Mobility Digest Review: id America Gasket Case for iPhone 4

The review marathon continues and Mobility Digest is going to crank out another review for you. This time I am going to have a look at the id American case for the iPhone 4 called the Gasket. Why is called the Gasket? As luck would have it, my day job happens to be in the Automotive High Performance Industry so I naturally figured this out right away. The case is taken from the design of cylinder head gasket for what would be in this case (no pun intended) a V6 engine. The three large holes in the center are the cylinder bores and smaller circular holes would be for the cylinder head  bolts that fasten the cylinder head down to the engine block. There are also some water port jackets which really make this case look very familiar to the real engines I see everyday. The company behind the Gasket case for the iPhone 4 is called  id America, who are based in New York and that is where all the creative juices flow from. The products of course are made in China. So let’s have a look at the Gasket Case by id America and put it to the test in another Mobility Digest Review.

What’s in the box

Cool packaging and some unexpected goodies inside is what you will find in the Gasket Case for the iPhone 4. The retail friendly packaging prominently displays the Gasket Case behind a clear molded piece of plastic.  Behind it is the welcomes surprise by id America. They have included:

• 1 Gasket Series Case for iPhone 4
• Front and back crystal clear screen protective film
• Squeegee for film application
• Microfiber cleaning cloth

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Design

As I mentioned above, the Gasket Case for the iPhone 4 is patterned off an automotive cylinder head gasket which really gives a great look. Made from a brushed aluminum, the Gasket case ads an exterior coating to seal the metal from impurities and grime and make cleaning a lot easier. On the inside of the case is a padded lining to protect your iPhone from scratches. However, the biggest complaint I had was how difficult this case was to install your device in and as a result of the sharp edges, I acquired some very unwelcomed scratches on my pristine iPhone 4. I had a major problem with this and there was no correct way to install the case with lip of the case directly contacting the device. I  had even attempted to slide one side of the device in the case and use some finger strength to bend the case out so that the top lip of the case did not contact the iPhone 4. using moderate force, I could not move or bend the case. Getting irritated I applied a significant amount of extra force and the case started bending but however did not seem to want to return to the point of my hostility. With some added room between the device and the case, once I got installed, I then was able to bend the case back about 65-70% to it’s original form. The Case was still tight, but you could see where the lip of the case sort of wavered. Now, to keep it in perspective, the scratches were pretty small and I have included them in this review.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are the scratches which are on the middle panel just above the lower divider:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Gasket Case by id America comes with a front and rear Quad Layer Structure protective film. The protective film features a tough shell coating, Material specific treatment, Scratch proof PET film, and a silicone polymer adhesive.The Quad Layer protective film is pretty easy to install and will provide pretty decent protection from scratches and varying degrees of nicks on the front and rear side of your device. The problem for me was protecting the sides on the device.

Conclusion

The id America Gasket Case for the iPhone 4 is for someone who is looking for the coolness factor first and protection second. Where a lot of other companies do not provide you  any additional protection, id America supplies a front and back protective film which I thought was great value added. The Gasket Case by id America comes in 6 different colors:

• Aluminum Silver (same as the test sample)
• Vintage Gold
• Modern Bronze
• Titanium Gray
• Jet Black
• Rally Blue

The id America Gasket Case sells for $29.99 and is available now on the id America website here or from several online retailers for the same price. At the end of the day I am not a huge fan of these cases for lack of protection and the difficulty it takes to install a device in them. However, with some care and the knowledge of the necessary care needed to install this case without scratching your device like I did, I will say it is a really cool and well engineered case that you will have a hard time finding someone else who has just like you. So for those of you who want to look cool and have a case that none of your friends will likely have, check out the id America Gasket Case for the iPhone 4.