Review: Nokia 9500 Leather Case
Score:
70%
Version Reviewed: Pouch Styl
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Once you’ve signed your life away with a 12-month contract to get your Nokia 9500 Communicator, or even if you’ve gone out and paid full price for a SIM-free model, what do you do with your smartphone after a few days of treating it like tissue paper? It gets thrown around your office, dropped into a rucksack while you go to the gym, and generally takes a huge amount of punishment. And when the first big scratch appears, that’s when you start thinking about getting a case for the phone. After all it’s easier to replace a case than a phone.
That’s why there’s a huge market for third-party cases, from iPods and PDAs, to cigar cases (eh? - Ed) and smartphones. And one of the most well known names is Proporta. They made their name with virtually indestructible cases for the second wave of PDA’s in the mid nineties, and known they’ve expanded to cover the Nokia 9500 market. In keeping with the executive look and feel of the 9500, the Proporta 9500 case is a nice leather affair, with stitching, belt hook (in a horizontal form factor) and magnetic clasp. But there’s still a good amount of protection on offer here.
Hiding between the soft leather outside and the slightly tacky insides (as in sticky, not cheap and cheerful) is a sandwiched sheet of ABS plastic. It’s these sheets (front and back) that provide the majority of the protection. While other leather cases are just that, 100% leather, these sheets add a certain toughness and strength to the case.
The sides of the case don’t have this rigidity, because they are very slightly elasticised so that when you slide your 9500 in, the phone is gripped and kept from sliding out. This is a good thing, as I still don’t fully trust any case with a magnetic clasp to hold the case closed. It’s just too easily knocked out when I’m walking around, so I’ve been constantly checking my phone is still there. I would have liked to have seen a more powerful magnet, as the current one doesn't quite locate positively enough.
Those elasticised sides also have some nice design features, with holes punched out so the speaker can still play into open air, and the other end leaves the Pop Port exposed for a hands-free or stereo headset to be left attached while the Communicator remains in the case. Well thought out, and practical.
So there you go, it’s another very good case from Proporta that does the job as advertised. As with most cases, whether it’s perfect for you is down to personal preference. In view of this, we’ll be taking this case and a half a dozen others, and putting them together for a head-to-head comparison in mid-February.
Reviewed by Ewan Spence at