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Fu-design Super Robot MacBook Air Sleeve: Review and giveaway
Last November I had the pleasure of reviewing an iPad case featuring a whimsical design created by Taiwanese-born graphic artist Keng-Fu Chu, AKA "Fu". Now Fu has teamed up again with Echo Creative to bring Super Robot to the front of a cool envelope-like MacBook Air sleeve. The Super Robot MacBook Air Sleeve (US$53.99 for 11" or 13" sizes) is a lightweight polyurethane sleeve that looks a lot like an interoffice envelope, but with a colorful rendition of one of Fu's latest creations -- Super Robot -- zooming high above the Earth. Even the packaging is fun; see the gallery below for details. %Gallery-156918% The sleeve features a soft leather lining and a combination closure that includes a pair of strong magnets and an elastic band that imitates the look of those button-and-string closures you used to see on reusable envelopes. There's also a soft "luggage tag" that attaches to the buttons and can be used to clean smudges off of your MacBook Air screen. There's just enough padding to keep your MacBook Air protected, but not so much as to make this sleeve fat and unwieldy. If you're like me and throw your MBA into a backpack full of other tech gear, you'll appreciate the way that the Super Robot Sleeve protects your laptop from scratches and bumps without taking up much more room than the naked laptop. The Robot 99 iPad cases are sold out and appear to now be a collector's item, so if you want one of these MacBook Air sleeves you'd better act quickly. Alternatively, you can enter our giveaway of an 11" MacBook Air Sleeve from Fu-design today! Here are the rules for the giveaway: Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec) who are 18 and older. To enter, fill out the form below completely and click or tap the Submit button. The entry must be made before June 7, 2012 11:59PM Eastern Standard Time. You may enter only once. One winner will be selected and will receive a Fu-design Super Robot 11" MacBook Air Sleeve valued at US$53.99) Click Here for complete Official Rules. Loading...
Fu Design Lettre X Robot 99 Special Edition: The coolest iPad 2 case ever?
iPad 2s are cool. Smart Covers exude coolness all over the place. And Fu, the awesome New York City-based graphic artist, has created a robot-filled world called Robot 99 that is über-cool. What happens when you get these three things together? Probably one of the most unique and fun iPad 2 cases ever. Fu has teamed with Echo Creative to create a Robot 99 Special Edition iPad 2 case (US$59.99, currently on sale for $47.99), and it turns out that it's not only completely fun, but also a pretty good iPad 2 folio case as well! Read on for my review. Design First, let's talk about Robot 99. It's a fun little iOS game ($0.99). The back story about Robot 99 is that "Robots live up in the clouds. Sometimes they might miss a step and accidentally fall down from the sky. Only your fingers can save them!" The case is an Echo Creative Lettre X iPad 2 folio, which is a rather slender leather folio case with built-in cover magnets for Smart Cover-like automatic on/off. The case has a tab in the back that allows the cover to be folded back and used to prop the iPad up in several ways. While there's nothing new about folio cases -- I know I've reviewed bazillions of them -- the one thing I like about the Lettre X is that it's not over-padded like so many of the cases are. Instead, it's very thin and doesn't add too much to the weight or thickness of the case. %Gallery-138672% The star of the show, though, is Robot 1. He's on the front of the case emblazoned in bright primary colors. His fellow cloud-inhabitants from Robot 99 are line drawings on the brown leather background, but the entire case is just covered with the doodle-like characters. It's fun, and it's sure to get the attention of everybody. Functionality As I mentioned, the case works similarly to many of the Smart Cover / folio case mashups we've seen. I was very impressed with the build of this case, and I liked the way that the iPad 2 is held in place. There's a small slot on the top of the case into which a leather tab fits. Pull out the tab, slide in the iPad 2, and then push the tab back into the slot to hold the iPad 2 securely. That's simple, but something that a lot of folio case designers haven't figured out! Many of them use ugly and breakable elastic straps to hold things into their proper places. The inside of the case is lined with a grey felt that compliments the grey leather holding the iPad into place. It's an altogether attractive package, and would make an excellent holiday gift. Conclusion Unfortunately, we don't get to keep any of the goodies that are sent into the TUAW Labs for testing, because I would have nabbed this case in a heartbeat. When someone makes an excellent iPad 2 folio case, sells it at a decent price (especially with the 20% off fall sale right now), and then covers it with fun and colorful graphics, it's time for serious Robot 99 love.
