iPhone | At Home with Tech

November 15, 2020

Avoid these Tech Glitches Before your Next Backyard Movie Night

The cold weather could be the least of your concerns if your outdoor projector doesn’t function properly at your backyard event. Here are a few problems to look out for and how to fix them.

My family and I have returned from a little adventure across town. It was at a friend’s outdoor birthday party in his backyard for his eleven-year-old son.

My friend asked me if I could bring along my portable projector to help him create an outdoor screening of “Black Panther” via his Disney+ app on his iPad. I was more than happy to oblige. His wife put up a white sheet on the back side of their house overlooking their patio, and we were ready to provide the post-meal entertainment.

How to Set Up your Backyard Movie Night Gear
Over the summer, my new Nebula Mars II Pro projector made by Anker was the backbone of my own backyard movie night series. My iPhone served up movies through the iTunes Store and Disney+.

I connected my iPhone to my Lightning Digital AV Adapter (from Apple) and then used an HDMI cable to tether my iPhone to the Mars II Pro. Though you can connect via Bluetooth, a direct connection avoids certain content transfer restrictions.

Though my portable projection system worked great, there were two technical glitches that I needed to work through:

How to Fix Audio Sync Problems with an External Speaker
The Mars II Pro’s two onboard speakers are relatively powerful, but the outdoors can be a noisy place, especially with crickets at dusk. When I tried augmenting the audio oomph with my portable AOMAIS Go Bluetooth speaker I discovered an annoying quirk using Bluetooth.

When streaming content via the Mars II Pro’s onboard apps, the video synced up just fine to the external Bluetooth speaker. The Mars II Pro works perfectly in its own operating universe.

But once I tried extending that equation and connecting the Mars II Pro via HDMI to my iPhone, that was a step too far! It created a small but infuriating audio delay from my AOMAIS Go speaker.

The fix is to avoid the Bluetooth connection altogether and hard wire the external speaker using an audio cable with 3.5mm mini connectors. After that, my external speaker’s audio synced to the Mars II Pro’s video perfectly.

Don’t Miss this Setting when Downloading Movies from the Apple TV App
File compatibility can be a problem when using a digital AV adapter.

I found that when downloading movies onto my iPhone from the iTunes Store, the flicks wouldn’t play when I used my Lightning Digital AV Adapter. Instead, I received this message.

BUT…

When I opened my iOS 14’s settings and navigated to the Apple TV app, I spotted this critical setting under Digital AV Adapter Options:

Downloads for AV Adapter

And here’s the fix:

Slide Downloads for AV Adapter to – Green

This setting allows “Apple TV app to download titles specially-formatted to play through an AV adapter…”

Wow. Yes, it was that simple.

The Fall Challenge
Armed with my summer outdoor movie night learnings, I felt emboldened to confront any technical problem that fall outdoor movie night might throw at me. I brought my gear over to my friend’s house, eager to boot it all up.

My friend had already download the movie on his iPad’s Disney+ app to avoid the occasional but maddening video artifacts that can pop up when streaming gets bumpy. (smart)

I unpacked my Lightning digital AV Adapter and HDMI cable combo and connected his iPad to my Mars II Pro.

Docking was complete, and we were ready to go.

Great Scott!
My friend tapped the play icon, and the movie began.

Suddenly, I felt an uncontrollable impulse. I screamed, “It worked!” And I proceeded to take a victory lap around the patio. Everyone stared at me with confusion. They must have wondered if I was channeling my inner Doc Brown from “Back to the Future.” (I was.)

That’s because over the summer, I tried to project downloaded Disney+ movies using this same set up using my iPhone XS Max… and failed.

I’ve always receive this message:

So, I’ve been forced to stream my Disney+ content instead. And yes, that worked. But the Disney+ download method has continued to elude me.

Living Happily with Cold and Mystery
Of course I’ve tried to figure out why my friend’s iPad succeeded where my iPhone has stumbled. Let me simply say that the investigation… continues.

For now, the fact that my Nebula Mars II Pro was able to contribute to another successful outdoor movie night during this chilly time of year is plenty to celebrate.

Sure, it was cold out, but these are extraordinary times. If there’s a way to avoid cancelling yet another event while also being able to social distance outdoors, I think it’s worth considering.

So, break out the long underwear. Wear layers. Stir up some hot chocolate for the kids. And maintaining some glow in a fire pit doesn’t hurt either.

With that in place, it’s worth it!

January 19, 2020

Why Nixplay Smart Photo Frames are Better as Screens for Video

Nixplay’s new smart digital photo frames can handle HD video files transmitted via your iPhone. Here’s why that’s a game changer.

I picked up one of the next-generation Nixplay Wi-Fi digital photo frames over the holidays to support my ongoing quest to provide more exposure for my recent family photos. I’ve generated thousands of family images over the years, and most never get any screen time, let alone make it to the physical print stage.

Yes, I know that many folks use their smartphones and shared cloud photo albums for this purpose. Or they just email pics around. But that design requires an action from both the sender and receiver. A Wi-Fi digital photo frame only needs the recipient to glance over and see what’s on the frame.

Plus digital photo frames have the huge advantage of being able to cycle through many photos.

