PK Shiu
Creative ZEN Hybrid Headphones Review
Creative ZEN Hybrid Headphones Review

bag

Muji Double Fastener Case Review

Muji has a line of pouches that I find very useful. They comes in three sizes, large, medium and small, and in multiple colors: blue, light grey, mustard and black. Here I am reviewing the medium and small case together. The medium case is 5in x 7in, or 13.5cm x 19cm, just slightly smaller than a A5 notebook. The small is 4in x 5in or 10cm x 13.5cm. 

Both cases have two compartments — the front one has a mesh front and the back compartment is enclosed. The two zippers have a different zipper pull on them. The front zipper pull has a thumb loop to make opening it easier. I can see replacing the standard pull with a custom pull, although the hole is just a bit too small for a standard size 550 paranoid.

The polyester material is good quality with a tight weave but thin. They are definitely not as rugged as say halcyon or cordura, but are perfectly adequate for normal use.

For the cost, I think these just became my favorite every day pouches.

Bond Travel Gear Escapade Gear Pouch Review

I own a lot of different pouches, some no name brand ones, some expansive ones from well known tactical gear companies. As a mobile tech professional, I find this pouch fits my EDC need extremely well. I carry my MacBook Pro charger and cable, my slim rechargeable battery pack, my Anker small charger, several cables, all in this pouch. Adding to that lip balm, pen, and other smaller items.

The key to this pouch is the organization design. It is not just a few rows of elastic loops. I do not find elastic loops useful for office gear. They are good for flash lights and multi-tools, but I am not carry those around. Instead, the different size pockets in the Escapade pouch let me organize my gear inside and keep them separate. As a result, the overall, full packed size of the pouch is still very small and slim. Very space efficient. The elastic loops also have a sticky rubber strip inside of them, which helps hold on to items if they are not fully stretching out the elastic. Great design detail.

I only have two minor complains, one is the material, while rugged, seems to attract lint and other particles. I also wish it has a small strip of webbing in the back so that I can use it as a handle.

Overall, this is a really well design and made in America pouch. With the lay flat opening, I take this with me as I move between offices. Once I am at a desk, I zip this thing open and everything I need is inside, easily accessible. When I am ready to leave the office, or leave for the airport, I just put everything back inside, zip up the pouch, throw it into my bag and I am ready to go.

 

 

 

Alpha One Niner Chio Bag Review

Helmie of Alpha One Niner continues to design and produce bags that serve his own travel needs. I really like his designs. So when he released the Chio everyday carry bag I have to get one to try out.

Last weekend I took the bag out for a day trip on a family event, where I would mostly be waiting around for the whole day in a conference center. So I took my 10.5 inch iPad Pro, a book, my A5 notebook, and my nockco pen case with me to do some work. I took my Bose noise cancelling headset, iOS device charging pouch, and my mini EDC pouch with me. Add to that a hat, wallet, and mints.

All of these things fit snuggly in the bag. I also installed a Mill Spec Monkey loop panel inside the outside large compartment to hold a few pens. Note that while the bag has 5 outside pockets, they do not offer additional depth to the bag. i.e. any space taking up by these pockets pushes partially back into the main compartment. Or in my case, because the book and my notebook and my iPad with a Smart Keyboard cover together are quite thick, it does not leave a lot of extra rooms for the other pockets to hold anything beyond thiner items.

That is not an issue though — I have my wallet, my pen case, my car keys, and my mint tin placed in the outer pockets. The rest of the items fit perfectly in the main compartment. I like how the bag, once filled, fill out nice and symmetrically and the bottle flattens out. The bag can almost stand on it’s own. This goes to the very careful design of the shape of the bag.

Fully filled and weighted, the 1.5 inch strap feels comfortable either cross body or on one side. The zippers are buttery smooth. The construction of the bag is of very high quality — but then I expect nothing less from Alpha One Niner. The Evade backpack is one of my go to backpack for travel.

