CES 2009 OtterBox Defender for the Storm Case Review

Okay finally, our first official CES 2009 product post! I’m sure you guys have all been sitting at home waiting for us to get to this stuff, well so have we! What we have for you today is OtterBox. OtterBox had their new BlackBerry Storm defender case at CES! This case is still in the development process, but is coming soon, so if you are worried that you are going to drop your Storm and NEED ample protection, it will be here soon. *A side note with the images is that the case I used was a prototype so the outer skin that covers the plastic part of the case is not a perfect fitment, however I was assured that this will be fixed when the design is finished and ready for manufacturing.

So, I got to mess around with this case on a Storm for a while to get a feel for it and I was quite impressed. I personally do not use OtterBox cases, because I am careful with my babies, but if they ever do something waterproof for BlackBerry, I am all about it! Anyway let’s start with the case size. 

As with all OtterBox Defender cases, it is pretty large. The immediate difference I noticed with the large size of this case with the storm is that in your hand it feels very good, very natural. Something I didn’t like with the Storm when I had it is that since it is kind of heavy, when you have it sideways in landscape ratio, you must position your fingers so that while you are typing you have to have it secured all around. With this case, it makes it significantly thicker so that it fits very nicely into the palms of both your hands. Now the only issue with this is that no it will not fit in your pocket, but OtterBox cases come with a belt clip and they are pretty necessary to carry your device.

Now let’s move on a bit to the screen area. I was worried about a few things when I thought of an OtterBox Storm case because it was a touch screen so if it was designed wrong, typing and screen use could suffer. I was relieved when I began using it and this was not the case. If you notice on the image, the border of the screen has a moderately sloped surface so that your fingers to not get obstructed by a high wall of plastic protection. Another issue I was curious about was screen protection itself. If you have ever used an OtterBox Defender, you know that the case is a 360 degree protection case and has a clear shield that protects your keyboard, screen, and camera. Well the design has not changed for this model. The Storm has a protective clear coat over the whole opening of the case, which includes the call and menu buttons at the bottom below the screen. This is all well and good but, what about the touch recognition? Well I can honestly say that it is perfect! When I first got my Storm, I left the stock plastic screen protector on it for a day and it really affected the screen. The touch worked the same but it would be slow at recognizing I was touching the screen. With this cover, it is not the case. I don’t know how they did it, but it works as if there is nothing on the screen at all. This is probably the most important feature that OtterBox had to get right, in my opinion.

Now let’s do a round robin on the rest of the phone. The back of the case has the finger grooves so that when you are typing, you get a better grip on the back of the phone. The camera opening is not like the front of the case, so it does not have a plastic coating to protect the face. This however is not necessary because the Storm camera and flash is housed behind glass for its own protection. There is also a small hole cut out towards the bottom for the speaker. I did not get a chance to use the speaker, but I’m sure it muffles sound a little bit.

The sides, top and bottom have the typical rubberized button covers that let you still use your volume, and convenience buttons. Like any thicker rubberized case, the button covers do hinder use a bit, but they are necessary and they do still work, you just have to push in a little more. Just like the other Defender cases, there are attached rubber removable covers for the headphone jack and the charging port. These are a bit ugly, but they are on all the cases.

Overview
Overall, besides the prototype rubber skin fitment (which is temporary), I am very satisfied with this case. I was worried that the Defender case for the Storm would be too much like the Impact series which has little protection on the screens or keyboards. I was pleased that they came up with a solution that could offer full protection for the Storm. I am most impressed with the touch screen protection and how it works flawlessly with the touch recognition, great work OtterBox! This case will be around $50 like all the other Defender cases for BlackBerry, so if you need awesome protection for your devices, go OtterBox.

Check them out at the OtterBox Link