My new frame is the Nixplay Smart Photo 10.1” Black.
$152.99 at Amazon Prime

HD Video Capability
But a funny thing happened while I set up my new Nixplay frame, which was a snap… and an entirely different experience than earlier generation Nixplay frames that I had to wrestle with.

I finally processed that these current Nixplay frames now have the capability to playback HD video files.
(Older Nixplay frames could only handle SD videos, which required you to first convert your native HD MOV video files to lower-resolution AVI files. Ugh.)

So, this improvement instantly sets up a simple distribution pipeline for all of my family video clips that have had an even harder time finding an audience than their photo cousins.

But before I was able to get too excited, I read the fine print:
The length of videos is limited to a mere 15 seconds.

Well, how Vine of them!
(I expect this is not so much a creative choice as a limitation of the hardware handling huge video file sizes.)

Still, you can do a lot with 15 seconds.

Straight Out of Hogwarts
And once you put together a playlist of short video clips using the Nixplay iOS app, it creates a whole new visual experience on the frame that a sequence of digital photos simply can’t compete with.

I immediately set up a series of video clips for my Nixplay highlighting our day’s fun sledding during a light snow storm.

I felt like I was transported to the middle of a Harry Potter movie where photos and paintings come to life. Watching the videos on the frame was really that cool!

For the record, I kept the frame’s audio functionality off. Sure, it would be great to hear the sound, but I think only when you’re actively showing off your videos. Otherwise, it would be too intrusive as an ongoing environmental background element.

15-Second Videos for your Photo Frame
To simply throw your clips into a playlist for easy viewing and not have to edit together a finished video… that’s so quick and easy!

Plus, video files fit perfectly in this HD 16×10 aspect-ratio frame.
(The screen resolution is 1280×800, which is essentially 720HD. That said, my 1080p video files have been playing back fine.)

Sure, there are still some drawbacks.

The 15-second video limit is depressing, but it also respects people’s limited attention spans. If you want to show off the ten-minute school chorus performance that your child was a part of, you’ll simply need to tether your viewer to another screen.
(If you’re interested, I be happy to set up my video for you.)

And the restriction to load videos only via the Nixplay iOS app means you’ve first got to get your video onto your iPhone. So that could mean another step or two if you’re not working with native iPhone videos.

I’ve been having a lot of fun lately shooting time lapse videos with my new DJI Osmo Pocket.

Still, a digital photo frame that can easily play your HD video files is a big step forward in functionality.

Every day, we’re evolving further into a world dominated by video. Digital frames that show off photos are nice, but that trick is so yesterday.

Smart frames that can handle HD videos isn’t magic anymore. It’s the only way to go.

Thank you, Nixplay!

October 27, 2019

My Favorite Feature in iOS 13

If you hate spam robocalls as much as I do, you’ll be happy to learn Apple has provided a better defense in iOS 13…

I expect this iOS 13 tweak is not on top of anyone else’s list, but it’s quickly become a game changer for me when using my iPhone.

First, some background…
Earlier this year, I activated the ‘Do Not Disturb’ setting on my iPhone in an attempt to stop spam robocallers from interrupting my life.
(This setting still allowed calls from my ‘contacts’ to get through.)

But the big problem I found with this setting was there were still plenty of times when my iPhone was not in its Do Not Disturb mode, because I was using it. And whenever my iPhone was on, it was no longer locked down.
(I had decided not to engage the Do Not Disturb… ‘Always’ mode, because that was too restrictive. I’d never see any incoming texts!)

So of course, those moments when my iPhone was awake presented a crack in its defenses…

Invariably, I would be interrupted by a robocall when I was using an app on my iPhone. And I couldn’t just decline the rogue call for fear that any manual response would somehow trigger even more unwanted calls in the future. So, I’d sit there for twenty seconds while the call rang out. And then I’d continue along, having lost twenty seconds I’d never get back.

That stinks, right?

Silence Unknown Callers
I imagine this annoying problem has also happened to enough iOS designers at Apple over the past year. And so they’ve created a better defense for it in iOS 13.

It’s a setting called ‘Silence Unknown Callers,’ and here’s how you turn it on…

Tap Settings
Tap Phone
Slide on Silence Unknown Callers

Apple describes this setting as “Calls from unknown numbers will be silenced, sent to voicemail, and displayed on the Recents list. Incoming calls will continue to ring from people in your contacts, recent outgoing calls, and Siri Suggestions.”

So, the huge change here is when a call from an unknown number comes in while you’re using your iPhone, the call doesn’t take over your device other than a momentary drop down notification about the unknown call.

More ‘Good’ Calls Get Through
With this feature in place, I no longer needed to keep the draconian ‘Do Not Disturb’ mode on.

The ‘Silence Unknown Callers’ setting is much more flexible, because it lets through numbers that you’ve used before but may not yet be listed in your contacts.
(So, if you make a one-off phone call but also expect a return call, now your iPhone won’t immediately send it to voice mail.)

Hailing Frequencies are Open
Of course, the real solution to handling spam robocalls is not how to best avoid them, but how to stop them from happening in the first place!

But until then, I’m pleased that Apple has helped me keep my generally ‘silenced’ iPhone more available to receiving legitimate calls from my own little universe.

It just takes sliding on the right setting!

Tag: iPhone

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