If you haven’t upgraded to iOS4, VolumeButtonExtender available on Cydia is worth checking out.  While the iPhone offers a couple of ways to control your music, you need use the screen to do it, not a great solution if you’re jogging, using it in the car or otherwise need to turn adjust the volume or skip tracks quickly with just one hand and minimal attention.

VolumeButtonExtender gives you quick access to the music controls, even in standby mode, using just the volume buttons. Available on Cydia, the handy utility also helps extend your battery life. Here’s Cult of Mac’s guide to help get you started.

If you type a lot on your iPhone and haven’t upgraded to iOS4,  BTstack available on Cydia is worth checking out.

The iPhone’s on-screen keyboard and auto-correction are great, but if you write long missives or are used to hammering out complex messages on a keyboard, you’ve probably wanted to use an external keyboard to get your point across at one time or another.

This is where BTstack keyboard comes in: it’s a simple paid application that lets you hook up most external Bluetooth HID keyboards to your iPhone or iPod Touch. Keep in mind that it doesn’t support more sophisticated commands for your mobile opus (selection, copy/paste, etc.) but it works like a charm for straight typing. Here’s Cult of Mac’s quick guide to get you started.

We start the day with two deals on iPods. First up is the 2GB fourth-generation iPod shuffle for $35. Next is the 8Gb current iPod nano for $99 from the Apple Store. We wrap up our top deals with the latest batch of App Store freebies, including “QuickRemind” for the iPhone and iPod touch. Along the way, we’ll check out other deals, including the PowerBug, a new stand for the iPad and new software bargains for the Mac.

As always, details on these and many other items are available at CoM’s “Daily Deals” page after the jump.

With Office for Mac 2011 launching later this year, Microsoft is giving a sneak peek of the productivity suite.

Above is the first in a series of highlight videos, showing off several new features, including Outlook for Mac (with Conversation View and Spotlight integration), a new Template Gallery and the Ribbon UI nav scheme.

Mactopia: Office for Mac 2011 Behind-the-Scenes: Conversations, Templates and more!

Amid all the new product news on Tuesday Apple quietly shipped a driver update titled: Magic Trackpad and Multi-Touch Update 1.0. I discovered the 78.6MB update last night via Software Update on my Macbook Pro and promptly installed it.

I highly recommend this update for most recent Macbook and Macbook Pro notebooks since it adds support of the new $69 Multi-Touch Trackpad as well as adding gestures for inertial scrolling and three-finger dragging. The three-fingered gesture is my favorite since it allows me to quickly drag windows around.

A complete list of notebooks that support the new gestures can be found in this Apple support document https://support.apple.com/kb/ht4254.

Also Tuesday, Apple released updates for Windows that add support for the Magic Trackpad hardware. A 6.62MB update is available for 32-bit versions of Windows and another for the 64-bit versions of Windows is 3.98MB. It works with Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 as well as Macs running the operating system via Boot Camp.

For some time, the iPhone has been saddled with the award for data hog. So much so, data usage has become an excuse by AT&T to explain poor network performance and a recent cap on data usage by iPhone owners. But it turns out the iPhone is second to Verizon’s Droid, a new study released Wednesday indicates.

According to a report by Validas, Verizon’s non-Blackberry smartphones consumed 421MB per month compared to 338MB for AT&T’s iPhone. The study analyzed consumer bills from 2009 and 2010. The 2009-2010 Wireless Data Study “provides year-over-year trends and detailed distribution charts segmented by device and by carrier, providing unique insight into the explosive growth of wireless data, which carriers are benefitting most from it, and which user and device groups are most driving it,” notes the study.

Panasonic has just announced their newest camcorder, the HM-TA1, a high-definition pocket cam fully compatible with the iFrame standard.

Available in black, red, gray and purple, Panasonic camcorder is compact, weighing less than a quarter of a pound. The HM-TA1’s software is streamlined for social networking, making it easy to upload videos to YouTube or Facebook, while also boasting electric image stabilization and a 4x digital zoom.

Other features of the HM-TA1 include support for SD/SDHC/SDXC memory cards, a 2-inch LCD and an integrated USB port. If you want one, the HM-TA1 will be available in August for $169.95.

Despite all the headaches over a rash of worker suicides, Foxconn should be resting easier today. Instead of headlines about overworked iPod assemblers jumping to their death, the electronics factory is being hailed as manufacturing half of the world’s electronics. The company, officially known as Hon Hai Precision Industries, seems to have caught a ride on a rocket – Apple.

“Foxconn’s customers are some of the hottest companies in the electronics business today, most notably Apple,” iSuppli associate Thomas Dinges said Wednesday. Foxconn, with a little help from the Cupertino, Calif. iPhone maker, posted nearly triple the revenue of it’s closest rival for first place. Foxconn, based in Taiwan, earned $17.1 billion in the second quarter, massively overshadowing No. 2 Flextronics International, which reported $5.9 billion.

