Performance
Getting to spend all of CES with the Atmosphere was a major benefit. I was ready to write about it before the show but ended up a little to busy with everything. The extra week of hands on time solidified my opinions on the case, especially considering how much time I spend on the phone between meetings at CES. Let’s start from the beginning though. For starters, as similar in design as the Atmosphere is to the Poetic Bumper, when using the case there was a world of difference. They share a similar design with the rubber that holds the case in. But having an actual back to the case was the difference between me worrying about dropping or breaking the phone and me tossing it around without a worry in the world. Seriously, without a doubt I would have broken my phone the way I tossed it around at CES. But with this case on it I wasn’t worried or nervous like I was before. I even found myself pulling it out over balcony’s to take pictures for example. Something I would have been very worried about without the case or even with the bumpers. Why the difference? Well the semitransparent plastic used is actually very grippy, a major improvement over all of the other cases we have tested at least. I still think a rubber coating might work better, but for the first time I wasn’t worried about it slipping out of my hands.
To be fair, much like the Poetic bumper I didn’t feel like the design would absorb a lot of impact like an Otterbox or Ballistic’s case would. But the solid frame felt like it would absorb more than the very thin bumper. Speaking of that, the plastic used on this felt thicker than the bumper as well.
Like most cases, the case did make the fit around the headphone port a little tight for some headphone cords. We ran into the same issue with the power plug area as well, but only when playing around with a slimport cable, not any of our standard charging cords. Other than those issues all of the openings cutout are perfectly placed. The rubber buttons over the power and volume buttons feel good and are much nicer than what you have available on most other cases, other than the lg bumper of course. On the back you can still see through enough to see the glamor finish on the back slightly and the Nexus logo is very visible. The last part of my testing was related to the small rubber feet on the back of the case. With the phone in the case I had no issues with it sliding off of any tables. When compared to the other cases/bumpers, the Atmosphere gripped our test surfaces (metal and a white plastic table) better than the others, especially compared to the Rengke Slim and the Nexus 4 without a case.
