No More Greasy, Oily Screens on that iPhone?

Sunday, June 14, 2009

“Oh, is that an iPhone? Can I take a look at it?” says your female acquaintance. She takes the iPhone from you and says in her head “yuck, why is the screen all oily? Disgusting!”

Hopefully this situation won’t happen if you have the new iPhone 3GS. Apple has apparently updated their touch screen with oleophobic coating as announced on their website’s “How to: Cleaning iPhone” page. Oleophobic means a lack of strong affinity for oils. Instead of using a wet cloth to clean your iPhone screen, the new 3GS model only needs a dry, soft lint-free cloth.

This means the linen shipped along with the iPhone will do fine without water. If you are desperate for a quick oil removal to avoid an oily embarrassment like above, your shirt will probably do fine to remove the oily stench and smudges. Nothing better to remove greasy stains than your own shirt, right? OK, you shouldn’t always use your shirt to clean the grease on the iPhone. But if you are truly concerned about oily screens, keep the lint-free cloth with you at all times. Don’t have a lint-free cloth? Here’s a link to get one.

For those that don’t have the newest iPhone 3GS, sorry, you are out of luck. For those with the old iPhone 2G and iPhone 3G, a little bit of water is still necessary. If you are on a date in a restaurant. Just use a little bit of water available to you there to remove the grease on the iPhone.