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Down-to-the-wire holiday gift guide: app-enabled accessories (and Swingbyte giveaway!)

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It’s Thursday and you have four days to get the perfect Christmas gift, but have no fear…9to5Mac is here. O.K., enough with the cheese, let’s talk app-enabled accessories. Oh, man, I need to stop.

But, seriously, app-enabled accessories are the perfect gifts: they come in a variety of price ranges and work with a variety of iOS apps. So, we looked at a few popular, unknown, pricey, and not-so pricey ones and rounded them up below. Hopefully, this guide will give you a few ideas and inspire you to go shopping A.S.A.P.

Note: If you buy through Amazon, and are an Amazon Prime member, you could get many of these products shipped overnight for just $3.99 each.

Scroll to the bottom for details on the giveaway.

1. Ion All Star Guitar | Amazon sale: $93.15 (reg. $129.99)

Ion launched this nifty toy in the fall, and it is really, really cool. Think Guitar Hero…but for jammers and free-stylers. Like Ion’s popular iCade line, it charges with AA batteries. So, no wires and no fuss. It also fits any iOS device. A padded storage compartment adjusts to fit the iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch, and there is room to plug in a Lightening adapter (not included).

The built-in speakers pump out great volume, but there is also a headphone output for silent practice, and it has electric, acoustic, and bass guitar effects. The guitar, which is useable by both left-handed and right-handed folks, works best with the All-Star Guitar app that comes with 10 free songs pre-loaded, with access to additional songs for download, but it also works well with Garage Band and WI Guitar.

It’s packed with features, feels sturdy, and is definitely a cool gift for the musically inclined. Oh, and it seems like a neat way to learn guitar.

www.ionaudio.com

More accessories are below.


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Review: Moleskine’s $30 Evernote Large Ruled Smart Notebook for iOS (and giveaway!)

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UPDATE: The giveaway is now closed.

Moleskin, a widely renowned high-end notebook manufacturer based out of Milan, teamed up with popular note-taking app Evernote to launch a series of smart app-enabled notebooks just before the new school year commenced.

I bought one of these notebooks right away for grad school, intended to use it religiously, and hoped it would transform the way I study. Of course, one week into the semester, I found myself using the Evernote app on my iPad more often than the smart notebook itself. However, I still found the notebook quite beautiful, well done, and interesting in concept. For that reason alone, I figured I’d write up a little review now that the semester is over and even giveaway two of the $29.95 large-ruled smart notebooks.

Check out the review, and then leave a comment below. We’ll contact the winners in 9to5Forums.

A gallery is below.


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