I went with the Kryptek typhon material because all black I think will be too boring for a everyday carry bag. I am not a big tactical bag guy but I really like the typhon pattern on this bag. For the average person it just look interesting. My minor complain is that the material feels a bit rough to the touch. My Evade has the two tone ripstop material that is very nice. However in this bag, the Kryptek may offer a bit more structure, especially when the bag is not fully loaded.

In conclusion, the bag works really well for as an every day carry bag. This is going to replace my smaller sling bags, or sometimes my Jack Spade canvas field bag as my EDC bag.

Vanquest JAVELIN 2.0 VSlinger Sling Bag Review

After a lot of research, I bought the Javelin 2.0 from Vanquest as my first “tactical” bag. Chances are you will not see me using this sling bag in the woods. Instead, I am using it daily to and from the office, and running around with the kids on weekend. There are a lot of great features on the Javelin. It is a mid size sling bag that carries a good amount of stuff, great for daily EDC for work, or as a camera bag. It has amongst many things:

  • a front small zip pocket, perfect for a wallet, that can be optionally “locked down” with a snap closure

  • the front admin pocket and the main compartment is designed to be accessed primarily when the bag is swung to the front of the body while the bag is on your shoulder, or from the top if the bag is standing up like a bag pack 

  • a CCW back pocket that fits my iPad, or can be used with a hydration pouch, with all the routing necessary for the feeding tube

  • lots of hook and loop and molle attachment points on the outside of the bag

  • removable dividers for the main compartment — I use them when I use the bag as a camera bag

Some of the especially nice things about this bag are:

  1. quality — the build quality of this bag is top notch. Threads are straight and well sewed. Zippers are smooth — in fact getting smoother with usage. Plastics on buckles are strong and well molded. We are in contacts with the bags we carry all the time, and the quality feel adds to the enjoyment of the bag.

  2. design — There are a lot of nice details in the design of the bag that make it very functional. One particular — the C shape zipper opening of the main compartment — makes getting items in and out of the bag while on body or off body very easy. I love this design. Placement and padding of the top carry handle, the bottom grab handle for pulling the sling forward while on body, are all very well designed and executed.

  3. The orange interior color — I like bright color interior. It helps locate items in the bag.

  4. Carry comfort — the sling strap is wide and padded. The strap geometry is just right. This is one of the most comfortable bags I have.

While there are no real problems with the bag. Here are a few items that could be improved, at least from my usage pattern:

  1. The bag is not wide enough for carrying a 13 inch macbookPro and a lot of other items. The MBP will fit, but stretches the main compartment enough to make carrying a lot of other items difficult. The bag is also not wide enough to carry letter size paper portfolio (which tends to be slightly wider than letter sized).

  2. Too much velcro — while I understand that for a sling bag, internal compartments have to be useful in two directions. Therefore a velcro closure on the large internal pockets make sense. However, for use in an office environment, the velcro is loud. Also it is hard to open, particularly the big pocket inside the main compartment one handed or in one go. I often have to “tear” the velcro with two or three pulls. For my use I would love to see a zipper closure instead — while understand that a zipper makes the opening and ease of putting things in and out a bit harder.

  3. Minor personal usage issue: because I use this as my office EDC, I would like to have a little less molle on the front of the bag

  4. There is no water bottle pocket — I understand for a sling bag it is hard to design in a water bottle holder that works in two different orientation though.

Conclusion

This is a great bag that became my main EDC bag weekdays and weekends. I can’t wait to get my hands on the 3.0 version — and hoping that it is expanded in width as Vanquest has said so that it can more easily carry a laptop and paper. 

wise-walker OS-01 urban day bag review

I have always interested in getting a Nomadic wise-walker bag. Jetpens sells some online, but from the description it didn't seems to fit my needs. Luckily I am in Hong Kong and found the right bag for myself. Here is a review of the wise-walker OS01 bag.

Why is this bag so good? It looks small on the outside, but the carrying capacity is great. It is comfortable to carry, and it is secure.

The bag has a large rectangular main compartment, and a ton (well maybe 14) of organizing pockets and areas. When travelling or commuting, a lot of the items I crarry are small. They will all fit outside of the main pocket, leaving the main compartment for the larger items like laptop or camera and a sweater.

