Sonim XP Strike Review

Direct Connect may not be a pressing issue in the cellular landscape these days, but there was once a time where you couldn’t walk onto a construction site without hearing the familiar shrill “beep beep.” Small business owners thrived on the instant communication it provided for their employees and the rugged, no frills handsets would withstand the harsh treatment of its user base. Nextel and iDEN has gone by the wayside and these days Sprint’s Direct Connect has become a niche service, but Sprint has not forgotten about these customers and have a small lineup of rugged, dependable handsets available. The newest entry to that lineup is the Sonim XP Strike, a basic bar phone that may just be the most durable phone the general market has ever seen.

Sonim has chosen the venerable candy bar form factor for the XP Strike, and with the thick, rubberized black exterior and yellow accenting this device could easily blend into Nextel’s lineup 10 years ago. Of course there are some “newer” features, like a 2” QVGA display and 2 megapixel camera with LED flash, but overall this is a very worthy design for Nextel’s glory days.

That 2” display isn't the brightest and unfortunately can be difficult to read in direct light, but it is covered by 1.8mm thick Gorilla glass to ensure it stands up to the roughest treatment. The speaker grills up front and around back are coated in waterproof GORETM and the external casing is hardened rubber molded to fiberglass.

The XP Strike feels very thick in your hands, which is reassuring for a phone of this nature. There is a lot of grip thanks to the different relief patterns all around. The battery door is held in place by two screws to ensure a water tight seal, and underneath the battery you’ll find an unoccupied microSD slot. The only four openings on the device are the aforementioned speaker grills and the charging and headset ports, both of which are covered by thick sturdy flaps. The charging port is a non-standard pin-style port, though a microUSB adapter is included. The keys taper up to a crest in the middle, and are well spaced (Sonim claims the spacing makes the phone easy to use with gloves on.) Besides the volume rocker on the right, there is a dedicated key on each side of the device; the left is the DC button and the right launches the camera with a short press or the LED flashlight with a long one.

The XP Strike meets military 810G specs for dust, shock, vibration and blowing rain but goes beyond that with IP86 certification for dust proofing and submersion resistance. You can dunk your XP Strike in up to 6.5 feet of water, leave it in there for half an hour and it will come out working perfectly. Sonim is so confident in the durability of the XP Strike that they offer a 3 year manufactures warranty (most devices offer one year), which even includes accidental damage coverage. That is an unprecedented warranty in the cellular world.