Tag: Android - Part 2

What’s The Difference Between SD And Micro SD Memory Cards?

I won’t bore you with all the technical details of what makes a micro SD card different from a standard SD card, because I’m pretty sure all you care about is whether or not a micro SD card will work with your various devices. The answer is, so long as your device can accept a standard SD card, yes, it can accept a micro SD card — provided you have a standard SD card adapter or USB plug-in adapter (as pictured in this post). You can buy micro-to-standard SD card adapters and USB plug-in adapters on their own, but plenty of micro SD cards come bundled with adapters, too. To use a micro SD card in a device that takes standard SD cards (most digital cameras, for example), you just slide the micro SD card into the adapter’s card slot, then insert the adapter into your device the same as…

Music Lovers: Are You Checking Out Amazon’s Monthly List of $5 MP3 Albums?

Did you know that MP3s you buy from Amazon are totally iTunes-compatible, and totally DRM-free? DRM-free means no restrictions on copying to all your various devices, no restrictions on backing up, and no problem using these MP3s on both Apple-brand and non-Apple devices that can play MP3s. That means you can play ’em on your iPod, iPhone, Android phone or tablet, Kindle Fire, PC, Mac, or any other device that can play MP3 files. And did you also know that Amazon kicks off each new month in its MP3 Store by discounting 100 MP3 albums and posting that list to the “deals” page of the MP3 store? I’ve been posting about this list each month for over a year at the Kindle Fire on Kindle Nation Daily site, so I can tell you true: every month’s list has more than a few of those “essential” albums that always turn up on annual lists of…

Carcassonne: My New Favorite Game App

This is a cross-posting of a piece I originally wrote for Kindle Fire on Kindle Nation Daily. It is reprinted here in full with that site’s permission. I am a HUGE fan of games of all sorts, including board games, so it came as a real shock to me that I’d never heard of Carcassonne (4/5 stars, currently priced at $4.99) before I came across it in the form of a Kindle Fire game app—it’s also available for other Android devices in the Google Play store, and for Apple devices in the iTunes App Store. Carcassonne is a turn-based strategy game about empire-building, and even though it was only invented in 2000, it’s become a hugely popular board game in Europe. When you hear “empire building” you may be thinking of Risk, but this game doesn’t involve careful management of invading armies and weaponry. Instead, players take turns laying down tiles with pictures of different…

Kindle Fire / Android Tips & Tricks: Where’s My App? Revisited, Where’s My Music? And Where’s My Audiobook?

In my last Kindle Fire Tips & Tricks post I included information on how to force a newly-purchased app to show up on your Fire when you don’t want to wait for it. I’ll just reprint that tip here, then go on to elaborate a bit more on how to force other types of content to show up. Note that some of these same methods will work on ANY Android device, so if your thingie is something other than a Kindle Fire, it still may be worth giving these tips a try. Where’s My App? If you are in the habit of downloading a new app and then immediately wanting to try it out, you’ve discovered that purchased apps don’t immediately, automatically show up on your Fire’s carousel. And you may have resigned yourself to waiting a few hours, or until the next day, for that app to show up….

Can I Share Content From My Thingie?

This is a question I get pretty often, in many variations. “Can I share the movies on my iPad with my daughter, on her iPad?” “Can my wife use an app I bought for my Galaxy Tab on her Android smart phone?” “Can my roommate listen to the audiobook I got for my Kindle Fire on her own Kindle Fire after I’m done with it?”  The answer to the question of whether or not you can share content from your thingie with someone else’s thingie is twofold: It depends on the thingies, and the content. I can’t possibly address every portable device (the thingies) or every existing piece of content. So I’m going to deal in types of thingies and types of content.

Printing From Kindle Fire, Printing From Android

Today’s post is brought to you by Weekly Shirts, where you can get the coolest custom-designed, limited edition shirts around. Advertisers make it possible for Digital Media Mom to bring you great content each day for free, so thanks for your support. 3/27/14 UPDATE: please see this more recent post on the same topic, which includes links to more printer apps that have been released since the time this post was originally written. Like most people who own one, I LOVE my Kindle Fire. But one area where Android tablet computers and smartphones fall short of their bigger, beefier PC, Mac and laptop counterparts is in printing. Android smartphones and tablets like the Fire aren’t designed to be connected to other devices with cables, like regular computers are. You can connect your Android device to a computer with a USB cable for file transfers, but unless your device has printer driver software installed (a program that…