The bag is comfortable to carry. I like to carry these bags messanger bag style, with the bag resting on my lower bag. This bag has the air meshed in the back to reduce sweatiness, important when in Asia. The shoulder strap has a padded pad in the middle.

The bag is designed to keep its content secure. This is especially important in some cities like Hong Kong. I can keep wallet and ID cards etc in areas of the bag that is very difficult to be pick pocketed.

How to Use

When running around the city:

  • I carry my Olympus E-M10 for pictures, a polo shirt for when entering crazy air conditioned restaurants and malls, and sometimes my kindle, in the main compartment
  • My battery pack for my iPhone also goes into the main compartment
  • My field notes and pen goes into the back compartment with my wallet
  • Sun glasses, lip balm goes into the front compartment under the flap

When flying:

  • Amazingly, same items as above, plus
  • my travel wallet in the back main compartment
  • currencies goes into the secure compartment
  • when going through security, all my metal items goes into the front compartment under the flap temporarily

Details

The shoulder strap pad is sewn on as part of the strap. It is not movable. As a result it will not slide back and forth. This I think is a good design, but there are two related problems: one is that sometimes I like to slide the bag from my back to my front, for example when I am on a crowded subway train. Because the pad location is fixed, when the pad is set right for the back, it will be wrong for the front.

Most of the inside organizer pockets are made with a semi transparent mesh. So you can see what is in them. The ones that are not made with messed are padded.

Packaging -- look at the little "tab" that is used to wrap the strap in the packaging. Nice touch.

There are 10 pockets according to the product leaflet. In fact there are more. Check out these little touches:

  1. inside the front outside zipped pocket, there is two small shallow pockets that are good for subway pass cards.
  2. under the front flap, the lower zip pocket is for plane tickets
  3. the second zip pocket is double zipped, has three meshed organizer pockets
  4. the zip openning on the pocket is 2/3 high of the actual pocket depth. So things are not likely to fall out after the zips are opened
  5. the main compartment under the flap is about three inches deep, which is what I like about this bag compare to others. A 13 inch MBP fits into it with no problem
  6. the back zip pocket is double zipped, and the openning is 1/2 of the height, again good for not having things fall out
  7. inside there are two mesh pockets across the very back (outer side), three slightly padded pockets and two pen slots on the other side, and two meshed pockets behind them.
  8. There is a headphone cord openning right at the center of the back of the bag
  9. The back of the bag has the "airmesh" type materials. I can tell you it really makes a difference after testing it out in the hot humid (33C, 70% humidity) Hong Kong environment.
  10. There is a "security" pocket in the back of the bag between the back pocket area and the main area of the bag. Why it is a security pocket? It is closed with velcro across the entire length of the bag. If someone try to reach into there it will be difficult, and you will definitely hear and feel the "ripping" of the velcro
  11. and finally, there are two water bottle pockets on either side of the bag, and they are large enough for 500ml size bottles.

Problems

  1. I wish the bag has either little feets on the bottom, or maybe a different materials on the bottom, for when I need to put the bag down on the floor
  2. This is the only medium size problem -- the bag has a flawed side wing design in the main compartment. In theory when the front flap is closed, the side wings will fold inwards to make sure rain will not get into the bag. But I find that most of the time the wings ended up folding outwards instead (see pictures).
  3. Finally, the none movable strap padding problem as I mentioned above. I may replace the strap with something custom or more comfortable

But seriously this is a very well thought out bag. I highly recommend it. However I seems to not be able to find it online in the US, nor in Shanghai. 

L.L. Bean Underseat Commuter Bag Review

Running from one gate to another at the airport with minutes to spare. Laptop, jacket, bag of chargers, kindle all stuffed into my Tumi messenger bag. By the time I made it to my seat, my shoulder hurts, my back aches. That is no way to start a 15 hours flight to Shanghai. It is time to get a small wheeled carry on bag.

Here comes L.L. Bean

Tumi makes a few wheeled brief cases, but the cheapest one, the T-Tech network is US$400. When I found this $169 L.L. Bean Commuter Underseat bag, I bought it.