I don’t really know if this neat little iPod Touch case will work, or even if it’s real, but superficially, it’s very promising: the Apple Peel 520M promises to turn your SIM-less Touch into an actual smartphone.

How does it work? Software-wise, presumably through jailbreaking. The hardware’s simple enough, though: just slot your Touch into a case containing an Infineon baseband chip and an 800mAh battery capable of providing 4.5 hours of call time or 120 hours of standby.

So basically, the Peel 520 is a mobile phone that uses a jailbroken iPod Touch as an external cell phone display. Ingenious and cute, but has the whiff of vaporware about it. If the Peel ends up being real, though, it’ll be released in China next week for a pretty reasonable price of around $50. We’ll keep our eyes on the import shops.

To further promote HTML5 as the future of web graphics, Apple has swung open the door for extensions to the public. While introduced in June to developers, Safari 5.0.1 now can be downloaded. The Cupertino, Calif. company also opened its Safari Extensions Gallery, joining the ranks of Firefox and other browsers extending the basic browser.

Bing, Twitter and the New York Times are among the first extensions available for Safari. “We’re thrilled to see so many leading developers creating great extensions and think our users are going to love being able to customize Safari,” said Brian Croll, Apple’s vice president of OS X Product Marketing.

Safari Extensions are built with HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript web standards. They are available for download at the extensions.apple.com site.

[9to5Mac]

According to the Daily Mail, Monday’s best-selling ebook was Blonde and Wet: The Complete Story on the UK iBookstore.

It wasn’t exactly an exposè about gossamer-haired scuba divers: it was an erotic novel, one of two by author Carl East that populated the top ten list of downloadable iBooks. Another collection called Six Sexy Stories by Ginger Starr came in at number five.

Yesterday, the list was very different, with all of yesterday’s erotica suddenly missing. In fact, according to the Daily Mail, all of the erotic books were was yanked simultaneously overnight, making it unlikely that they had naturally fallen off the list.

We’ve seen a good few next-gen iPod Touch leaks in the past few months, but the most recent rumors pretty strongly indicate that the next updatewill bring a FaceTime camera to the device.

What to make, then, of this latest prototype, supposedly found in a Californian “recycling place” and running iOS 3.1.3. It has no front-facing camera. That means no FaceTime… despite the fact Apple said they’d ship the software to millions of “iOS devices” this year.

At this point, it seems pretty clear that a lot of the iPod Touch prototypes with the second/third generation-style design and the back-mounted camera occulus are hold overs from last year, when Apple came within an inch of selling a camera-equipped iPod Touch, then pulled out at the last second due to module supply shortages. The next iPod Touch is going to have FaceTime, and it’s not going to ignore the iPhone 4’s glass-backed design.

Although Apple’s new 27-Inch LED Display is a wonderful addition to their product line-up, finally bringing the 27-inch iMac’s gorgeous 2560×1440 display to other Macs, it has come at a cost: Apple has discontinued the 24- and 30-inch display.

That’s disappointing: the 30-incher, in particular, is a gorgeous display, boasting a few more vertical pixels than the new 27-incher. The good news is that if you want Apple’s biggest display, you still have an opportunity to buy it: Apple will continue to sell the 24- and 30-inch Cinema Displays until their stock runs out.

We overlooked it in yesterday’s gluttony of new Apple products, but Cupertino’s quietest new product might, in many ways, be its most interesting: a battery charger.

The battery charger costs $29.99, and is remarkably green friendly: it has the lowest vampire rating in its class, intelligently shutting off power when batteries are full, and the six batteries that ship with the device itself are specced to last ten years.

It’s a strangely practical and unflashy device for Apple to release, even though Apple’s trademark design elements are infused into the device to the core. It makes sense that Apple would release something like this, though, as more and more of its peripherals go wireless.

What may be most interesting to me about the charger, though, is that it’s the first Apple product in recent memory that was launched to everyone’s complete surprise. No one seems to have had the slightest inkling that Apple was working on this.

I’ve got to admit: even though my job is to follow rumors and sift through patent filings, it’s just really nice to be surprised. That, in and of itself, is enough to lay down $30.

Apple appears to have fixed the widely-reported iPhone 4 proximity sensor issue in the latest iOS 4.1 beta 2 update.

The latest beta also includes a baseband update (AT&T 7.1), which seems to fix HSUPA upload speed issues, which slowed video and photo uploads to a crawl.

Despite reports to the contrary, our tests show that the proximity sensor issue appears to be have been fixed. (MacRumors says the issue hasn’t been addressed).

In numerous tests, I couldn’t get my iPhone 4 to hang up a call. Previously, the iPhone was plagued with proximity sensor issues. It would constantly hang up calls when I held the phone next to my cheek.

