The iPhone is a fantastic device, small and yet so powerful. It is of course all to easy to scratch, damage and knock about. So what do you do when you live an active lifestyle? Well you explore the options for a case to protect your phone. One such case that is great for this sort of job is the Defender from OtterBox.

OtterBox are a company based in Colorado who specialise in making cases for many hand held devices to give them, as they say, “added bump, scratch and drop protection” – and having taken a moment to play with the Defender case I believe them. I have dropped a mobile phone before and watched as it hit the ground and flew to bits – something I do NOT want to repeat with my iPhone.

The Defender case from Otterbox is a two part case. One part hard plastic shell, one part soft rubber cover – the two together give you a solid feeling yet soft case for your iPhone.

So lets take a look through shall we:

The case arrives in a simple cardboard box, at US$49.95 I wasn’t expecting too much from the packaging & this is the sort of packaging you’d find hanging on a display stand at your local store. However to me that’s perfect for this no nonsense, to the point, case.

You open the box to find the case, firmly locked into a very solid belt clip system. Also in the box is a flyer mentioning you can purchase this in Pink to support breast cancer research (fantastic!!), and a sticker – btw: Otterbox are the ONLY company who’ve sent us a sticker as part of their package lately!

I had difficulty getting the case out of the belt clip the first time, it’s a very firm hold it has – perfect for those of you wanting to use this in say, construction, hanging off a cliff or racing around on your mountain bike. The case is NOT about to slip out of the belt clip!

While we are talking about the belt clip – here it is. A very solidly formed plastic clip. The extensions you see on the right side, are what firmly lock the case in place. Note the clip on the back, it rotates and will stop an a variety of locations as you rotate it round. As you can see, it’s a very firm spring on this. Again, it’s perfect for those who are going to be giving this a battering through their work or lifestyle.

Fitting the Case

As I mentioned, the case itself is a two part item. It’s a solid plastic case that is wrapped in a rubber suit – kinda like batman – without the soft gooey insides. So, to put the iPhone into the Defender case you have to remove the rubber and then split open the plastic and pop it in.

You simply pull the skin up and over the top, then the case kinda just falls out. I did feel the first time that if you did this lots and lots you’d end up stretching the skin – although having done it now about 10 times, I don’t see any evidence of that. If you are using this case, chances are you won’t be removing it all that often anyway.

In the picture above you can see we have the black rubber skin, the two part yellow plastic case and the black belt clip. Note the case comes in all black, all white, black and yellow (as photographed) and all pink. The screen area is a fine clear plastic that reminds me of the old acetate slides we used to use on old school projectors – only it’s a bit thicker. You’ll notice the white square where the iPhone ear piece is. This is a white cloth like material that protects your ear piece, mic and speaker from dirt and dust.

You first of all slide the iPhone into the front part of the case – note the bottom cup like area for the base of the iPhone. NOTE: if you have a skin on your iPhone as I do – it’ll be a VERY tight fit. This case (as are most) is designed for a naked iPhone. It can fit with the skin but only just and it makes it very hard to put the back of the Defender case on.

If you are going to use this case I recommend removing any skin you may have on your iPhone

The next step is to slot the back of the case into place and “click” closed. See the oval shapes on the side of the case in the pic above, these have little teeth on the back that lock the back section into place. You need to pry them open when removing the case.

Then you slip the black skin on and that’s it – the whole process takes maybe a minute, not long at all.

Here’s a shot of the case from the back

You’ll notice there is a nice circle showing off the Apple logo – I’ve noticed this is something Otterbox do with all their cases and it’s a really nice touch. I also love their logo, which in the photo with a flash shows up great, it’s very subtle in reality.

Now, unfortunately I don’t have a spare iPhone that I can afford to really test this case (hopefully as this site continues to grow we can get one) – I’d love to put this case through it’s paces with the iPhone inside it – but .. well sorry. I have however dropped the empty case, thrown it against a wall etc – and I see no visible damage at all to the case other than a bit of dust on the skin.

