Zagg: The Verdict

OK, first off, I will be sure to put my ordering fiasco frustrations behind me while I write this review of the Zagg Invisible Shield.

Zagg is a company from Utah that markets a very durable anti-scratch covering for a very broad spectrum of devices.  This ranges from GPS’ and phones all the way up to laptops.  For the purposes of this review, I ordered a full device cover for my HTC Touch.

The material is the same that is sold to be installed on the blades of helicopter rotors so this stuff is truly durable.  To back this up, Zagg offers a LIFETIME replacement guarantee. 

To test this, I took a leftover piece of material and took my very sharp pocket knife to it.  It would not puncture and what cuts I could inflict were very superficial.  I should note that Patrick Norton managed to scratch his Zagg cover on a recent episode of Tekzilla.  I will dig up my Olfa knife tomorrow and see if it will cause massive damage.  However even if a fresh Olfa blade can cut into this stuff, I really hope that people are not going far out of their way to test the durability.  That kind of testing once installed could damage your device even if the shield material does not cut or scratch.

Installation is shown in videos on the Zagg site to be a painless and simple process.  It took me about 30 minutes to install my shield and given that I am installing a full device shield kit, it was not too bad from a time perspective.  The pieces were not all cut to precision to fit.  In particular, the main screen piece was basically missing a slice about 1.5mm wide down the right hand side of the screen.  Fortunately, the HTC Touch has a non functional portion of the clear screen all around the perimeter.  However, for the $25 USD that they charge, the least that can be expected is the main screen cover is precisely cut to fit the device (Of which alone costs $11).

The other miscellaneous parts for covering the rest of the device were just as poorly cut and did not actually cover the entire device.  Rounded corners are a bugger for cutting so I will give a pass on that but with as much of the surface of the phone NOT covered as there now remains, it makes the phone look sloppy and cheap.  The one saving grace so far is that the large piece for the back lid was near perfect and will keep me from being worried about the back of the phone getting mucked up with dings and scratches.

The included squeegee was mostly useless as it still had frills from the stamp cutting process on the edge.  Even after carefully de-frilling it, I found a cloth and a fingertip was a better and easier way to apply the invisible shield.  There is also a bottle of application spray that is simply a non stick lubricant to allow for the easy placement of the pieces on the device.  In this, there is truth.  So much so that my recommendation is to soak the part down completely.  The bottle of spray included contains far more spray than you need so do not be frugal.  The only time you want to be careful with the quantity of spray is if a part you are applying is close to cracks or holes in the body of the device you are covering.  I am pretty sure you do not want this stuff inside your phone or whatever.

So, to tie the installation experience all together…

In addition to the instructions in the box (Which are good and the additional info in the web is even better), I also did the following:

Laid out a clean lint free towel for everything to sit on

Took off the back cover and left it off during installation

I only had to remove and reorient one piece in the whole process and that was the back piece as it was the largest and had to clear four separate obstacles.  There were a few extra small pieces that were a total waste to include so I did not install them.  They were useless due to one being meant for the main button and it and the other two useless pieces were all cut far too small to be effective and they would have additionally contributed to the unkempt look that parts of my phone now have.

After installation…

At this point, I have to let the phone sit for 12 to 24 hours and let it dry.  I will report back in with the results after 12 and 24 hours.  So far, the only part that has some of the cautioned to distortion is the main screen.  This is said to disappear after the drying period so this is why I will report back after it is dried.

The areas of the main screen that are of good clear quality are, well, good and clear.  Most cheap screen protectors tend to cause a lot of rainbowing on the screen and there is none of this with the Zagg product.  There is a modest orange peel texture to the material but it is not at all distracting when the screen is on.

The small parts that were not well cut that I earlier referenced are, by my usage patterns, expected to come off in short order.  Where they are not cut to fit all the way to the edges, there are now edges of the shield material sitting in ways that it is near guaranteed they will pull off.

My tentative final opinion…

This is a reasonable product that when installed on phones that have curves can likely only be expected to do so well.  That given set aside, there are quality issues that are very appearent and for the price they should not exist.  The factory screen protector from HTC fit perfectly and the dozen other people that I know with an HTC Touch also had perfectly cut and fit factory issued screen protectors.  If HTC can do it, Zagg should be able to do it.

Because of all of the smaller pieces needed to deal with the curves of the HTC Touch, there are now a lot of edges on what was otherwise a nice and smooth device.  With that in mind, it is more likely that either I would recommend that you get the screen cover only or that you get the full body kit ONLY if you need the back of your device protected (Like the iPhone 3G) and you forgo any additional fussy little parts that they may include.  Simply put, anyone that bought a phone as a piece of apparel as much as for its usefulness will not like the way the full body kit will make your phone look.

As always, your experiences may vary but mine was only OK overall and the $25 is only worth it due to the lifetime guarantee.