Print & Share
EuroSmartz LTD
http://mobile.eurosmartz.com/print/
Price: $6.99
iTunes Link

Have you ever been on your iPhone or iPod Touch and found yourself having to print a website or an email? If you are like me you wait until you’re at the computer to do it or you forget before you get to the computer. Well, with Print & Share installed on your device this problem is a thing of the past.

Print & Share let’s you print photos, websites, emails, documents, and addresses from your iPod or iPhone. The photos are from your library. Emails are from any email account you set up. You can even set up outgoing mail and use the app as your mail app. Contacts are from your address book. Websites are from the built in browser. Finally, document can be imported from your computer or you can even type a document in the program. The text editor is nothing special, but it is a place to type something for a quick printout.

Here is how it works. Before printing anything you have to install and set up the free printer server on your computer and have it running. The server is a free download and very easy to set up. My one complaint about the server is that you cannot hide the dock icon. I asked about this an the company said they are working on it for a future release. Once the server is up and running you are ready to print.

The print quality if fantastic and full size. I just printed a photo from my library. It printed to 5×7 and looked like I printed it from iPhoto. Documents will print at full page size, not a tiny iPhone proportionate document.

The only problem I had with the app was setting up an exchange email account. However, I am 99.9% sure that is a problem with my employer’s server and not the app.

With everything built in, you can use the app as you primary email app and web browser, or you can go to it when it is needed. Unfortunately, there is no way to have a button in Safari to send a page to the app for printing. That would be really cool.

For a full list of all of the features (and there are A LOT) check out the iTunes link.

At $6.99 Print & Share is a must have for those always wishing they could print from the iPod Touch/iPhone. EuroSmartz promises even more features in the future. I can’t live without it.

MYMAC.COM RATING 4.5 out of 5

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iMuffs
Company: Wi-Gear
Price: $149.99
wi-gear.com

iMuffs from Wi-Gear include a number of features to meet the ever growing wireless demands of the technology minded among the citizenry. With such features as: stereo bluetooth connectivity, controls for your iPhone/iPod, and a noise canceling microphone, iMuffs, on paper, seem to be ready for prime time. For more information on the features of iMuffs, jump to the product page.

DESIGN
iMuffs have a very sensible and practical design.

While the design of iMuffs is not likely to find its way into the Apple design Zeitgeist, it serves the purpose to which it was intended. In terms functionally, Wi-Gear has built in the required specs to deliver the promise of stereo bluetooth to the masses. However, comfort is another issue altogether (more on this later).

USABILITY
I found iMuffs to perform all of the listed functions as advertised. I used iMuffs with a 3G iPod Nano, 2G iPod Touch, and an iPhone 3G. Once the included dongle was attached to the thirty pin connector, everything worked seamlessly.

All of the controls (play/pause, next track etc.) worked as labeled. Once paired to the iPhone, the iMuffs would pause my music and allow me to answer an incoming call etc. Nice feature to have sans cumbersome wire. As with the current state of stereo bluetooth, the audio quality is good but not great. The newer bluetooth standard promises to solve some of the current limitations. If you are an audiophile, iMuffs are not for you.

Everything is great with iMuffs as long as you don’t have to wear them very long. Sadly, the engineers, in my opinion, skimped on the padding which covers the earpieces. When you place your fingers on the earpiece, you can feel the thinness of the cover.

In the above picture of the earpiece, my fingers are actually pressing against the cover. As you can see, they are not depressing the cover. This is due to the fact that there is very little material there, subsequently, I am pressing up against the hard plastic earpiece.

Once one has worn a pair of iMuffs for a while (my limit was about 1.5 hours) the hard plastic begins to press against the ears. I let my son use the review unit to get a second opinion. He could only manage 2 hours.

MAKING A GOOD THING BETTER
iMuffs by Wi-Gear have great functionality but suffer from a lack of comfort when worn for any length of time. A slight redesign of the earpiece cover could rectify this deficiency and improve the overall usability of the product. 

MyMac.com Rating:
Overall, this is a good product. It performs as advertised. As an Apple enthusiast, I tend to prefer a little more in terms of industrial design. Additionally, Wi-Gear definitely needs to redesign the earpiece covers from a comfort perspective. That said, I am awarding this good product from Wi-Gear a 4 out of 5 on our MyMac.com rating system.

LittleSnapper
Company: RealMac Software
$2.99
iTunes link

RealMac’s LittleSnapper iPhone/Touch app is the companion app to the Mac program of the same name. I love the Mac application. It has become my default way to take and organize screenshots on my iMac. When I was presented with the opportunity to review the companion iPhone/Touch app I jumped at it. Does the app live up to my expectations from the Mac version?

Unfortunately, it doesn’t. The app has a ton of potential, but it is disappointing. Here’s why.

One of the coolest features of the Mac application is that it will take a screen capture of a webpage. The screen captures is not the the portion of the page you see on the screen, but it will grab the entire webpage. The LittleSnapper app also takes webpage captures through its built-in browser. You navigate to the page, and take the picture. These pictures can be shared through QuickSnapper (RealMacs online photo sharing site), twitter, via email with a link to QuickSnapper, or through you Photo library on your phone/iPod. The picture is automatically sent to the library. Unfortunately, only the portion of the screen seen is taken. You can zoom into areas of the page you want, but it would be nice to have the feature of the entire page.

Also, the image quality is not the greatest. If you don’t zoom in on specific text you want a picture of you might not be able to read it in the photo. You can zoom in (in iPhoto for example) but the quality might no be good enough for it to be legible.

After you take your screen capture you can title the picture, rate it, and add keywords. Once again a feature with great potential. However, these labels do not show up in iPhoto when you import the image. The tags are for the QuickSnapper site.

You can also access your photo library on your phone/ipod and tag, rate, etc. them for sharing in QuickSnapper.

LittleSnapper has two more features: 1. You can go to the QuickSnapper site in Safari by clicking the QuickSnapper button. 2. You can manage QuickSnapper accounts. 3. You can take a picture with your iPhone and label, tag, and share it through the app (I have a Touch, so I was unable to test this feature).

I love the interface for LittleSnapper. It is a partial view of a classic 35mm camera. The features are on the lens which you spin around to get access, too. Unfortunately, the rest of the application could use some work.

So, should you buy the application? I would say wait for an update to be released. Many of the features can be done without the app. You can take a screenshot by holding the home and power buttons together, you can open Safari and go to QuickSnapper, etc.

MyMac.com rating 3 out of 5

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