Review for the
Stealthguards Epic 4G Full Body Protection
Price paid: $2.85 shipped!
Stealthguards are a bargain, through and through. And for less than 3 bucks you get the front and back shield, enclosed in a plain white window envelope, your invoice, and a postmarked .44 stamp. No instructions, solution, or microfiber cloth are enclosed; it's as barebones as it gets. But don't let that dissuade you from checking out Stealthguards, there's a lot of good value here.
Clarity - Once applied, and all the air bubbles worked out, the appearance of Stealthguards was obvious when the phone is off or on. Epic's SAMOLED display appeared slightly foggy, but still mostly sharp. When fingerprints and smudges started to appear over the screen, the rainbow scattering became quite distracting and terrible at times. With the display off, there was a obvious texture, with some persistent lines that looked like creases. This may have been due to an installation snafu, but the creased look never worked itself out.
Form - The front skin fit well and matched up on the side edges perfectly, but ended up peeling up a small bit around the lower edges. Reinstallation remedied this a small amount but the peeling around the lower edges never quite fixed it. To be fair, this could have been because of my Seidio case, but no other screen protectors exhibited this behavior.
Ease of installation - I might have messed up the initial installation, due to lack of instructions. Originally I carefully applied without the dish soap solution, and the screen was filled with micro bubbles, and looked shimmery. After discovering that the StealthGuards site has a somewhat hidden collection of
Installation Videos, I reapplied the skin with improved results. The protector is sturdy enough to withstand reapplication, and did not stretch at all. For removal, I recommend an ordinary piece of scotch tape to pull up the corner. Once I had a bottle of solution, I have plenty left to reapply more stealthguards.
Feel - Surprisingly good, much better than Zagg, in fact. StealthGuards has a very slightly rubbery feel that only slightly slows down your fingers. No problems swiping or performing multitouch operations, and the unlock pattern only misses about 1 out of 5 times. Testing with the multitouch program Dotty, there were no lingering touches from a lifted finger or any problems registering multiple touches.
Maintenance - The rainbow scatters happen from the moment a slightly oily finger touches the screen. A significant amount of wiping causes the oil to smear, and eventually dissipate, but the color scatters never truly go away. Once all the micro bubbles are worked out of the shield, it stays put adequately, but the peeling lower edge ends up being slightly worse over time.
Durability - Because this shield is slightly thinner than the Zagg version (with the advantage of better screen response), I get the impression that scratches (which should be "self-healing") will have more of a detrimental effect. Indeed with the key scratch test that I tried, less force was required to put a mar in the protector, though it was not very noticeable after a day or so.
Overall Quality - Even though some of the niceties of other packages weren't included, the Stealth Guard is a worthy contender. Visually speaking, Stealth Guards is pretty obvious that it's applied, but it won't interfere with your ability to manipulate your phone by touch. While it's not as bulletproof as Zagg, it will protect your phone nicely, and it's dirt cheap. All-in-all, you can't beat the price at under $3.
Next week, I'll review the Realook sheild!