You can do a lot of interesting things with an iPhone, but until recently it never occurred to me that an iPhone could be a laser pointer. But then the folks at Conary Enterprise sent me a free review sample of the iPin, a tiny laser pointer that fits into the headphone jack of an iPhone and is activated by an app. Why might you want to add a laser pointer to your iPhone? I'll admit that the first justification that occurred to me was that I could do my best Dr. Evil voice and brag that my iPhone had a frickin' laser beam attached to its head. But the real answer is that many folks like to use an iPhone to run a presentation on a computer, and since some of the best presenter remote controls have a laser pointer built in, the iPin adds that same capability to your iPhone.
Hardware
The iPin hardware is only .75" long and it fits into the headphone jack of your iPhone. Using an app (discussed below) you press a large button on your screen and a red laser shoots out of your iPhone.
I tested the standard model. I see that there is also an extended model that sticks out from the iPhone just a tiny bit more to accommodate iPhone cases that are less than 2 mm thick.
The technical specs say that the iPin uses a Class II 635 nm laser pointer. According to Wikipedia, that is a good thing: "The least expensive laser pointers use a deep red laser diode near the 650 nanometers (nm) wavelength. Slightly more expensive ones use a red-orange 635 nm diode, more easily visible because of the greater sensitivity of the human eye at 635 nm." I cannot comment on wavelengths, but I will tell you that from my tests, the laser is more than strong enough to remain very bright across a very large conference room like the one that you might use when giving a presentation.
The iPin is so small that the package comes with a plastic white square that holds the iPin so that it doesn't get lost in your briefcase. The iPin really is quite tiny, and there were a few times that I lost it for a minute when it was sitting on my desk (without that white square) and got buried under papers.
However, you might not even need to use that white square because the iPin is so small that you can actually just keep it plugged into your iPhone whenever you go to give a presentation. I kept an iPin plugged in for an entire week in which I flew to another city for a meeting for two days just to see what it was like to have the iPin in my iPhone for a long period of time. It was fine. I sometimes noticed the iPin, but it only sticks out of the iPhone just a little bit so it wasn't uncomfortable when I put my iPhone in my shirt pocket.
You might fear that keeping an iPin plugged in risks having a laser beam shoot out of your iPhone by accident. Fortunately, there are three reasons that isn't going to happen. First, the laser beam only activates when the app is running and you hold down your finger on the iPhone screen. Second, when you are not using the iPin, you can turn it 90 degrees which disables it. Here is a picture of the iPin in my iPhone when it is in the off position.
Third, if you exit the app without turning off the iPin by rotating it, your iPhone will show an alert reminding you to do so.
Software
One part of the iPin software is the app that runs on your iPhone. When you first start the app on an iPhone 5 or 5s, you will notice that it is upside down, but that actually makes sense because the headphone port (and thus the iPin) is on the bottom of the iPhone, so you hold your iPhone upside down when you use the iPin and thus see the app in the correct orientation.
The main use of the app is to activate the laser. Just tap anywhere on the screen. The large circle in the middle of the screen gains a red glow to alert you that the laser is on, as does a yellow warning triangle.
The app also shows you the current time, your remaining battery life, and an optional countdown timer if you want the app to help you know when you are getting close to the end of your allotted time for your presentation. Speaking of battery life, the iPin gets its power from your iPhone. The website states that it uses the same amount of power as playing a song. I would not dispute that; I did not notice any major battery drain while using the device.
If that was all that the iPin did, it would be little more than a novelty that you might use to amuse (or annoy) friends and pets. As noted above, the goal of the iPin is to help professionals giving presentations. Thus, you can download free software for your Mac or PC that allows the iPin app to control your computer as long as you are connected to the same Wi-Fi network. Simply swipe left and right on the iPhone screen to advance to the next of previous slides of a presentation. The app also lets you use your iPhone as a wireless remote to control your mouse cursor and click.
I tested the Mac software with the iPin and it worked as advertised. My only complaint was that I sometimes lost a connection, and I don't know if the iPin software was at fault or it was just a problem with my Wi-Fi network. Fortunately you can tap a few buttons on the app to reestablish a connection. Note that there was also a single occasion when even that didn't work and I had to quit and then restart the iPin software on my Mac. But for the most part it worked well, and it was very nice to be able to control a presentation on my Mac using just the iPhone in my hand, and any time that I wanted to emphasize something in a slide by using the laser pointer, I simply held down my finger on the iPhone screen to activate the laser.
Is this iPin right for you? I give presentations all the time, but it is very rare for me to do so from a computer. Instead, I typically use the Keynote app on my iPad and connect my iPad to a VGA projector, swiping my iPad screen to advance slides. Keynote even includes a virtual laser pointer; simply tap and hold on a part of your iPad screen and a bright red dot will appear there so that they audience will see a red dot similar to, but less bright than, a real laser pointer. So for me, I can't imagine many times when I will have a need for an iPin.
But if you give presentations using a Mac or PC and you like the idea of controlling the presentation using a handheld device, the iPin is a reasonable alternative to buying a handheld presenter that includes a laser pointer. Those products appear to cost around $35 on Amazon, and you can get the iPin on Amazon for $40. For the slight difference in price, you gain the ability to not have to carry around another device that you need to keep track of and keep charged with fresh batteries.
And you also gain the knowledge that your iPhone has a frickin' laser beam attached to it.