Organization

A bag is all about organization. Too little pockets and everything gets lump together, making retrieval difficult. This is particularly bad while traveling. Sometimes I just need to get to my headphones, or passports, or whatever while standing in the TSA line or stuck in a cramp seat on the airplane.

Too many pockets is not good either. How would you remember where things are? And if any of the pockets are too large or too small, they just become not useful. How does this L.L. Bean bag perform?

Main Storage Area

The main storage area zips open like a mini suit case. On the "bottom", it has a deep storage space complete with a tie down strap on the bottom, useful for holding down clothing's. This is where I put most of my travel items. A package compression thing  just fits inside.The area is covered by a zip around mashed cover. The main area is just large enough to fit an Eagle Creek Travel Gear Pack-It Folder 15 (the smaller one). I managed to pack for a two day business trip, travelled by train in China, using this bag with the Pack-It kit.

The "top" of this main area has a padded computer storage area, and a smaller lined area, perhaps for an iPad. The computer area is quite large. My 13 inch MacBook Pro fits in it with a lot of room to spare. I think you can fit two 15 inch MacBook Pros in there if you need to.

There are a few issues with this main storage area:

  • If you place the bag on it's back and open the main area, the laptop and any thing else tends to slide down and out of it's space (see picture). So you should make sure you strap down the velcro tab to protect the laptop.
  • It seems natural at first to put any paperwork, folders etc in between the front and the back of this main area. But because the meshed cover of the back area, if you try to insert anything stiff, like a file folder, into the bag while the bag is upright, it will likely get caught by the mesh cover.

One big improvement for L.L. Bean will be to add another document pocket, or a stiff divider, in this area.

Small pockets on Top

The bag has two horizontally zipped small pockets on the top. One is lighted with a soft white water resistant material. This pocket is quiet deep. The other is lined with a felt like material. Both area is great for phones and other small items. I use them to hold small items like headphones, phone and wallet when I have to empty my pockets going through metal detectors.

Sides

One side of the bag has a grab handle and a hidden luggage tag. The grab handle is really handy when you have to retrieve the bag from overhead bins. This is one of the great little design touch of the bag.

The other side has a zipped pocket that is slightly too small even for a small water bottle. Maybe it is for a compact umbrella?

Front Section

The other storage area is a zipped open front section that contains the usual organization pockets for pens, business cards etc. There is a small zipped meshed pocket at the front, good for storing more valuable things like passports and wallets. The sides of the half entire front section has "wings" that prevent things from falling out while the section is opened - good design.

Miscellaneous Features

One very nice thing about this bag is that both handles are very well padded. When you have to lift the bag to a overhead storage bin, or pick it up to walk up long flight of stairs much easier.

There is a little attachment point on the front of the bag, presumable good for attaching a small flash light or something. I have yet to use it.

There is a pass thru strap on the back of the bag that allows you to slide the bag over the pull handle of another luggage. I find that it does not fit over the very wide handle of my travel pro roller board.

The zipper pulls on the main compartment have eyelets for a lock. The zipper pulls on the smaller front compartment do not.

Telescopic Handle


The telescopic handle is hidden under a zipped opening, which is nice. The handle pulls out easily, but I find that I always have to give it an extra tug to get it fully extended and locked in place. Once extended, together with the very smooth rollerblade type wheels, it rolls easily. I dragged the bag over a mile of cobble stoned sidewalk of shanghai and it worked fine.

Conclusion

I have taken this bag on a few long haul flights, a few short haul flights, and one train trip. It has been holding up. It is definitely better than a messenger bag in terms of comfort and capacity. Even with the minor issues noted above, I recommend this bag.

Jack Spade Work Twill Haversack Review

I have a small Jack Spade messanger bag that I bought from the Greene Street store from a very long time ago. I use it my weekend city bag all the time. Now that I am in Shanghai, I do not have a car and I run around the city a lot more on foot and subway. I need a slightly larger bag to carry my stuff. So when Jack Spade ran a secret sale earlier this, I bought myself a new bag -- a grey work twill Haversack messanger.