Cupertino, we have a problem. This morning I woke up to a dead iPhone 4S. When I went to bed last night, the battery gauge showed at least 50 percent. I did see a few vampires roaming the streets (it was Halloween, after all), but I didn’t expect them to sink their fangs into my …

The App Store is home to countless Angry Birds knockoffs and Fruit Ninja slice-alikes, but rarely has a game so blatantly borrowed from two big hits. Cut the Birds plays exactly like Fruit Ninja, but instead of fileting flying fruit, you’re slashing birds–mad-looking birds. Indeed, there’s no mistaking the inspiration for these foul-tempered fowl. Their colors, their shapes, and even …

You may find this shocking, but getting my 11- and 9-year-olds to do household chores is like pulling teeth. Rotten kids! That may change now that I’ve got You Rules Chores on my iPhone. This clever new app turns household chores into a game, rewarding each kid a designated number of coins for each completed job. Whoever finishes the week’s …

As I wrote earlier this year, Android battery life can be atrocious. Most of the Android-powered phones I’ve tried end up dead overnight if they’re not left on a charger, and Android tablets are just as bad. I can understand phones having power issues, what with all their syncing and pinging and fetching. But tablets aren’t phones; they should be …

When Scribblenauts made its Nintendo DS debut back in 2009, it instantly joined the ranks of the console’s showcase games. GameSpot gave it an 8.0 rating and called it “a jubilant experience that is sure to delight.” Scribblenauts just arrived for iOS, going under the name Scribblenauts Remix, and it feels as original now as it did two years ago. It’s not perfect, …

Cloud Engines’ new Pogoplug Mobile is a small box that plugs into your home router and streams your media libraries to your Android or iOS device. That may sound familiar to anyone already familiar with the Pogoplug line of products, but the Mobile adds one key feature to the mix: it automatically backs up photos and videos captured with your …

It was just over two years ago that I wrote about Line2, a clever VoIP app that adds a second phone number to your iPhone. Now developer Toktumi has released Line2 HD, an iPad-specific version of the app, which should prove popular among business users. It not only turns your tablet into a full-featured phone, but also provides a nice …

One pretty cool iOS 5 feature that flew in under the radar is Shortcuts, which CNET’s Jason Cipriani dubbed AutoText in his June preview, How to customize AutoText shortcuts in iOS 5. If you’ve ever used AutoHotKey, PhraseExpress, or even Microsoft Word, you’re probably familiar with this time-saving capability: When you type a customized abbreviation, iOS expands it into a complete …

Looking for a boatload of free cloud storage? If you own an iDevice, you can score 50GB of it, no strings attached. That’s the deal being offered by Box.net: 50GB of online storage for anyone who installs the Box.net app on an iPhone, iPod Touch, or Pad. (Sorry, Android users–not sure why you’re being left out.) The app itself is …

My iOS 5 upgrade went pretty smoothly, though it took the better part of two hours and left me scratching my head about a lot of things. (One of them is iCloud, but thankfully Apple now has a brief guide to iCloud setup and operation.) Indeed, while I’m overjoyed with Reminders and loving Safari’s new Reading List, I’m really perturbed by some …