GBM’s iOS and Android Apps Of The Week [Jan 15 – 21]

Every week the staff of GBM uses dozens of apps, some we can’t live without and some we can’t uninstall fast enough.

These are the apps we’ve been using or discovered recently that stood out in the crowd. They range from the practical to the time-wasting (in a good way).

Lumin — $1.99 [iOS]

Turn your iPhone into a magnifying glass.

Lumin helps you view print in dark places or hard to see locations. When I want to upgrade the firmware on my HDTV, I can never remember the model number. iPhone does a great job of getting behind the thing on the wall. I can then use my iPhone camera and take a photo of the label. It’s also good for fine print in documents. With Lumin the image is magnified 2X and you don’t have to snap a photo unless you want to. It uses the LED flash for better viewing.

Kevin Purcell

Meebo — Free [iOS, Android]

If you like to chat on your phone, Meebo is the app that you want.

Meebo brings a bunch of chat services into one platform. Once you fire it up, you can use AIM, Google Talk, Facebook, and more, to talk to your co-workers, friends and family members while on-the-go. I’ve been using it for quite some time now and I’ve found it to be the most reliable among its kind. Switching from 3G to Wi-Fi is seamless and the push notifications, when I have them turned on, work like a dream.

Adam Mills

TileStorm HD — $1.99/$3.99 [iOS, Android]

This puzzle game will keep you occupied for hours.

TileStorm HD is a fun puzzle based game that tasks you with sendng your wheeled robot companion from one end of a spaceport to another. At $4 on Android it is a bit pricey for some, but well worth it thanks to 100 puzzles.

I’m usually tire of puzzle games unless they are well thought out. So far, I am still having fun moving my tiles around to get my robot around outer space, an industrial complex, medieval times and the jungle.

Josh Smith

TuneIn Radio — Free [Android]

This Internet radio app just got better with Car Mode and voice commands.

I’ve been looking for the perfect radio listening app for a long time since I’m an NPR junkie and recently came across TuneIn Radio. It’s not focused on public radio stations specifically, instead offering up a single app for streaming multiple radio stations of all types.

Find stations from across the country based on type or genre or just search the call letters you want. There’s both a sleep timer and an alarm function so you can wake up to any station.

A recent update brought with it Car Mode, which has bigger, chunkier buttons and a voice search component that makes it easier to control.

K. T. Bradford