Some of the most popular questions I get over at AskTheAdmin involve being caught out without a backup. Normally when we talk about backups you immediately think about the PC or the laptop, but nowadays PDA’s, especially Windows driven ones, are becoming more and more important in the workplace and in our everyday lives.

It’s also inevitable, especially under any build of Windows, that you chance losing your data. Notwithstanding the inherent faults in Windows, having all your life’s info in a device that can be dropped, stepped on, kicked, flung accidentally while speaking in an animated fashion (git her done), melted, forgotten and otherwise mistreated can be very precarious.

If you’re an iPhone user you’ll know why it’s such a knock-out device. It has email, browsing, calling, texting, and tons of other functions. Now with the addition of the App store, it has the potential to be much more than any prior incarnation. Here are a few great utility apps to turn your iPhone into a veritable Swiss army knife:

A couple of days back, after surviving an accident, my girlfriend’s father decided to cheer me up by giving me his very nice Sony Ericsson K750i mobile phone. This gave me the opportunity to learn how to make MP3 ringtones - and it made me realise it’s not as difficult as I thought. All you need is your desired MP3, Audacity and the mobile phone software to transfer the MP3 to your phone.

I am in the habit of sending regular SMS messages to one of my best friends who lives in the United States. But each SMS message I send (from Germany) costs only what it would cost to send the message to someone in the United Kingdom. How do I manage that? By routing the message through Twitter, that’s how. It’s very easy to do and I’ll show you today how it’s done.

The rise of blogs and easily publishable content created a need for the ability to track it, hence the creation of Really Simple Syndicate Feeds or RSS for short.

“RSS is a family of Web feed formats used to publish frequently updated content such as blog entries, news headlines, and podcasts in a standardized format. RSS makes it possible for people to keep up with web sites in an automated manner that can be piped into special programs or filtered displays.”

These ’special programs’ and ‘filtered displays’ consist of either:

I’m a big fan of ebooks and have a huge collection of ebooks on various topics. Although I don’t read them on my cellphone now but later in this year when I plan to travel extensively, I’d definitely like to have the access to my ebooks collection on my phone and read them on the go.

While I was searching for ebook reading softwares online, I came across Mobipocket which is a free ebook reader provided by the Mobipocket.com ebook store. It works only on Windows PC and also works on mobile phones like Smartphones, Blackberry and on devices like PDA.

Even though Twitter has experienced a pretty hard time staying up 24/7, that hasn’t slowed down the development of numerous applications that integrate with Twitter.

At Make Use Of, we’ve covered a ton of tools to make your Twitter better. From 4 Tools for More Productive Twittering, to other Tools and Apps to Improve your Twitter Experience. All you really have to do to see everything we’ve listed on Twitter is to check out the “Twitter” tag here on the website.

YouTube, the most popular video sharing site on the internet, allows its users to upload and share videos easily but doesn’t provide any way to download them.

So if you are a YouTube fan and would love to download some of the videos to your computer so that you may watch them again, without the need to visit the site again, then here are 4 quick ways to do that.

1. Add a ‘ Kiss ‘

Yes, you heard me right You just need to add the word ‘kiss’ to the YouTube video URL and then it directs you to a website where you can download it as a .flv video or convert it other formats as well.

If you happen to be one of the many people who use their built-in mobile web browser to check your e-mail, chances are you get frustrated by that little scroll wheel or tiny scrollbar when trying to move around inside the page.

If you’ve used the web-based version of Gmail on your mobile browser you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. Like when you open an e-mail, read its contents, then decide you want to archive or delete it; you usually have to scroll nearly all the way down to the bottom and click on the appropriate link or whatever other link you were trying to click. This can be quite awkward if you’re reading an e-mail that your sister sent you that’s 45 pages long and you’re just trying to easily delete or archive it. In last month’s Gmail podcast, Chuck Tomasi talked about a feature he calls “Speed Dialing”.

Once in a while I need to send certain things from my PC to my mobile phone. This can be a personal memo note, an address of some place, telephone number or even a document. If you also frequently need to send stuff to your phone, here are some tools to help you with that.

SendToPhone - Send Text Messages, Addresses, Directions, Phone Numbers etc.

Google SendToPhone is one of the coolest Firefox extensions out there. When installed you will be able to highlight text, emails, physical addresses, directions, telephone numbers, etc. on any webpage and instantly send it as a text message to any mobile number within US for free. Quick and easy.

