Compare FarFinder With Competing Products
We know there are other applications that let you access your Mac, and other applications you can use to view files on your iPhone.
Here at Flying Mac we're not trying to sell you a lemon - we want to to compare, because we know how well FarFinder comes out! Here are some of FarFinder's advantages when compared to other products.
Air Sharing (also Briefcase and other similar iPhone apps): This iPhone app lets you copy files to your iPhone for later viewing.
- With Air Sharing you have to copy files when you're at or near your Mac. This means you have to remember to do it before you leave your home or office! Not very good for spur-of-the-moment viewing.
- With FarFinder you have access to your whole Mac all the time (as long as you have 3G/EDGE/Wi-fi coverage), so you can access anything whenever it takes your fancy, rather than thinking "gee, I wish I'd brought that file with me".
- You can copy files to your phone if you want to - useful if you'll be in the subway or on a plane - but most of the time you'll find you won't bother; just connect straight to your Mac!
Searchlight: This Mac application lets you use a web browser or iPhone to search your Mac. The idea is similar to FarFinder, but much more limited:
- Searchlight only lets you search - you can't navigate around your Mac's folders. Imagine trying to use your Mac without the Finder - only Spotlight - and you get the idea.
- FarFinder lets you search when you need to, but more often you'll click through your Mac's folders and files like you would in the Finder.
- Internet access: FarFinder eases the pain of getting at your Mac from the internet, by configuring things for you and giving you an easy to remember URL, like findme.flyingmac.com/adrian. Searchlight seems to have been designed more for use within offices, not from outside, and it shows.
- FarFinder is much cheaper, and you get much more!
Back to my Mac: This is Apple's offering.
- Mac-to-Mac only. Great if you happen to be on another Mac running Leopard, but sadly the world is full of Windows boxes and other things. With FarFinder, all you need to get to your Mac is a web browser - and they're almost everywhere.
- FarFinder gives you iPhone access too, of course.
- Can you get it running, and keep it running? Internet wisdom suggests that BTMM can be difficult to get working, and might not be there when you need it - awkward when you're not around to fix it.
- BTMM itself is free, but you have to pay $100 a year for Mobile Me to be able to use it.
iGet: A file-transfer tool aimed more at systems administrators and other geeks than at your average Mac user. (Although many geeks, myself included, enjoy the niceties of FarFinder too!)
- You need iGet on the Mac you're connecting from. This is different to FarFinder, which only needs to be on the Mac you're connecting to. We figure when you're out and about, you never quite know what computer you'll have access to, so it's nice that all you need is a web browser. You have more control over your Mac at home or office, so installing FarFinder there is easy, and you only have to do it once.
- Mac-to-Mac only.
- Configure your network, remember your IP address. Good luck with that! FarFinder generally takes care of this stuff for you.
- While it looks a bit nicer than most ftp programs, it's not really as "Mac-like" as all that, and is missing a lot of the niceties that make FarFinder a joy to use.
ShareTool: Quite a different tool to FarFinder. Again, it's Mac-to-Mac only, but looks useful if you're at a Mac with ShareTool installed on it, eg. you've brought your laptop with you.