poorman Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 SPIRE USA META ME6 BACKPACK REVIEW LIST OF IMAGES INTRODUCTION Purpose The purpose of this review is to give readers an introduction to the Spire Meta. Preview The review will cover company background, ordering, shipment, and the backpack. COMPANY BACKGROUND Information I heard about the backpack on dl.tv. They were reviewing the volt xl. The meta is bigger. It's big brother. Spire is located in Massachusetts. Their web site is spireusa.com. Finding reviews of the Meta online is difficult. In fact there are none. ORDERING AND SHIPMENT Ordering was very simple. I received a confirmation e-mail with all the tracking information. It took about a week to arrive, to California. If you want to you can order an additional laptop sleeve. THE BACKPACK Out of The Box The backpack comes in an unassuming small box. There was no damage, although UPS did kick around the box. The first thing I noticed was the logo, and then how nice it looked. Three Compartments The bag has three main compartments. The the rear compartment, middle, and front. On top of the front compartment are two additional pockets. Each compartment can hold about two average size textbooks. The only compartment that is padded on the bottom is the middle one. The rear and front compartments have no bottom padding. However, there is padding between your back and the rear compartment, and the rear and the middle compartments. Other than that it's all nylon. There are four compression straps which cinch the bag together. This makes the bag very compact. Pockets This bag has 11 separate pockets all which are different in size. Two are located outside the front compartment and one is a large enough to hold a full-size textbook. The other can hold a flashlight and has it's own mini-pocket. The front compartment has six pockets and two pen holders. The middle compartment has one pocket. The last pocket is located between the rear compartment and your back. Harness System The bag has a standard mountaineering harness system. There are two shoulder straps, a waist strap, a torso strap, a briefcase strap, and two handles. You can use the bag as a briefcase with the shoulder briefcase strap and the side handle. The other handle is on top. The shoulder straps and the waist straps are heavily padded. There is also specific padding for your spine and then additional padding between the spine padding and the rear compartment. There is also a rigid piece of plastic with aluminum reinforcement between your back and the rear compartment. Here is a figure. Figure 1. Depicting the Organization. air -- you -- your back -- spine padding -- nylon -- extra padding -- rigid plate -- nylon -- rear compartment -- nylon -- more padding -- nylon -- compartment middle -- nylon -- compartment font -- nylon -- front pockets -- air The waist straps, shoulder straps, torso strap, compression straps, and the briefcase strap are all adjustable. If you want to you can hide the shoulder straps in the pocket right behind your back and make the bag look like a briefcase. Zippers and Construction The zippers are nice. The bag probably is not waterproof. There seems to be no ventilation. There are few fabric loose ends where extra thread is hanging. Compared to Kevlar, ballistic nylon it is the next best thing. The Meta is made out of this type of nylon. My Thouhts These bags are supposed to last for a long time. It's not really a mountaineering bag because it has no place for water bottles, carabiners, or ropes, compared to more expensive bags from North Face. It's not really big enough for a european backpacking vacation. That being said I know of some army people who used it in the Kuaiti desert on hardforum and also a guy who used it skiing and it saved his life. I plan on using this around campus. The bag is designed to be a laptop bag. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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