Using the phone in the case

Once the phone is in the case of course you have to still be able to use it. The Defender case makes it reasonably easy to carry on using your phone as intended.

Docking the phone is of course not going to happen. The iPhone in the defender case just won’t fit any dock you have – I pretty much guarantee that – however you can use your iPhone USB cable easily. The base of the case has a rubber flap / plug that covers the dock connector. Simply open it and plug in your cable. Note: I ended up using an older iPod cable as it has a bigger plug on it making it easier to pull out.

Note again in the pic above the white coverings over the microphone and speakers. I never noticed any real lose of audio volume or quality while the iPhone was in the case. However if you are using an app like Ocarina and you have the dock connector plug in, you will get feedback from the speaker to the mic – meaning Ocarina basically plays itself.

Likewise at the other end there are two flaps / plugs; one for your headphone jack and one for the mute switch. One thing I found out about my iPhone habits when using this case, is I’ll often simply reach into my pocket and flip the mute switch as I head into a meeting – kinda without thinking. This case however forced me to pull the phone out, open the plug and flip the mute switch.

Just below the mute switch of course are the volume buttons for your iPhone, with this case there are 2 raised rubber buttons on the case allowing you to control your volume. You do need to ensure your phone has a good fit to make sure they work. I found these to work really well – although again, a little hard to find if you are adjusting the volume from your pocket.

Likewise there is a raised button on the top allowing you to put your iPhone to sleep when needed.

The camera has it’s own hole through the case and like the screen and Apple logo the hole is covered by this fine clear plastic. The photos taken through this look no different to the photos taken without the case.

On the front is a soft home button, placed as you’d expect over the iPhone home button. This button however is smaller than the iPhone one as the plastic edge of the case does run over half the button. Still, it’s big enough to use easily as intended.

Summary

Overall I was pleasantly surprised with this case. The rubber around the case gave it a really nice feel, you really don’t think your iPhone is actually in a hard plastic case. I found the size of it to be really good, easy to hold and generally easy to use the phone.

However I had some issues with this case:

• It can be hard to get the iPhone out of the belt clip and answer a call – the clip is very tight and can be hard to quickly release the iPhone from. I found myself more than once just grabbing the whole thing, clip included and answering the phone
• It can be hard to reach edge of the screen – I have big fingers, so I found one handed operation of the iPhone in this case hard. My thumb couldn’t get right to the edge of the screen as it would hit the screen border first. I’d have to use two hands to type the outside letters on the keyboard too.

Having said that though, I really think this case is perfect for what it can do. If you work construction, if you go mountain biking or any sort of outdoor type activity where you may have a lot of dust, a place you may drop your phone etc – this case is going to be great.

It’s not water proof – they even tell me it’s not water resistant. So it won’t do so well for kayakers, however it would certainly protect your phone from splashes.

My only other issue – and this MAYBE because I have the skin on my phone is the moray effect I get on my screen.

As I said earlier, I don’t recommend the use of this case with any form of skin on your phone.

UPDATE: I’ve been in touch with the folks at Otter Box and they mentioned if you do use a skin and have this effect, sprinkle a little baby powder on the inside. And I mean a little the first time I did it I put too much! Oh dear. But it works, a very fine amount of baby powder helps remove this effect and all is good.

Overall I did like this case, it gave the protection I thought it would, it felt great in the hand and it doesn’t really impede phone usage. If you need a tough case for your iPhone, then I highly recommend the Otterbox Defender for the iPhone 3G.

Links

• View all our review photos & more on flickr
• Read more about the OtterBox Defender series of cases
• Or you can read about and purchase these cases directly from OtterBox:
  • Otterbox Defender for iPhone 3G
  • Otterbox Defender for iPhone 4
  • OtterBox Defender for iPod Touch
  • Otterbox Defender for iPad

Video Update

Just found this video on YouTube – I think it sums up the Defender Case’s brilliance pretty well: