AM Mist + Spray Screen Cleaning Blocks Review
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AM is responsible for some of the world's most innovative cleaning products designed exclusively for cleaning filthy gadget screen. We were never as excited about screen cleaning as we are now. Although you may not have heard about them, AM has been around for decades making cleaning products for record and cassette players. The company resurfaced late this year with a brand new line of colorfully fun and unique cleaning products suited for today's tech lifestyles. AM has quite a few options for laptop, tablet, smartphone, desktop, keyboard users and even TV viewers, but one screen cleaner immediately stood out to us.
We've got our hands on the Spray and Mist, AM's mystical all-in-one solution for eliminating all that "schmutz" on your touchscreen devices whilst sanitizing them too. With a bit of Apple and Danish thrown in, AM's all-in-one cleaners are appealing enough to wet our taste buds. So be sure to jump over the break for the full review where we put the Spray and Mist to the ultimate test of cleaning our gadgets to a squeaky clean finish.
Packaging is minimal, fairly easy to open up and very attractive. What more can we say? Oh right, pricing. You can pick up the Spray (left) in gray or blue colors for right around $20. While the smaller Mist comes in green or orange colors for $13. And if you live in the UK, that same price is mirrored in £. Thanks to the cool people over at OneWiseMac, you can order AM products and other cool gadgets and accessories directly from them.
If you don't already have at least a microfiber cleaning cloth and liquid spray setup no matter what brand or kind it may be, shame on you. Regardless, if you're reading this right now, you my friend have a screen that needs to be cleaned. It needs your loving care and undying devotion because screens don't clean themselves. And that's not all, no. You see, your touchscreen is plastered with all kinds of nasty stuff like germs, dirt and grime, oil and grease, and maybe even leftover Cheetos residue.
AM managed to turn something as generic as a cleaning spray and cloth into a beautiful, minimalist item that's actually functional and extremely satisfying to use. It works great too, which is kind of surprising but then again also expected. AM's Mist and Spray are both all-in-one microfiber and spray cleaning blocks with svelte, Danish design language and vibrant colors. Both the Spray and Mist we're reviewing including all other AM spray products use the same type of cleaning liquid which AM calls the Anti-Schmutz. The great thing about it is that it's designed to disinfect and kill 99.9% of germs found on your screen and keyboard without damaging delicate coatings. That's because the anti-static liquid inside these sprayers is free of any harmful chemicals, alcohol and ammonia. It's non-toxic and will not harm your skin if you come in contact with it, but like AM claims, it's still effective enough to properly clean your screen without leaving behind streaking residue. It's odorless as well in case you were wondering.
Of course, AM isn't the only brand of cleaning products to use such friendly ingredients so that's not what makes them special. So what's the big difference between AM's Mist or Spray compared to the ordinary microfiber cloth and spray bottle setup? We honestly think there isn't any difference at all in terms of cleaning performance. But there's a big difference in the way you use them. Sure you can purchase Klear Screen's well known iKlear kit or Belkin's Portable Screen Cleaning Kit, amongst many others. But they all lack what AM brings to the table, which is aesthetically pleasing design that you won't want to hide away inside a cabinet. Granted AM's all-in-one sprays aren't ideal for every task. For example: because these are rigid blocks of microfiber you cannot use them to clean your glasses or goggles. Whereas any small or big microfiber cloth could due to its obvious ability to flex and fold into small spaces and conform to curved surfaces more easily. And that really is the only downside to AM's all-in-one Mist and Spray cleaning products.
Personally, I had never heard about AM’s existence until only a few weeks ago. And I’m really happy to have had the opportunity to discover such a incredibly unique brand with amazing products that are designed to make people’s gear-care drudgeries a lot more enjoyable, and maybe even easier than ever. Speaking of design, if you start stacking them up next to each other, it starts to look like you've brought some colorful statistical bar graph chart to life. It's geeky and posh all at the same time. Who would have thought this would said about a screen cleaning spray and microfiber product?
If you want to collect every color, you can actually do exactly that with AM's Minis which include 5 mini microfiber cleaning blocks in various colors for $13. These would be great if you already have your own liquid cleaning spray and simply like the idea of these cheeky and highly compact microfiber blocks.
AM's smallest all-in-one Mist cleaner is so small you can put it in your pocket. At just 3.54" tall, it barely makes it past an iPhone 5s yet still effective enough to clean even a large tablet like the iPad. On the other hand, the larger 4.55" Spray cleaner isn't as pocketable but will without a doubt be able to easily fit into your gear bag without taking up much valuable space. It'll of course make for an outstanding self-standing desk accessory. You'll just have to figure out which of AM's three all-in-one sprayer sizes fits your needs. AM's Blast for example will be too large to be used on a handheld device, but perfect for large screened devices such as external displays and even flat screen TVs. And if you still prefer the good old microfiber cloth and spray individuality, AM has got you covered with that as well with what it calls the Giant. It's also a self-contained unit but features a removable microfiber cloth that you can use on all devices including glasses.
