Hi folks,

I would like to share with you my opinion of the Fortte Pearl Glove Fit case found here [removed until I post 10]

This is the first “high quality” cell phone case I’ve ever used. My last phone was a Sony Ericsson T68i. In fact, that was my first cell phone ever. It had an interesting leather case that I picked up for a few dollars at a mall kiosk. It was definitely leather, or least it felt like leather. It was a perfect tight fit, I dropped in the phone and no problems for the past six years that I’ve owned it. It was a “glove fit” style case. The guy at the T-Mobile store was impressed that I #1 still had that phone and #2 it was in such great condition. Needless to say I had a great experience with that glove fit case so I wanted something similar for the Pearl.

Narrowing down the choices I ended up looking at these five cases:

[removed until I post 10]

The Krusell cases multiadapt system is a great idea. The Designio looks like a nice fit. Finally, Fortte just impressed me immediately with their website and also their involvement in the BB forum. Fortte and the Designio website folks were both extremely helpful in answering my questions, since I wanted a lay-flat case. Needless to say, I chose the Fortte Glove Fit case. It is zipped up, the entire face is covered, and Fortte always has a deal for BB forum members.

Both I and my wife have Pearls. She got a case with a clip, I didn’t. Today I went about putting the phones into the cases. It was an experience from which I learned the value of patience. First I cleaned up the phones sparkling clean with some micro fiber lens cleaner clothes. I started with my case.

It went along well enough getting the pearl in there, but it was pretty tight. Basically I forced the Pearl in and out at least three times before it would fit. It involves lots of tugging and pulling, more then I expected. Eventually the leather loosened up and I could get the phone in there. After it did get in there I found one irritation. On both sides of the case where the leather is stitched, the clear plastic forms sort of a lip that sticks out. This lip catches on the Pearl and does two things. #1 is blocks the Pearl from getting in the case easily and #2 it sticks up over the end of the Pearl resulting in the case sticking up and also an unsightly plastic lip. It took a good amount of work to get it looking nice and tidy. I figure I will only do this once, so may as well get it perfect. The next phone, the one with the clip, was a lot more work.
Basically it was the same process, but it took about 5 tries of pulling and tugging the case to get it on, only each time I got it on those plastic lips I mentioned would stick out terribly and I would have to start all over again. On top of that, I really had to pull. I mean, the leather itself was making creaking noises. You really have to stretch the leather to get the trackball hole lined up correctly. This case was a lot tighter than the other one. I actually pulled the zipper apart once just by closing the case when it was still not loosened up enough. Once it loosened up I ended up (carefully) using a toothpick to pull down that plastic lip. When I was finished, it looked great.

These cases are excellent. When they say “glove fit”, they mean it; tight leather glove fit. The screen and keyboard are covered. The trackball is exposed and easy to use; when you center the hole correctly over the trackball you don’t notice the case at all. The screen looks great and is showed off well by the surrounding leather. The volume buttons are actually shielded with plastic. This is a thoughtful touch as they are used infrequently and the plastic shielding will better protect the screen from exposure (I think this is why they did this, but I didn’t ask). The accessory keys need to be clicked with your fingernail, unless you have smaller fingers. This doesn’t bother me one bit.

Fortte seems to post a discount coupon here every month. Unfortunately they didn’t have one for me this month, but they do have a standing %25 discount coupons for folks that purchase two cases. Using that basically pays for tax and the least expensive shipping option.

From what I’ve seen so far, I love this case. These cases are great. You definitely need to loosen up the leather a bit, but once you do you will be rewarded with a form fitting functional case that looks and feels great.

Attached are some photos, the rest are in the next post. They are resized to 640x480 or cropped to meet the posting requirement. Other then when I’m obviously holding the cases, my fingers are only present in the picture because I had to hold up the case so it wouldn’t tip over. That plastic lip is hard to see, and the photos are a little blurry, so I circled it to show you where it is. Avoid it, and happiness will come easily to you.

Best Wishes,

Grant

Here you go.

Blurry, oh well.

Sweet! They fixed the port cut-outs.

I was planning on doing a review for Fortte when I pointed out they had covered all the ports with their clear plastic. Looks like the fixed it.

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Samson Blinded's author advocates religious state of Judea at the border with Israel and expulsion of Arabs. Obadiah Shoher denies democracy dominated by liberals and Muslims and calls Israelis to oppose police efforts at removing the settlements. His other point is dismanlting economically unbearable Israeli army and relying on nuclear weapons. However, he decried Lebanese and Iraq invasions.

Public opinion seems to strongly shift the the right in Middle East issues. Any thoughts on that?

Hmmm... I don't think I like the fact that the keyboard is covered by plastic. I tend to be able to type/dial "blind" so to speak using the grooves between the keys to figure out where my thumb is. That plastic over the keyboard kills all "touch typing".

I'd love to see this same case with no plastic sheilding at all (I use a BSE full body skin anyhow, which protects the screen) or just shielding over the screen.