The Amazing liquid glass screen protector!

[Sparks]

    A friend just got a Samsung S9 and told me about her screen protector. I've always been rough on my phone's so I had to look into it. Silicon dioxide applied in a micro thin layer which dries to a scratch resistant super shield. By filling the pores of the glass with more glass, it somehow gives a hardness of 9, repels water ( because water always goes through the glass) and protects from fingerprints.
   Has anyone out there tried any of these products? I just don't believe it's worth the money

[tom66]

To me a screen protector only makes sense if it's sacrificial, so I can't see that working.  It needs to be weaker than the screen below so it cracks before and absorbs the energy of an impact.  Maybe that's a fallacy,  but it makes sense in my mind. 

I buy the cheap £3 glass screen protectors.  If they get cracked, I replace them, and I've never cracked a screen with one of them on a phone.

[exe]

When I got a phone with Gorilla Glass 2 (quite old, but was positioned as super-tough at the time) I thought I'm well protected. But soon I noticed scratches, etc. Turned out some dust and sand can leave scratches. Also, screen is not protected from being dropped, etc. So, I agree with tom66, no coating can provide protection as good as a cheap screen protector that can take a lot of damage without impacting the screen.

[rdl]

It "dries"?

It's not easy to dissolve silicon dioxide, seeing how it's what sand and glass is primarily made of. Selling it in a form that can be applied to a phone screen and "dry" would be a real trick. I think there must be some confusion here.

[Alex Eisenhut]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_silicate

[CJay]

To me a screen protector only makes sense if it's sacrificial, so I can't see that working.  It needs to be weaker than the screen below so it cracks before and absorbs the energy of an impact.  Maybe that's a fallacy,  but it makes sense in my mind. 

I buy the cheap £3 glass screen protectors.  If they get cracked, I replace them, and I've never cracked a screen with one of them on a phone.

Ooh, you buy the expensive ones

I agree though, I fit a half dozen or more a week here, they are cheap insurance (we pay about 45p each but we import boxes and boxes of them) but they're not a guarantee against a broken screen.

[tooki]

    A friend just got a Samsung S9 and told me about her screen protector. I've always been rough on my phone's so I had to look into it. Silicon dioxide applied in a micro thin layer which dries to a scratch resistant super shield. By filling the pores of the glass with more glass, it somehow gives a hardness of 9, repels water ( because water always goes through the glass) and protects from fingerprints.
   Has anyone out there tried any of these products? I just don't believe it's worth the money

Filling the pores of the glass?! Uhhhhh... don’t do that. The screens are already chemically treated AND have multiple layers of coatings. If any protection can be achieved by a liquid, they’ll have already done that at the factory!!!

[Towger]

Sounds like one of those water repellent treatments you can get for glass. Except I am sure it is much more expensive when marketed for mobile phones.

https://youtu.be/alo7IMj6_9M

[Halcyon]

    A friend just got a Samsung S9 and told me about her screen protector. I've always been rough on my phone's so I had to look into it. Silicon dioxide applied in a micro thin layer which dries to a scratch resistant super shield. By filling the pores of the glass with more glass, it somehow gives a hardness of 9, repels water ( because water always goes through the glass) and protects from fingerprints.
   Has anyone out there tried any of these products? I just don't believe it's worth the money

It sounds like the mobile phone equivalent of being up-sold "paint protection" or window tinting at a car dealership -- Costs far more than it should and achieves nothing in reality. Gorilla Glass is marketed as being super hard and scratch resistant, the problem with it is that it is very brittle when bent or exposed to stress.

There is no coating or screen protector that will protect your shiny new S9 from drops. A decent case is your only sensible (and cheaper) option.

[tooki]

It sounds like the mobile phone equivalent of being up-sold "paint protection" or window tinting at a car dealership — Costs far more than it should and achieves nothing in reality. Gorilla Glass is marketed as being super hard and scratch resistant, the problem with it is that it is very brittle when bent or exposed to stress.

Are you sure you're not confusing Gorilla Glass and sapphire? Cuz the chemical treatment that turns ordinary* glass into Gorilla Glass makes it much more flexible — it's much, much less brittle than normal glass or tempered glass (or sapphire). Meanwhile, sapphire is much harder and thus much more scratch resistant, but far less flexible.

Here's a comparison of sapphire vs an older version of Gorilla Glass from 2014 (when Apple was considering moving to sapphire for iPhones): https://www.ubreakifix.com/blog/sapphire-vs-gorilla-glass-bending-and-impact


 

*of course, it doesn't begin life as ordinary soda-lime glass, but as a specialized blend. Here, I really mean the "raw" glass vs the chemically treated end product.

[Sparks]

Thanks all for confirming my thoughts on this. My wife has a Note9 pre-ordered for tomorrow and was gung-ho for this stuff. She now agrees a real screen protector is best.

[amyk]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_silicate

Heated to drive off the water, the result is a hard translucent substance called silica gel, widely used as a desiccant.

...I don't think so.

[rdl]

Silicon dioxide can be made from sodium silicate, but it's an industrial process involving sulfuric acid. It's not something you can put in a bottle.

[Alex Eisenhut]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_silicate

Heated to drive off the water, the result is a hard translucent substance called silica gel, widely used as a desiccant.

...I don't think so.

I don't think he heats up his reloaded shotgun shells.

[Mr. Scram]

When I got a phone with Gorilla Glass 2 (quite old, but was positioned as super-tough at the time) I thought I'm well protected. But soon I noticed scratches, etc. Turned out some dust and sand can leave scratches. Also, screen is not protected from being dropped, etc. So, I agree with tom66, no coating can provide protection as good as a cheap screen protector that can take a lot of damage without impacting the screen.

Sand tends to be super hard. That always seems to catch people by surprise, but it's why sandpaper exists.