I used my Motorola Defy without SP or case for more than a year and I actually managed to get alot of scratches. My friend's HTC Incredible S have even more scratches than mine As someone mentioned abobe, anything harder or have the same hardness as glass WILL scratch it, and that includes the ever so common sand which sometimes manages to enter your pocket without you knowing or gets stuck to your shirt while you wipe your screen plus scratching it at the same time. Didn't use a case coz it wasn't even necessary. The Defy is built like a tank! Survived countless falls onto tarmac and i handle the phone quite roughly.

Now I'm on a HTC One X and the first day itself i quickly got myself a case and SP. Main reason for getting a case is the HOX's stupid camera lens design which protrudes out of the body by quite alot and the SP due to my previous bad experience from running a naked screen

so yeah, if the phone is built tough enough, I won't bother getting an SP or case

This post has been edited by Nightstalker1993: Dec 2 2012, 02:55 AM

scratch resistance is same, just that in terms of strength(breaking) it's almost twice as strong, so to achieve the same strength, you can use half of the thickness compared to if it was using the first gen gorilla glass which is what most manufacturers do to achieve that 'thinnest phone' status.