for iOS

DB is one of the more basic entries on our list. It serves as a simple decibel meter, allowing you to calibrate your speaker levels manually. If you’re an avid enough Digital Trends reader, you know that we recommend manual calibration in our home theater speaker setup guide. As an added bonus, those of you who are true audiophiles can use the app to measure the relative loudness of sporting events, concerts, and various other cacophonous events.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

NPD: People prefer watching online video on televisions over computers

Definitely driven by the accessibility of streaming content on smart televisions, more people are watching online video in the home theater.

According to a new study published by the NPD Group, the most common place to watch online, streaming video is now the television rather than the personal computer. According to the results of the study, 45 percent of consumers use the television as the primary place to watch free and premium streaming video off the Web. When asked the same question during 2011, only one third of the respondents utilized the television as their first choice for watching streaming video. Alternatively, the amount of people that choose a personal desktop or laptop computer as the primary screen to watch online video dropped from 48 percent in 2011 to 31 percent during 2012. 

NPD attributes the shift to the increased adoption of Web-connected, smart televisions as well as usage of set-top boxes like the Roku 2 or gaming consoles like the PlayStation 3 on older televisions.

According to NPD’s data, about ten percent of U.S. households have at least one smart television with access to streaming video applications like Netflix or Hulu Plus. In addition, more than forty percent of those households with smart televisions have accessed one form of online entertainment within the past year.

When asked about the transition of online video into the home theater, NPD Group senior VP of industry analysis Russ Crupnick stated “The growth in connected TVs is another sign that online video is maturing. Streaming video has moved from the dorm room to the living room; and, as more households obtain and connect TVs to the Web, we predict increased trial and engagement for video distribution services.”

Definitely not surprising, Netflix dominated consumer’s time in regards to services being used on Web-connected televisions. Approximately forty percent of the respondents that had a smart television used the flat panel to access Netflix Instant programming. Other popular services included the similarly priced Hulu Plus and the pay-per-view movie service Vudu. Perhaps most interesting, nearly twenty percent of households with smart televisions stopped using devices like set-top boxes, gaming consoles or Blu-ray players to access streaming video applications.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Citizen’s arrest: Girl foils would-be thief with iPhone app

A would-be thief who tried to stash a stolen phone in the padded wall of a movie theater was foiled by a teenager wielding Find My iPhone.

Recently, 18-year-old Elizabeth Curtiss and her friend, 15-year-old Annika Anderson, found themselves in the empty parking lot of a Sherwood, OR movie theater well past midnight, staring in amazement at Anderson’s phone. The two had left the theater around 12:45 a.m. after seeing a late movie, but quickly returned when Curtiss realized her phone was missing. A search of the theater they were in turned up nothing, and they went back to the car completely stumped.

That’s when Anderson downloaded Apple’s Find My iPhone app. Within moments, the two girls were stunned to see an icon representing her phone moving across a satellite image of the theater they had just left. 

“You could refresh it and it was in different spots,” Curtiss told the Sherwood Gazette. “I thought, ‘that’s suspicious.’”

So did the cops. The girls called them after the theater’s cleaning crew refused to let the girls back in, despite the fact that the app clearly showed the phone was moving around the building. Before long, Curtiss and Anderson were back in the theater with two police officers, wondering why a phone that was lost in Theater 8 was now, according to Find My iPhone, in Theater 9. The four cleaning service employees, who were now the only other people there, all denied any knowledge of the phone’s whereabouts. 

They might have been vindicated when a search of Theater 9 turned up nothing up, but Curtiss’ suspicions were confirmed when calling the phone revealed it had been shoved into padding that lined the theater walls for sound-proofing. One of the cleaning service employees confessed, and was charged with second-degree theft. 

It’s likely developers had entirely different cushions in mind when they envisioned Find My iPhone being used. 

“Everyone’s got a smartphone and knows about these kind of ‘find my phone’ apps,” Captain Mark Daniel of the Sherwood Police Department told us. “But it’s the first time a citizen has provided this sort of service to us.”

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com