I recently got a new 13″ Macbook Pro with TouchBar. This is a 2016 model and the TouchBar is a bit gimmicky, but that’s another story. I wanted to keep it svelte and thin, but also wanted some protection. I looked on Amazon for a skin and finally found a version from a company called SopiGuard. At the time, it had one review and it was not a good one. The reviewer didn’t like anything about it. So I bought it.
Nuts you say? Well, I had a feeling they just didn’t understand how to install it. So, when it arrived I began to transfer my files from one Macbook Pro (i5 2.9 GHz) to my new one (i7 3.3 GHz). The kit has 3 parts rolled up in a nice box. Despite the nice packing, there was a wrinkle in one main piece. More on that later.
Here’s my computers transferring files and the SopiGuard kit on top.
So, a while back I had installed a skin on my Macbook. I learned that the trick was to spray a fine mist of water on the laptop so that you could move the skin around and adjust it. If you do not do this, the large unwieldy self adhesive skin is really hard to position and you’ll be peeling it off to reposition it over and over. The problem is that when you peel it off, odds are food you’ll stretch it and then it doesn’t fit anymore.
So with that in mind, I sprayed a fine mist of water onto my laptop. It’s waterproof and the laptop was turned off. There is little risk of problems from the fine mist.
Spray a fine mist to start.
Next used a knife to pick out the cutouts for the apple logo. I most did OK, but the laser cut wasn’t perfect and I had to tug a little. That left a little imperfection that I’ll show you later. It’s really small. Anyhow, because of the water, I was able to position the skin and then move it around a bit. I started by lining up the Apple logo perfectly. When I got it where I wanted it, I used a credit card as a squeegee and got the water out, keeping a paper towel handy to catch the drips.
You can hardly tell there’s a skin on it!
The color of the skin was a bit darker than the space gray, but it wasn’t so bad after I got used to it. The skin is also slightly metallic so it enhances the laptop quite well. Now all was not perfect. There was a wrinkle in the skin before I even placed it on the laptop. I am hoping that this small wrinkle will settle over time.
Can you spot the small wrinkles?
Also as I mentioned, the area around the Apple logo wasn’t perfect because the cutout left a little piece that I had to tug at. However, I’m being nit picky as you can see here, it’s pretty darn close. Also I guess there’s a tiny shift right. Very tiny.
Small imperfection in upper right of logo.
Well, the last thing was the bottom. It actually ended up being the hardest as it has the most cutouts. I got it applied, but there are many parts that are only ok. I had to pull it up a few times and sure enough, it stretched.
Bottom was the hardest, but it’s still pretty good.
There’s holes for the tiny screws and the speaker exit cutouts as well as the notch along the top for the screen. In the end, I stretched it a bit and the upper left cutout for the rubber feet isn’t perfect. If you look really close, you can tell the skin doesn’t sit perfectly.
However, all in all the skin looks great and it does protect the majority of the laptop from scrapes and scratches. For the $16 I paid for it, it’s a pretty good deal. The bad reviews you see are the fact that it’s tricky to install a large self adhesive skin. Use some of the tricks I’ve shared here and you should get good results. I’d recommend this kit!
Here’s a link to the kit on Amazon. SopiGuard Skin.
Good luck to you!
