Review: Nokia E7 Black Silicone Skin
Score:
68%
If you've been paying attention to our coverage of the Nokia E7, you'll remember that I complained at length about the slipperiness of the unibody main shell of the device: it was prone to dropping, especially when opening the E7, plus the device tended to skate away from me on the desk when I was typing. In addition, the camera glass on the back was flush, meaning it was prone to picking up dirt and scratches. The Black Silicone Skin fixes all the above, as you might expect, although there are a couple of minor caveats that help to push my rating for this accessory down a bit.
You'll have seen many silicone cases for smartphones before, many of them cheap and cheerful. This one is no different - £2.79 on eBay, including postage! However, in the continued absence of Nokia's official case, this is all there is - so I took one for the team, ordered it and fitted it.
Fitting the case is a little like fitting a bicycle tyre - it requires a bit of coaxing and patience, taking about five minutes. So you won't be taking it off and on too often - but then there's no need, since the E7 has no memory card slot or user-replaceable battery (and no, it's not like the N8's - you can't just whip off a couple of screws!)
Here's the case in situ:
Notice three things immediately:
- obviously, this is a two part solution - one silicone sleeve goes round the E7's screen section, one round the bottom
- this being a silicone case, it attracts dust like mad - it's simply impossible to get rid of it all for the photos, let alone day to day life
- the bottom sleeve lip is indeed badly fitting, in that its lip overlaps the bottom of the lower row of keyboard keys. More on that in a moment...
Here's the E7 in closed mode - doesn't look too bad, eh? And it's a million times less droppable:
The depth of two layers of silicone does mean that the E7 doesn't quite close as tightly as its designers had planned. Here are the two relevant side views:
So not a perfect fit then, but not a huge problem either, given the other benefits. Thankfully, the E7's sturdy mechanism is more than up to the job of keeping the screen closed. I'd apologise again for the dust, but hey, you try photographing a silicone case fitted on a device!
One other problem mentioned at the start was that the flush camera glass on the E7's bottom is very exposed and liable to pick up dust, dirt, fingerprints and, ultimately, scratches. The silicone is at its thickest on the E7's bottom, around 2mm, so this raises the case bottom around the camera aperture by this amount. Providing a decent amount of protection for this most vulnerable component.
So we have a win all round. The E7 is less droppable, especially during the crucial 'opening' operation, it grips any desk or lap tray and stays put, plus the camera glass is protected. But, for less than £3, there have to be a few caveats. The fit isn't 100% perfect all round, though it's certainly good enough for most people. There's an odd aperture in the silicone on the bottom decal surface of the E7 - there are no ports here, so it serves no purpose.
Most annoying though is that the front lip, where the case curls over the front of the keyboard, is slightly too long and it obscures the bottom millimetre of the entire bottom row of keys. Now, silicone is flexible and it doesn't actually affect the key operation for most buttons, but it does hamper the feel of the space bar, which of course you'll be hitting a hundred times a day. The next stage is to take my scissors to the case and cut the front flange down by the offending millimetre. A trivial 'op' but even at this price it shouldn't really be necessary!
I'm sticking to my guns in protesting that Nokia should have designed in some little rubber feet on the E7, as they did on the E90 - but what's done is done. In the meantime, we have this cheap eBay solution and Nokia's official version, the CC-1010, which has been 'coming soon' for the last month.
Knock yourself out, E7 owners - for the sake of £3 - and give this silicone case a try.
Steve Litchfield, All About Symbian, 15 April 2011
Reviewed by Steve Litchfield at