Wednesday, May 28, 2003
The RoadWired Pod: The Ultimate Gear-Carrying Gadget for Geeks?
Posted by Jason Dunn in "HARDWARE" @ 08:30 AM
If you've got gear, you need a way to carry it. And I've yet to encounter a more versatile and functional small gear bag than The Pod from RoadWired. The bag is made of top-quality materials, and other than a few small nit-picks, this is a superb bag for taking all your important Pocket PC and photo gear with you on the go. Check out the full review!
Whenever I think of bags, I think of RoadWired. Ever since they sent me one of their laptop bags last year, I've been a huge fan of theirs. RoadWired gear is top-notch in every way: tough materials, excellent workmanship and great customer service. I've had The Pod for a few months, and I'm kicking myself for not taking the time to get to know this little bag better until now.
It's All About The Materials
When you're going to be cramming your best tech gear into a bag, you want to know that it's going to be protected – if you didn't care, you'd probably just carry it all in a paper bag. The Pod doesn't disappoint in this area – it's made from something called "1050 Denier Ballistic Nylon". Anything with the word "ballistic" in it just sounds cool, doesn't it? I wouldn't suggest shooting The Pod though – I didn't see Kevlar listed anywhere on the materials list. :-) There's a patch of neoprene on the front of the top cover, apparently for looks. I don't know how water repellant the ballistic nylon is, but I'd venture to say the case would keep your gear fairly safe from random water sprays. The Pod wouldn't qualify as being truly water-proof however.
Figure 1: The Pod when fully "deployed" with all wings open and the lid flipped.
Physically, the bag is a good size: 7" wide, 6.5" tall and 5" deep. It's big enough to hold a good amount of gear, but small enough to be unobtrusive and very easy to carry. It weighs in at 13 ounces when empty. The main pouch is big enough for my Canon G2 digital camera, which is one of the bigger non-SLR digital cameras. I'm not sure how well some of the cameras with longer lenses would fit (like some of the high optical-zoom Fuji cameras), but I'd say it's good for all small and medium-sized cameras. There's a sturdy shoulder strap included that has metal fasteners on both the strap and bag – once this strap is attached, it's not going to come off without tremendous force.
Figure 2: The Pod is available in six colours made up of a base colour and accents: black/black, titanium/black, navy/black, yellow/black, red/black, olive/black. The Pod in these photos is the titanium/black model.
Figure 3: It's possible to loop a belt through The Pod for easier carrying, but please, for the love of the geek gene pool everywhere, don't do this if you're single. If you're married, it's okay to look like a dork. ;-)
So Much Gear, So Many Pouches
After being a Pocket PC geek for over three years now, I've collected a fair amount of gear. I've sold and given away a lot of it over the years (trying to spread the Pocket PC gospel so to speak), but I still have a fair amount left over. And, believe it or not, it was a struggle to find enough stuff to fill all the nooks and crannies in The Pod! There are over 20 pockets and compartments in The Pod.
Figure 4: Everything I managed to fit into The Pod – amazing!
So how much can The Pod fit? Well, here's what I managed to cram into mine:
It's All About The Pouches…
There's nothing more important on a bag than how many pouches it has, and where you can put things, so let's get right down to it. A breakdown of all the zones on The Pod, from left to right.
Figure 5: The memory card pouch
This is the memory card pouch. Tight elastic bands allow you to fit one or more memory cards per slot. I could fit one CompactFlash card, vertically, per slot. Two SD/MMC cards fit easily. I can't help but think that these slots were designed for Smartmedia cards, which is a shame – the space could be better used in other ways to fit the more common forms of CompactFlash and Secure Digital cards. There's also a pouch on the inside of the flap with a Velcro fastener.
Figure 6: Lots of space for a Pocket PC – everything from an iPAQ 1910 in a Proporta aluminum case up to a naked Dell Axim fit without trouble.
Figure 7: A close up zoom on the front pouch – lots of dead space for my needs here.
Now we come to my least favourite part of The Pod: the battery and film zone. If this was designed in 1997, I could understand the need for a design like this, but it's 2003. Realistically, if this bag is being marketed towards the uber-geeks like myself, we're using digital cameras, not 35mm cameras. And the vast majority of digital cameras on the market today (and PDAs, MP3 players, etc.) do not use standard batteries or take little rolls of plastic film. So what's with the loop battery and film holders? I spent a few minutes staring at them, thinking if there was a creative way for me to put something in them, but came up dry. I'd much rather see more memory card slots, or some larger elastic bands for spare digital camera batteries (never leave home without them!). There's a mesh pouch with a Velcro top attached to the inside of the flap here as well.