But after installing the iOS 4.1 beta 2 update this afternoon, I couldn’t force the iPhone to hang up calls when lifting it up to my face, no matter how hard I tried.

I stress that the issue only seems to have been fixed. I could of course be wrong. Apple hasn’t yet documented what is in the latest beta update.

Apple has just released iOS 4.1 Beta 2 to developers. We’re currently downloading it and will report what’s new ASAP.

The firmware is build 8B5091b. There’s also a new SDK, build 10M2305a. Both are available from the iPhone Developer Center.

The new 27-inch iMac launched today has room for two internal hard drives, including a solid state drive (SSD) that could halve boot times.

Apple suggests putting the operating system and key applications on the SSD, and everything else on a traditional Serial ATA drive, which come in 1 TB or 2 TB capacities.

The iMac’s product page says:

To give your iMac a real performance boost, configure your 27-inch iMac on the Apple Online Store with an optional 256GB solid-state drive. You can choose it as your only drive or have it installed in addition to the built-in hard drive, allowing you to store the operating system, critical applications, and important files on the solid-state drive and your other files on the hard drive. Because solid-state drives have no moving parts, the computer can access data at over twice the speed of hard drives. Which makes starting up your iMac and launching applications faster than you ever thought possible.

This is the first time the iMac has been offered with dual drives. It’s not cheap, however: A top-of-the-line 27-inch iMac with a 2 TB traditional drive and a 256 GB SSD costs $2,899 — a $900 premium over the base $1,999 price.

[polldaddy poll=3531556]

Apple’s Magic Trackpad looks like an optional peripheral for now, but it’s much more than that. It’s several nails in the mouse’s coffin. It may even be a stake through its heart.

Apple’s intent for the Magic Trackpad is clear: it’s a replacement for the mouse that brings multitouch gestures to the desktop. As more and more people use multitouch on their mobile devices, it’ll become more natural to use them on the desktop also.

Doug Engelbart invented the mouse, but Apple’s first Macintosh brought it to market and popularized it. And now, after more than 26 years as the primary UI device for desktops, Apple is beginning to phase it out. The success of Apple’s iOS platform, which uses multitouch as its primary interface, shows the path of Apple’s trajectory — it’s multitouch all the way.

Apple today unleashed a number of goodies, including giving iMacs and Mac Pros more oomph with new processors and increased storage options. We have those deals today, along with many more items for the Mac lover. Along with the refreshed line of iMacs and Mac Pros, we’ll also look at a number of software deals for you iPod, iPhone and Mac.

As always, details on these and many other items are available at CoM’s “Daily Deals” page right after the jump.

Apple has refreshed its Mac Pro, giving the desktop workhorse up to 12 processing cores for a top speed of 3.33GHz, boosting performance by up to 50 percent. The refresh also provides users the option of four 512GB solid state drives.

“The new Mac Pro is the most powerful and configurable Mac we’ve ever made,” said Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “With up to 12 cores, the new Mac Pro outperforms our previous top-of-the-line system by up to 50 percent, and with over a billion possible configurations, our customers can create exactly the system they want.”

Apple Tuesday updated its all-in-one iMacs with Intel’s Core i3, Core i5 and Core i7 processors, confirming rumors that the Cupertino, Calif. company would completely replace the Intel Core Duo line of chips powering the desktop machines. The low-end 21.5-inch iMac now sports a 3.06GHz i3 processor for $1,199.

The mid-range 21.5-inch iMac is powered by a 3.2GHz i3 chip for $1,499, while the high-end 27-inch iMac includes a 2.93GHz Quad-Core i7 processor for $1,999.

Have you lusted after those new iMacs with the 27-inch LED screens, but already have a MacBook – or even Mac mini? Well, Apple must have heard your pleas, because Tuesday the Cupertino, Calif. company unveiled a 27-inch LED display compatible with all Macs — for just $999.

The Apple Store is back up following some downtime this morning and the Magic Trackpad is now available.

At just $69, the Magic Trackpad provides your desktop Mac with all of the multi-touch functionality and gestures you’ll find on your Mac notebook. It looks fantastic and uses the same sculpted aluminum design as Apple’s wireless keyboard, so it will blend in perfectly on your desk.

Maybe it was the recent high temps which struck the U.S. East Coast, but a lawsuit now claims Apple’s wildly-popular iPad tablet device just can’t stand the heat. In a complaint filed July 23, lawyers claim the iPad “overheats so quickly under common weather conditions” and “does not live up to the reasonable consumer’s expectations created by Apple.”

The lawsuit also claims when placed in direct sunlight, the iPad “turns off, sometimes after just a few minutes of use.” Filed in a federal court in Oakland, California, the lawsuit seeks class-action status, as well as unspecified damages.