Funny stuff.

Possibilities:

1. It is painted
2. It is fake
3. The surface is processed in some way, but not necessarily painted.
4. one and two
5. Chemical contamination.
6. Bad batches has found their way to the market (more or less 2)

IMO number 4 is most reasonable. I mean it is well known that the N9 is not sold in US, UK and so on, yet the demand is large. Lots of "original replacement parts" can be found on the net. For outlets it is not particularly difficult to mix in non-original parts, and the risk is close to nothing. The internals are original (most of it), but the housing, buttons and so on can be fake.

Number 3 is also plausible. Surface processing is a normal procedure for outdoor optical PC lenses (car head lights mostly). They will seldom brake or crack, but they are hardened to prevent scratches. Gorilla glass - same stuff. This can be combined with 6. This kind of surface processing may also include matting of certain areas for wanted optical effects.

The least speculative, the most reasonable explanation is 4. Therefore it most like is the truth.

Do you use the cover that came with it?
if yes then it depends - the color is supposed to be through and through but its possible in cases where its not a scratch that the color just faded due to exposure to either some corrosive...

Do you think it is a possibility that its not the original?
Quite easy to make a replica/duplicate part assembly....

To state the obvious: If you're still under warranty(which you should be, its not been a year since it was launched), I think it would be right to exercise it.

And Fake is especially plausible cos even the cheapest Nokia's I've owned have not flaked like that. And believe me I've never handled any of them delicately.

I've always taken them in while I take a bath, I keep it away from the water of course, but i've answered quite a lot of calls with soapy hands too... No Peeling.

My N73(also black) fell off my pocket while I was riding my bike. Surprisingly all I had to do was find the scattered pieces and put them together. There were mighty dents but no peeling.

(Additional Info: All of them were Finnish including my beloved N9 , but I don't think thats it... cos their build methods would be the same across )

Guys, policarbonate is not painted.

If you haven't the seen the peeling for yourselves how can you say these devices are fake? I find it highly implausible that Nokia PR would use fake devices to demo to the public. The black is painted/coated.

I guess you guys took the blue pill and woke up in your bed and believed whatever you wanted to believe

I'm sorry but you are actually reeeeetarded for saying that. Nokia employees (including the person who designed the polycarbonate) have stated countless times it's coloured all the way through. People on this forum have stated that they've scratched/chipped the phone, with the phone still displaying the same colour throughout the scratches

Case in point. Blue pill.

edit: I never said it wasnt coloured all the way through. Read here.

Everyone insisting that devices with chipping paint are fake is laughably hilarious. I have a valid s/n, imei, OS, etc. Just drop it.

I have the same issue, but only at the usb cover.

Seems that the Black N9 has a matte coating over the black PC. The coating seems to have 2 layers, the outter black and the inner gray..

When the whole coating has worn off you will feel the real PC which is paint throughly in black.

So don't worry, Nokia has applied another layer of protection to the real body.

So in conclusion, the N9 housings are NOT FAKE, the PC is not painted, but rather matte-coated (the cyan, magenta and white does not have this matte coat)

Alright, yesterday I got a Lumia 800 for trial, which meant I had to compare it with my 4-month-old N9. So I removed the rubber cover & I found this.






The matte layer has indeed worn off. How? It's my own fault because I hadn't removed the cover since a few months and it definitely hasn't coped well with the sweat and heat while inside my pocket (I live in a country with a very warm weather).

Clearly, Nokia haven't tested it under this extreme weather condition.