Review: Nokia 6126

...most have speculated that the issue is the screen not having a protective plastic lens on top of the screen. is this the case, Rich or Eric?

It does (unusually) lack a protective layer above the main display. However it seems plenty durable. The ones they put on display at trade shows are generally expected to be abused - I mean tested - so I had no qualms about testing the durability of the display, and it seemed fine. I'm not sure if it's a type of LCD that is more rigid and durable to begin with, or the polycarbonate layer is simply bonded to the display module itself. Either way, it seemed very durable.