The mobile web is starting to really take off. More websites started to offer mobile versions, new mobile apps released on a daily basis, mobile browsers getting better, etc. To sum up, more and more people access internet from mobile phones. If you got a blackberry, iPhone or any kind of smartphone, here are a couple of tools and websites to get you started.

OperaMini - Mobile Browser

With the advent of Apple’s new iPhone and iPod Touch, a whole host of websites have set up mobile version of their regular site. Notable among these various sites is Gmail and all of the related Google web services. (disclaimer: for the rest of this article I will be referring to the iPod touch, but I tested the application to the same extent on the iPhone as well.)

For a while I didn’t have any native mail application on my iPod touch. I bought by iPod in September and didn’t want to pay 20 dollars for the January application upgrade. Being a Gmail user, I was delighted to find that Gmail was such a versatile web app and can be conveniently accessed both from iPhone and iPod Touch.

I am back with another mobile productivity application. You remember me covering Goog-411? I loved that and I love this as well. Way to go Google!

If you are using an iPhone, the newest Windows Mobile 6.1 device, a Blackberry, Android or ANY device with ANY type of mobile browser and you want to grab some local information, point your mobile to: www.google.com/m/lcb.

With this new doo-hickey you can look stuff up without typing! Google automagically discovers your city but that’s it. Maybe someday they can grab your latitude and longitude by triangulating your mobile… (no I do not watch too much “24″!)

I do a lot of texting on my mobile phone, either to my girlfriend, to my family back in Britain and even to clients. I also do a lot of Twittering when I am out and about. This can lead to a lot of SMS’s being stored up in my phone and some phones impose a limit on how many messages can be stored before you have to start deleting. If your phone has a limit, you may be interested in TreasureMyText which is an online SMS storage system.

Not so long ago MUO author Dave posted an article on How to control Windows Mobile Phone from the Desktop, today I want to show you how to synchronize your phone with your loved one.

Due to my career and title as “The Admin”, when I am at home the wife expects nothing less than technology perfection, and being an admin I like to be in control of things. I hate outsourcing anything I can do myself; specifically running my own email server, ftp site and such.

Why use other peoples services when you don’t have to? Good Question!

The mobile web is really taking off. There are a ton of startups exploiting this very market, and it’s only going to get more and more competitive.

With lots of mobile users in the US, unlimited internet and wi-fi enabled phones; browsing the web can be quite the experience. If you don’t have Opera on your phone, chances are you’re using a crappy built-in browser that rarely, if ever, renders pages correctly. That’s where Mowser steps in.

Windows Mobile 6 is my mobile OS of choice (sorry Blackberry fans, I really hate the closed-source nature of the Blackberry!). I keep all of my contacts synced to it via ActiveSync and basically keep my life organized with it. Via Twitter I heard someone talking about My Mobiler… so I had to check it out, and I was pleasantly surprised!

So why would one want to control their Windows Mobile phone from their desktop?

• Too lazy pick up your phone to make a call
• Writing long sentences on that tiny keypad is annoying

Want to have identical browser settings on every one of your PCs ? How about keeping documents on your office and home PCs synchronized? For these and several other ways to sync your data read further. Enjoy!

1. Google Browser Sync - Sync Browser Bookmarks, History, Settings, etc. between diff. PCs

Google Browser Sync is a Firefox extension from Google that can auto synchronize your browser bookmarks, history, persistent cookies, and saved passwords – across multiple computers. It even lets you restore open browser tabs and windows across different machines so you can always pickup from where you left. It’s completely automated, all you need to do is to install it on all computers that you use on a regular basis.

2. SyncToy - Synchronize Files Between PC and USB Thumbdrive

After every 500 additions to MUO directory , we select the 40 most unique and unusual services. It’s been 5 months since the first one, so it’s time for batch no. 2. As mentioned earlier, this round-up is about those little-known undiscovered apps that are rather unusual, useful, free, and are the must-be bookmarked type. Enjoy!

Top 10:

1. beFunky - Awesome web app that turns images to cartoonized paintings and videos to cartoons.

2. DisplayWars - Incredibly simple tool that helps lots of people. Want to buy a new screen? DisaplyWars lets you compare screen sizes by mapping one display size on top of the other. For smaller items see SizeEasy.

I did some research on iPhone specific websites and found out, to my surprise, that there were quite a few out there. Aibek has covered iiPhone web apps before, but here’s a small list of more websites specifically designed for the beautiful iPhone.

