Wednesday, 24 June 2009
Blackberry Protector - blackberry tour, blackberry 9630
As I read in the one review, there is some flaws with this case. I can agree with that; but, I do believe the positives outweigh the negatives.
***POSITIVE:
This case is rugged. Yes, they do make more durable cases, but for a price. For what this case costs, you get your moneys worth. The best part about this, is it comes in two pieces. This is great because it makes it easier to take on and off. The rubber is nice, and the plastic is very durable. I would be confident to say that I could drop this from an average height and not panic. I constantly leave the phone on my lap, and get out of my car. I was tired of my phone hitting the pavement, and this was my solution. I would say this case is in the middle. What I mean by that is that there are softer, more flexible cases.. and harder, more durable ones. I did not want a big bulky case on my phone. It would be way to difficult to take in and out of my pockets with a monster case on. The softer ones I was afraid of the lack of protection. Another good thing about this is that the plastic makes it smooth enough to take in and out of your pockets. Ive had cases that were mostly rubber like and it grabbed my inner pockets. Everytime I would take my phone out, everyone would get a full view of my pocket contents, along with all of my change falling out. You get the picture...Overall, this is a great case that isn't too bulky, but still protects as needed.
***NEGATIVE:
It would be great if you could just leave the case on your phone, but I couldn't. I had a charging dock for my tour, and I had to take this off every night to dock the phone. This was a huge pain. The other negative part about this is the flap that goes over the charging spot on the phone. Every time I plugged my charger in ( when I wasn't docking it), within minutes, the charger would fall out. I ended up taking a razor and cutting this flap out. Yes, the flap protects the charging port on your phone from getting dust and whatever in it, but I was not going to deal with the charger not staying in.
Overall, its a great case, for what it is. I'm stuck between 3 and 4 stars. The price inst the greatest, but you get a decent durable case. If you have a charging dock, you've been warned. You need to sacrifice one of the two, or just deal with taking it on and off every night. Maybe the charger falling out was just me, but be careful with that too. If you want a pretty durable case, without the bulkiness, and the negatives aren't significant to you, this is the case. OtterBox Commuter Case for BlackBerry Tour 9630 (Black)
The otterbox for the 9630 Tour (Was used on a Sprint one, but Sprint/Verizon 9630s are identical) is a stellar case that fits extremely well and offers a fairly decent amount of protection as well. Otterbox is known to make good cases and you definitely see the quality in the case that makes the product actually worth the cost (which is normally higher than your average mall qiosk quality case).
The fit of this case is very good, it fits the phone almost perfectly. Almost - there is one minor "bug" that the case has (that other reviewers have mentioned) that can really drive you nuts - the charging port cover. I'll talk more about that and how to fix it in a sec. The case includes 3 pieces - the silicon layer of the case, which covers the entire phone and has plug covers for the charging port and headphone jack, the plastic layer which covers the full back and the edges (minus the corners which are silicon), and a very heavy duty screen protector that is cut to fit the screen perfectly.
The silicon itself is very thick - it is much thicker than the silicon case I purchased elsewhere that claimed to be OEM. It is also thicker than Sprint's silicon case they sold in their retail [corp owned] store. This layer provides pretty adequate protection and covers the entire edges and back of the phone, coming down at the top just below the earpiece running flush with the screen. It does create a lip that goes around the phone edges of the phone which is good if you ever drop your phone face-down. My initial concern before using the case was the buttons on the edges of the qwerty keyboard would be hard to press b/c of the lip, but this hasn't been an issue in the slightest. The lip is just big enough to help protect but not intrusive at all in my typing experiences.
I do notice the buttons (specially side buttons) are slightly harder to press thanks to the silicon layer, but I use them rarely so it isn't an issue. The lock button up top along with the mute button are also raised and I actually prefer this - always thought they were hard to press before.
The big issue with the silicon is, as mentioned in other reviews, the charging port! The top half of the silicon case on the edge of the charging port is too long. If you use the blackberry OEM charger, the plug doesn't quite fit in all the way. I did not have this issue with some of my third party chargers [Samsung micro-usb for example, worked great b/c it had a flat port connector], but definitely my OEM and sprint-branded car charger didn't fit. This caused any bump, sneeze, heck even a blow of wind to disconnect the charger from the phone. Simple solution - knife! I took a small pocketknife and carved away maybe 1/10th of a centimeter from the top edge of silicon and now it works perfect. If you carve much more, the charging port plug may not cover everything perfectly, but this worked perfect for me. Every charger fits snuggly like it should.
The plastic piece of the case is pretty no thrills - it fits snugly around the edges and top/bottom of the device. The buttons (all of which are raised by the silicon case) still stick out and are not recessed at all when you put on the plastic covering. The plastic piece isn't overly "grippy", but it isn't textureless and perfectly smooth either. The large otterbox logo is also printed into the plastic, forever advertising your fine choice in cases.
Finally, I cannot comment on the screen protector b/c I really haven't used it as I still have a good protector on there.
The bottom line: This a great case for this phone, in fact probably the BEST case. The protection is provides is more than suitable for just about everyone short of heavy construction (the heavier case may be better for that) and really doesn't add much bulk at all to the phone. The silicon case provides excellent shock protection I feel, and the case quality is quite high and above average for cell phone cases. It feels like the case is worth the cash. The only thing keeping it from 5 stars is the charging port issue - seems like someone that used the case at all with an OEM charger would immediately notice, but it still suffers in its production run :(
Pros: Very stable case, good protection w/o added bulk, raised top lock button is awesome, no typing issues with a large ledge/lip around phone.
Cons: The charging port is really its only issue, and is fixable as long as you own a pocket knife :) - Case - Blackberry 9630 - Blackberry Tour - Blackberry Tour 9630'
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