Have you had an issue with a phone who fell down and whose screen got completely broken ? Or maybe a friend of yours has ? Or maybe it wasn't a phone, maybe it was a tablet...
Somehow, it happened to me quite recently (HP desire HD) and I am surprised about a couple of things:
- how fragile the screens are
- how bad the insurances are
- how bad this is covered in blogs, news, and so on
- How fragile the screens are:
My phone fell down from my sofa. I was sitting. So the fell was really not from a high altitude. I did not smash it to the ground and I really did not expect it to break. I made some previous phones fall from higher or while running and so on. Never had been an issue. The novelty ? Touch screen !!! It seems to be the excuse to have fragile screens. Or is this a hidden marketing to force people to buy new phones ?
- How bad the insurances are:
So soon the screen is broken, will the insurances refuse to pay anything. That is clever from them but I find it a bit too good for them. I am wondering if a customer-protection company will someday do something about it...
- How bad this is covered in blogs, news and so on
Finally something interesting for me. Because that means I can write something that may help you in the choice of your next mobile phone. When I lost my HTC desire HD, I needed a new phone. But I did not want to do the same mistake and buy a phone with an easy-to-break screen. So I looked. Mobile-phone comparison websites, technical specifications, ... nothing. Not a damn thing about how hard or soft the screen is.
Let's see for example this page:
http://europe.nokia.com/find-products/devices/nokia-n8/specifications
It speaks about the screen of the phone: size, amoled, ... but nothing about resistance of the screen.
So you will probably think: "oh, every phones must be the same, then". And this is where my blog is helpful, no, every phones are not the same. The strange thing is that this has been forgotten in the specifications. Nobody speaks about it but it is there.
There are 2 types of resistant glass on the market that can be used for mobile phones: the gorilla glass and dragontrail. Please feel free to google them, a lot of information is available on these glass (you just had to know the names). Here for example, some quite convincing video/article:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVxj6gRYwS0
http://www.geek.com/articles/mobile/gorilla-glass-has-a-new-competitor-called-dragontrail-20110120/
So, where to find them ? The dragontrail is not yet in the market as far as I know and will more target tablets. As it goes for gorilla glass, nokia N8 and samsung galaxy SII are two examples of mobile phones using it. The full list is available here:
http://www.corninggorillaglass.com/featured-products
The only remaining question is when will we have this kind of info included in the technical description of smartphones/tablets/PC... :) ?