Information / News Web Apps :

CBS News: www.cbsnews.com/iphone
Fox News: iphone.foxnews.com
Google: Google.com
Reuters Mobile: mobile.reuters.com
BrainyQuote: www.brainyquote.com/iphone.html

Social Apps :

Digg: www.digg.com/iphone
Facebook: iphone.Facebook.com
Twitter: m.twitter.com/login

Reference:

Wikipedia: www.keishi.net/ipodia/
People Finder: www.2robots.com/iphone/#_ByNumber
Urban Dictionary: www.idotg.com/apps/iwurd.php
Realtor: iphone.realtor.com

Weather Web Apps :

AccuWeather: apple.accuweather.com/widget/iphone1/iphone.html
Weather Underground: i.wund.com
Weather.com: www.weather.com/iphone

We have covered ways to backup emails, wordpress blogs, Firefox settings, computer files …. all but mobile phones. So it’s time to introduce some services to backup your mobile phone, i.e. contacts list, calendar entries, text mesages, browser bookmarks, phone settings, notes etc. As usual, all listed services are free or come with a dececnt free account option.

(1) Mobical - Simple and straightforward over-the-air mobile backup and restore service to automatically backup mobile address book, calendar, settings, bookmarks and notes online. Mobical supports pretty much all modern handsets and can be accessed from any web-enabled device. You can edit contacts, add appointments, and save notes online and it will sync added changes with your handset. Similarly, all on-phone edits will be synced with the web copy. Simple and convenient.

A quick look over a number of unique, interesting and hassle-free reminder tools to assist you with daily stuff. All free and quite different from the rest.

Jott

Probably the best reminder service that can be accessed from any US phone. You simply dial-in JOTT number (1-866-JOTT-123), and as you speak it records your message and sends it over to your email address as text. Messages can be sent to yourself or anyone else.

Highlights include:

• Record and assign messages to different categories (expenses, reminders, ToDos, Work, etc.).
• Communicate with teams and delegate tasks to groups of people.

Have you noticed that phone companies charge an arm and a leg for directory inquiries? Last I checked it was well over a dollar at AT&T and the other big boys. I couldn’t just stand around throwing my money away on frivolous things like information. Money should be spent on fun things like alcohol, partying and the such (unless my wife is reading this then lets replace those with Baby Formula, Gucci Bags and Car Payments).

For my first MakeUseOf post I will be taking you through the wonder that is Goog-411. You dial up 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411) from any (US) phone. After you get a friendly Google hello you follow the voice prompts which are extremely intuitive.

Ebay is by far the most popular online marketplace. So in case you’re looking for a couple of free tools to help you get the best of it than read further. As usual, all free, and nothing useless. Search tools, apps to handle last minute bidding (both from web or mobile), ultimate bargain locater, and some more.

FINDING THE RIGHT ITEM:

A list of useful mobile apps that bring excellent features to your phone. Enjoy!

1 UnwiredBuyer - Receive last minute eBay notifications and place bids directly from your mobile. Definitely a must-have for every eBay junkie. (US and Canada). Video Demo.

2. Soonr - Need to access your PC directly from the handset? Enter Soonr, a free mobile client that brings remote PC access to your phone: search files, view documents, check emails, run programs and more. US only. Video Demo.

Microsoft as a company is not usually associated with cool and free products. In that sense, Google is way ahead, it has Gmail, Google Reader, Calendar, Google Docs and dozens of other useful services. Nonetheless, there are a bunch of FREE Microsoft tools that are definitely worth a look. While some of them are yet to be released, others have been around for a a while.

(1) HealthVault
Service that many US families should find really useful. In simple terms, HealthVault is an online safebox for all your medical records. It’s not just a storage place to keep medical history but also to share records with doctors, place to where medical documents can be faxed and auto-archived, and lots more.

Over the last week I came across a couple of handy services that let users sell their old or broken iPods, cell phones and other gadgets. These aren’t a marketplace-style website but services that WILL buy your gadgets at a sound price. Since we haven’t seen anything of this kind before, I decided to run a quick comparison and see how they stand against eBay. Actually both of the services were already covered in MakeUseOf Directory, but in case you missed it, here is a quick overview:

I have this urgent need to read my emails as soon as they land on my inbox. I realize it’s counter- productive and very distracting, however there is just something about it … You know that feeling, don’t you?

Anyways, here I would like to go over 4 different ways to forward, access and reply to your emails directly from your mobile handset. In other words, staying connected to your Inbox whenever you’re on the go.

Each method works slightly different and depending on your needs you may choose one over the others. However no matter which application you choose it’s totally free (in some cases carrier data fees may apply).