Figure 8: The "orange elastic zone"
This zone would be handy for cables, with twin orange bands on a horizontal plane. As the photo shows, I ended up putting my 56K and Ethernet CompactFlash cards here – they fit nicely. There's yet another pouch on the inside of the wing, with a Velcro flap to boot. I stored my Gomadic Sync 'n Charge cable here.
Figure 9: The business card holder and "secret pouch zone"
On the underside of the lid, they've given you a place for your business card (in case The Pod gets lost) and there's a clever hidden pouch behind it for money, credit cards and identification. This pouch is designed in such a way that, unless you know it's there, you can't readily see it. However, if you put any sort of plastic card in there, the normally flexible top becomes stiff, but only around the edges of the card. It wouldn't take a very clever thief to find this. It would be nice to see RoadWired put a polyethylene sheet in the top to add a little protection for this zone (nobody wants a bent or broken credit card).
Gotchas
All in all, I really liked The Pod. There are a few things that could use improving however:
The Pod can be purchased from RoadWired for $49.95. [Affiliate] This is a little more expensive than your average camera bag, but the quality is unmatched by what you'd find at your local camera store.
Conclusions
The Pod is an excellent carrier for your gear, and if you're going away for a short trip, it balances the need to carry important gear with the equally pressing need to be small and easy to carry with you. The bag is almost perfect, but they need to ditch the 35mm legacy design and move forward with a new design based around modern equipment needs.
Whenever I think of bags, I think of RoadWired. Ever since they sent me one of their laptop bags last year, I've been a huge fan of theirs. RoadWired gear is top-notch in every way: tough materials, excellent workmanship and great customer service. I've had The Pod for a few months, and I'm kicking myself for not taking the time to get to know this little bag better until now.
It's All About The Materials
When you're going to be cramming your best tech gear into a bag, you want to know that it's going to be protected – if you didn't care, you'd probably just carry it all in a paper bag. The Pod doesn't disappoint in this area – it's made from something called "1050 Denier Ballistic Nylon". Anything with the word "ballistic" in it just sounds cool, doesn't it? I wouldn't suggest shooting The Pod though – I didn't see Kevlar listed anywhere on the materials list. :-) There's a patch of neoprene on the front of the top cover, apparently for looks. I don't know how water repellant the ballistic nylon is, but I'd venture to say the case would keep your gear fairly safe from random water sprays. The Pod wouldn't qualify as being truly water-proof however.
Figure 1: The Pod when fully "deployed" with all wings open and the lid flipped.
Physically, the bag is a good size: 7" wide, 6.5" tall and 5" deep. It's big enough to hold a good amount of gear, but small enough to be unobtrusive and very easy to carry. It weighs in at 13 ounces when empty. The main pouch is big enough for my Canon G2 digital camera, which is one of the bigger non-SLR digital cameras. I'm not sure how well some of the cameras with longer lenses would fit (like some of the high optical-zoom Fuji cameras), but I'd say it's good for all small and medium-sized cameras. There's a sturdy shoulder strap included that has metal fasteners on both the strap and bag – once this strap is attached, it's not going to come off without tremendous force.
Figure 2: The Pod is available in six colours made up of a base colour and accents: black/black, titanium/black, navy/black, yellow/black, red/black, olive/black. The Pod in these photos is the titanium/black model.
Figure 3: It's possible to loop a belt through The Pod for easier carrying, but please, for the love of the geek gene pool everywhere, don't do this if you're single. If you're married, it's okay to look like a dork. ;-)
So Much Gear, So Many Pouches
After being a Pocket PC geek for over three years now, I've collected a fair amount of gear. I've sold and given away a lot of it over the years (trying to spread the Pocket PC gospel so to speak), but I still have a fair amount left over. And, believe it or not, it was a struggle to find enough stuff to fill all the nooks and crannies in The Pod! There are over 20 pockets and compartments in The Pod.
Figure 4: Everything I managed to fit into The Pod – amazing!
