Like many people over the years, I too have been the victim of my own clumsiness and destroyed a phone by dropping it in the worst possible place. Given our increasing reliance on our mobile devices to remain connected to our friends and society via social media, now more than ever a destroyed mobile phone is a disaster for the user. This led me to look into cases that provide high level drop protection and I found Go Ballistic Australia.
Installation
The installation is very simple, a lot of users have previously use the gel skins that are available for many phones. You install one of these over the device, then clip on a plastic cover over the top of that which provides the impact protection to the device. The phone sits inside of the case well, with almost no chance of it popping under for whatever reason.
Appearance
The Ballistic SG cases we tested were black in colour and very easy on the eye for our black phones. The rubber backing and plastic casing are well designed so that they look good whilst maintaining total protection of your device when you drop it.
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Size
Obviously for a case to protect your device, it’s quite thick but that’s the trade-off you make. There’s really not a lot more to say on the matter, it’s nearly doubled the thickness of my Nexus S — whilst this didn’t fuss me, it may fuss style-centric users, but that’s not the market these cases are aimed at.
Pro’s
- Provide drop and impact protection (excluding direct impact to your screen) that in my experience with smart phones is far superior to anything I’ve seen or used before.
- Designed to protect your screen from face down drops by having protruding edges on the rubber skin.
Con’s
- The cases increase the size of your phone dramatically
- The rubber skin sticks to the inside of your pockets which can make taking your device out of your pocket quite frustrating
Final Thoughts
While the size increase may bother some users, these cases are not aimed at your average users. They’re marketed towards users who are constantly in harsh working conditions, where the risk of damage to a fragile smartphone (whether it be Android, iOS, Blackberry or Simbian based) is high. For users such as this, the $40RRP investment to protect a $500+ phone is minimal and protects their device from most damage.
Due to the outdoor work I do in my spare time, when I finally bite the bullet and get myself a new phone I’ll be seriously looking at purchasing one of these to protect the phone. Being someone in their target market I’m impressed — it’s a great case.