Here's where things get really awesome. Although you can't remove or detach the microfiber cloth from the plastic brick structure, you can actually remove the interior liquid spray bottle by pushing up from the bottom hole, and what you end up with are two parts. The now hollowed microfiber-covered block can be cleaned under the tap when it becomes too dirty to reuse with some regular laundry detergent in order to restore the microfiber back to its original sterile self.
What's more is that the interior spray bottles are refillable. You can unscrew the spray cap to refill the clear bottle with more of AM's Anti-Schmutz antimicrobial cleaning liquid. The smaller Mist sprayer holds up to 0.36oz (10.5ml), while the Spray sprayer holds up to 1.27oz (37.5ml), respectively. In other words, it won't be much long before you run out of liquid with the Mist sprayer.
Thankfully however, AM does offer a solution for that inevitable problem. AM's all-in-one spray cleaning blocks are probably the most cost-efficient all-one-one cleaners on the market. That’s because AM’s Mist, Spray and other AM sprayers are all designed to be refillable with AM’s Refill Anti-Schmutz liquid which is readibly available. AM’s sells a single 70oz (200ml) refill liquid pouch for $12 which will extend the life and use of your all-in-one AM cleaners by a great amount.
At the top of each block is a round square with the AM logo embossed on it. That's actually the sprayer mechanism. Push down on it as you would on a normal spray bottle to spray the cleaning fluid on your screen. It's really neat how the spray cap is integrated within the block instead of protruding off the top. One of the small design details that make these cool looking all-in-one cleaners so very to use and just have standing around like they're a part of your designer mini vinyl figurines you cherish with all your heart and soul.
Our first cleaning process with the AM Mist and Spray went a lot smoother than I had anticipated. Notice this iPad mini's dirty, fingerprinted glass display and god knows what other germs there are on top of it.
A few sprays need to be applied, in moderation of course, directly onto the display in order to clean and disinfect it properly. Now all there's left to do is start wiping it down using the microfiber block.
The final result is a clean display that is as shiny as the day it was first unwrapped. It's so shiny in fact that it would mirror the picture that is hung on the wall behind it and so it was difficult to pull focus on such a spotless glass surface. It took about 5 wipes after spraying the iPad mini's display until it was dry and perfectly cleaned. Using a blocky shaped, and rigid microfiber surface is definitely something that isn't what you may be used to. We find that it's best to keep turning to a different microfiber side in order to effectively dry and clean the display. You would want to first wipe down the sprayed liquid using one side of the block, and then move onto a fresh dry side to finish the job. Very similar to how you would use different areas on a standard microfiber cloth which you can turn around and fold.
Like we mentioned before, these all-in-one cleaning sprays aren't one trick ponies and you can also use the Spray in particular to clean your MacBook's display. We find that it's perfectly sized for all portable Mac display sizes, but it may be too small to use on a larger display such as a 27-inch iMac or Thunderbolt Display. You could of course use it on all other laptops, external displays and all-in-one PCs.
The texture and detail of the microfiber surface is very flat with very little give, and resembles suede rather than fluffy microfiber cloths we're used to using. And still it does a fantastic job trapping dust and dirt with a single wipe even during a dry run. Initially I feared that I might scratch my screen due to the rigid microfiber surface of the Mist and Spray blocks coming from a traditional pliable microfiber cloth, but so far I've gone though numerous cleaning procedures on quite a few devices without a hitch.
You’re basically working with a 4.5” by 4.5” microfiber surface when using the Spray, and just a 3.5” by 3.5” cleaning surface when using the smaller and shorter Mist. So not the most room to repeat your screen cleaning until it’s time to wash the microfiber like you could with a typical cloth twice if not three times the size, but I find it plentiful for cleaning small screens like smartphones and tablets. A Spray will enable you to clean down your 27-inch iMac display roughly 3-4 times before the cloth will needs to be rinsed again, while AM’s larger Blast will most likely double that, not to mention take less time to cover more surface area for more efficient cleaning on such large displays.
We're really happy with the performance of both the AM Anti-Schmutz liquid cleaner and microfiber cloth. The two seem to work together to avoid liquid streaking residue and thoroughly clean up those oils and nasty grime off of screen surfaces. I’d much rather carry with me an AM Spray or Mist than two separate cleaning accessories, and I think that plus the simplicity of these all-in-ones make AM’s Spray and Mist superb alternatives to conventional screen cleaning accessories. If you like the idea of these all-in-one screen cleaning sprays, we can highly recommend picking one of these up. That being said, note that they're not superior to the normal microfiber cloth in terms of cleaning other things other than screens like sunglasses, eyeglasses and goggles.
Compared to individual spray bottle and microfiber cloths, and when it comes to cleaning touchscreens and displays – AM's all-in-ones are far more convenient, neat, portable and look phenomenal standing there on your desk. I tend to hide my microfiber cloths and sprays inside a drawer because they just look so messy sitting outside. What AM has done with these cleaning blocks is really extraordinary. Now whenever set up shop, I always leave either a Mist or Spray cleaning block on my desk for those times when I need to grab one and wipe down a dirty screen. Are they must haves? No. But you probably want one or maybe a few nonetheless. You can grab these two and others like them from AM's authorised dealer, OneWiseMac.
