[Review] “ExoLife” Battery Case by ExoGear – Breathe new life into your iPhone 4!

Ok, in order to be fair and honest, I have a case review that I am going to be posting here, but this case was sent to me free of charge specifically for review on this website. I did however, inform the company that sent it, “ExoGear”, that I intended on reviewing it honestly, and that if I found aspects about it that I did not like or was not satisfied with, I would report it to be fair to our readers and their customers. To get it, simply go to their official site at www.ExoGear.com and place your order. The purchase price is $90 for the case, not including shipping or tax, and it gets there usually pretty damned fast.

With that being said, let me begin. To summarize, I have fallen in absolute, undeniable love with this case, and here is why.

Initial Impressions: The design is extremely intuitive and elegant. It was designed to keep your iPhone 4 looking sleek and sexy. It is a two piece construction, but not the standard “top half/bottom half” design. It includes a silicon “bumper” designed specifically to fit around the case with the iPhone 4 seated correctly inside. So this to me is a wonderful idea. While you can’t use the bumpers without the case, you can simply purchase an additional bumper or replacement – inexpensive – silicon bumper case, and spice up your charging case by changing it’s “band” color. The people over at ExoGear were nice enough to also send me an additional blue bumper for the case, more for exhibitional purposes, and that was and is welcome as it will allow me to demonstrate the color changes in this review.

Also, EXTREMELY important to note is that unlike most charging cases I have used in the past, which literally fit tight enough to be a second skin, I was able to apply a ZAGG Full Body InvisibleShield full body protector to my iPhone 4, and simply seat it gently into the ExoGear “ExoLife”, snap the bumper into place, and it fits perfectly. There is zero “warping” to the protection, and to me, that is extremely important. Every single one of the previous charging cases I have used would damage, warp, or even forcibly remove my screen protectors (also ZAGG), and this is literally like a dream come true for me. With this “ExoLife” battery case, combined with the ZAGG InvisibleShield, I literally and finally have 100% device protection and that says a lot. This is new to me, as I always had to replace my protectors in the past.

The overall design of this case is extremely well thought out, and frankly, it’s designed to keep your iPhone looking sexy. It uses lots of rounded edges, not sharp, so your fingers can glide over any aspect of this case and not be disturbed by the hard edges of most other products.

An important factor to note though is at first, when initially seating your iPhone into the “ExoLife”, make sure that all of the tabs on the bumper click and lock into place with the actual frame of the case. Leaving some of them loose will obviously not be a good thing, and it’s always better to be safe than sorry.

Usage Observations: Unfortunately, it does not give a full 100% additional battery power, but it doesn’t claim to. Their website stated that it will give “nearly” a full charge, which is accurate. I was only able to get 84% charge from this case. I literally, on my third day of testing, charged my iPhone 4 from 3%, and the “ExoLife” charged the iPhone 4 up to 87%, which is honoring the “nearly full charge” they had referred to. It is also important to note though that there are some strict instructions when you begin to use this product. First things first, I went against my impulsive nature, and followed these directions to the letter. They state that before your first use, you should charge your case for “at least” 12 hours. To be safe, I charged mine for 27.5 hours. Next up, they tell you to COMPLETELY drain the case, and then recharge for another 12 hours, and to repeat this process 3-4 times to reach maximum battery capability. I have done all of this to the letter, and I am very happy that I did. It should ALSO be noted that there were a few factors to take into consideration during my tests. For one, there are medium users, power users, and then there is me. I am worse than most everyone. I literally don’t put my iPhone down. I use it in place of a laptop, and because I work multiple jobs, my iPhone is actually an extremely involved asset to my jobs. I also had the “Auto3G” tweak installed during all of my tests. This tweak turns your 3G service off when your iPhone is locked, or while you are charging, thus saving you a good amount of battery power. EVEN ON THE iPHONE 4, I am SUCH a “power user” that my battery will only last approximately 10-11 hours, so to me, these tests were extremely impressive. I also left the brightness at 100%, and my volume constantly turned on, and not muted.

Day 1: Heavy Usage

-Started charging it at exactly 11:00AM on 09/07/10.

-Unplugged it at 2:27PM on 09/08/10 while the iPhone 4 battery was fully charged at 100%.

-I turned it back on once it hit 66% at 8:49P.M.

-It turned itself off once it hit 100% at 10:22P.M., and the ice blue indicator on the case states that I still have approximately 40-50% juice left in the case.

-I turned the case back on at 2:33A.M., while the iPhone was at 59%.

-Case ran out of energy at 2:49P.M. on 09/09/10, 24 hours and 22 minutes after I unplugged the iPhone and “ExoLife”.At this time, my iPhone 4 had 3% battery power left, with the ice blue LED bar blinking as a notification of depleted energy in the case.

-At 2:55P.M., on 09/09/10, I began to recharge both the case and the iPhone 4.

Day 2: Light Usage

-On 09/09/10, I unplugged both the iPhone 4 and the “ExoLife” battery case at 7:38P.M.

-At 3:46A.M., my iPhone 4 hit 48% power. I turned the “ExoLife” on and went to sleep.

-Stopped charging at 5:57A.M., on its own thanks to its smart technology that doesn’t keep the case on. It turns itself off after reaching 100%.

-iPhone 4 hit 50% on 09/11/10, at 4:01P.M. I turned the case back on at this time.

- At 4:35P.M., while at 54% power, the “ExoLife” ran out of power. This seems inconsistent, as it only provided approximately 56% of a charge, which I found odd.

-iPhone 4 turned off at 9/12/10, at 1:44A.M., which means that I had about 30 hours and 6 minutes usage without charging it from a laptop or a wall unit.

There are multiple other notes, but none that are very significant. It should ALSO be noted that I am a hardcore “tweaker” in the jailbreak community, so at any given time, I usually have approximately 20 or so MobileSubstrate extentions running at all times, which means my battery life would only last roughly two thirds the time of a stock/”normal” iOS user, so those who are not jailbroken or who are light jailbreak users should expect at LEAST 6-8 hours more than I had previously listed.

Conclusions: This is simply a must have. Which the exact amount of charging seems to be sporadic in the beginning, I can only assume that is because of the battery acclimating to your charging habits. This thing is sexy to look at, it does its job, it comes with the ability to interchange the colors of your bumper to spice it up, and it’s very good at delivering the “WOW!” factor to any friends or co-workers who see it. It is amazingly thin to look at. While it does add a bit of bulk to the iPhone, it is nothing compared to some of the other charging cases that I have seen. This is probably the best $90.00 you’ll spend for your iPhone 4 accessories, and when even compared to other products such as the Mophie JuicePack Air, I actually much prefer this design and case to theirs. Other cases make the iPhone 4 turn into a big black iBrick, while the “ExoLife” turns your iPhone 4 into a high tech piece of machinery that thinks for itself and impresses all those who gaze upon it. I’d rate this purchase a high 8.5/9.0 on a scale of 1 to 10, and I very highly recommend it, especially if you are a power user like me, or a jailbreaker in general. You absolutely won’t regret it.