So how much can The Pod fit? Well, here's what I managed to cram into mine:
- iPAQ 1910 in Proporta aluminum case
- Pharos CompactFlash 56K modem
- Pharos CompactFlash Ethernet card
- Pocket PC Thoughts Sapphire Elite Microlight
- CompactFlash memory cards: 1.0 GB, 256 MB
- MultimediaCard and Secure Digital: 32 MB SD, 64 MB SD, 256 MB SD, 28 MB MMC
- PCMCIA CompactFlash adaptor
- Pretec CompactTRIO (SD/MMC/MS to CF adaptor)
- Prect CompactSSFDC (SmartMedia to CF adaptor, in case I run into a retro camera that takes SmartMedia)
- Socket 802.11b CompactFlash card
- Socket Bluetooth CompactFlash card
- Gomadic Sync n' Charge cable
- Pocket PC Thoughts business card, $20 cash
- Canon G2 digital camera
It's All About The Pouches…
There's nothing more important on a bag than how many pouches it has, and where you can put things, so let's get right down to it. A breakdown of all the zones on The Pod, from left to right.
Figure 5: The memory card pouch
This is the memory card pouch. Tight elastic bands allow you to fit one or more memory cards per slot. I could fit one CompactFlash card, vertically, per slot. Two SD/MMC cards fit easily. I can't help but think that these slots were designed for Smartmedia cards, which is a shame – the space could be better used in other ways to fit the more common forms of CompactFlash and Secure Digital cards. There's also a pouch on the inside of the flap with a Velcro fastener.
Figure 6: Lots of space for a Pocket PC – everything from an iPAQ 1910 in a Proporta aluminum case up to a naked Dell Axim fit without trouble.
Figure 7: A close up zoom on the front pouch – lots of dead space for my needs here.
Now we come to my least favourite part of The Pod: the battery and film zone. If this was designed in 1997, I could understand the need for a design like this, but it's 2003. Realistically, if this bag is being marketed towards the uber-geeks like myself, we're using digital cameras, not 35mm cameras. And the vast majority of digital cameras on the market today (and PDAs, MP3 players, etc.) do not use standard batteries or take little rolls of plastic film. So what's with the loop battery and film holders? I spent a few minutes staring at them, thinking if there was a creative way for me to put something in them, but came up dry. I'd much rather see more memory card slots, or some larger elastic bands for spare digital camera batteries (never leave home without them!). There's a mesh pouch with a Velcro top attached to the inside of the flap here as well.
Figure 8: The "orange elastic zone"
This zone would be handy for cables, with twin orange bands on a horizontal plane. As the photo shows, I ended up putting my 56K and Ethernet CompactFlash cards here – they fit nicely. There's yet another pouch on the inside of the wing, with a Velcro flap to boot. I stored my Gomadic Sync 'n Charge cable here.
Figure 9: The business card holder and "secret pouch zone"
On the underside of the lid, they've given you a place for your business card (in case The Pod gets lost) and there's a clever hidden pouch behind it for money, credit cards and identification. This pouch is designed in such a way that, unless you know it's there, you can't readily see it. However, if you put any sort of plastic card in there, the normally flexible top becomes stiff, but only around the edges of the card. It wouldn't take a very clever thief to find this. It would be nice to see RoadWired put a polyethylene sheet in the top to add a little protection for this zone (nobody wants a bent or broken credit card).
Gotchas
All in all, I really liked The Pod. There are a few things that could use improving however:
- No room for an external flash for my digital camera. Not an issue for the average consumer, but I found myself wishing the centre compartment was about twice as wide so I could fit my Canon Speedlite 420EX flash into the case. If you don't regularly use an external flash for your digital camera, this is a moot point.
- AA batteries? 35mm film? Who uses those things any more? Give me some larger elastic loops that go horizontally rather than vertically, and I could put my extra camera battery there. The battery loops are a waste of space for me, and likely most users (unless you happen to have a digital camera that uses AA batteries, which is rare, but possible).
- In my particular case, there wasn't enough space to carry both my Canon G2 camera and the AC charger that I needed for recharging the battery. The Pod was about half an inch too short to accommodate it. Depending on the size of your camera's battery charger, this may be a frustrating limitation. Another good reason to have a spare camera battery!
- This is a very minor thing, but since these bags are designed to be as esthetically pleasing as they are practical, it irritates me that the card holder doesn't display the whole card. Unless you have a business card with huge margins, a good portion of the card will be hidden. The plastic window should show 100% of the business card.
The Pod can be purchased from RoadWired for $49.95. [Affiliate] This is a little more expensive than your average camera bag, but the quality is unmatched by what you'd find at your local camera store.
Conclusions
The Pod is an excellent carrier for your gear, and if you're going away for a short trip, it balances the need to carry important gear with the equally pressing need to be small and easy to carry with you. The bag is almost perfect, but they need to ditch the 35mm legacy design and move forward with a new design based around modern equipment needs.
