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Review on Cotopaxi COSO 2L Hip Pack: Lightweight, Water-Resistant Storage For On-The-Go Adventurers! by Kyle Kriglstein

Revainrating 2 out of 5

extremely overdesigned, huge, heavy, baffling in its needless complexity

I had a hard time understanding from the pictures what this pack was, but it was the smallest volume sold by this company, so I bought it. It's extremely overdesigned, huge, heavy, and baffling in its needless complexity. Lots of zippers, four (!) different compartments.I ended up cutting off more than half of its substance to reduce it from four compartments to two, shorten the straps to hip length, add end-stops to keep the buckles from slipping off the shortened straps, take off the bewildering S-hooks and daisy-chains, and remove the pointless doo-hickeys attached to all the zippers.The idea of having one of the zippers always be against your body seems like a really bad design. The blue material seems like the kind of thing a raincoat would be made out of -- very thick and heavy, probably waterproof. It doesn't seem like it's going to be comfortable against my skin in hot weather. I bought this as a running pack. I'll see if it works for that purpose or is too uncomfortable. If you like somewhere rainy and cold like Seattle or London, then maybe the rain-slicker fabric would be desirable for keeping your stuff dry.Some of the needless complexity seems to be because they want you to be able to use it either as a fanny pack or a chest pack/man-purse. They should just pick one.The straps are very wide, which for my purpose is unnecessary -- it just adds to the bulk of the thing. I suppose that, given its large volume, some users might be intending to put big, heavy stuff inside it, like an unabridged dictionary, a Yorkshire terrier, and a supply of canned food in case of nuclear attack. If so, then maybe the wide straps would be helpful in dealing with the weight.

Pros
  • ‎HIP-S22-BLOK
Cons
  • The price point may be too high for some consumers, especially considering the small size and limited features