G1 1200 Hydration Pack

This is my fourth Geigerrig, three 1200's and one 700. The 700 is the girlfriends and she loves it. I have one 1200 (Camo) set up for summer excursions, another for winter (Black) and one spare 1200 as I could not resist buying the third due to it being only $10 more than the geigerrig hydration engine alone! I'm 6'5", 225lbs and the packs themselves are comfortable to wear with a great fit for running or moving with a purpose through rough terrain.They have enough room for a lot of gear and the external elastic stay is great for holding a jacket or rain gear. I have owned many different hydration systems and they are all currently in "extra gear storage" and will likely never be used unless given away or placed in garage sale.Review of the pack itself: (THE GOOD)ComfortableWell constructedPlenty of room for gear(Suggested Improvements)Pack is not water resistant so be prepared to treat material with appropriate water repellant. An integrated waterproof pack cover would be a great addition to a future version.Review of the hydration engine itself: (THE GOOD)It's AWESOME!Able to spray myself to cool down, spray off bleeding cuts and abrasions, and most importantly but definitely not last is the ability to spray my dog and to easily give her drinking water as we trek.(Suggested Improvements)They sell the Geigerrrig Insulated Tube as a separate item but it should be standard on all packs for the obvious reason of keeping water in the tube cool during summer and warm during winter, although the insulated tube is likely better for keeping cool during summer than to prevent winter freezing. It should also be standard as the clear tubing stands out like a sore thumb on the pack. I have purchased the Geigerrig Insulated Tube but would not recommend doing so as it is expensive and doesn't appear that it would insulate that well. I have added black neoprene tube insulation to both the water line and air pump line and the pack looks great blacked out! One neoprene tube insulator $9 shipped was enough to do both the water and air pump lines on one pack.I ordered my first two 1200's roughly a year apart and the older one has larger diameter tubing than the newer one. Unfortunately found this out when splicing in a Sawyer Fast Fill Adapter (Quick Disconnects for 1/4"ID (inner diameter) tubing) on the older one so I could use the Sawyer Mini Filter to fill the hydration reservoir through the water tube without opening the reservoir compartment. The Sawyer Fast Fill Adapter (Quick Disconnects) will work on the smaller diameter tubing (1/4" ID) that apparently is the current industry standard for hydration pack tubing. You however cannot find the larger diameter adapters (Quick Disconnects for 3/8" ID) anywhere on Amazon even Hydrapak , the tubing supplier/manufacturer only had 90 degree quick disconnects for 3/8" ID tubing (which they sent free of charge) but did me no good as I required straight disconnects so I had to order 3/8" APC Series Acetal Quick Disconnects through US Plastic Corp or USP.Overall this is an excellent pack with the absolute best hydration system/engine. You will not be disappointed with this product so if you're on the fence get off and get this rig!

Works well but somewhat confusing. Read the directions on use and how to care!!!! Had a problem with pressure on day three of Lolla, but pretty sure it was user error.Another Note, you can tell its built very well and should hold up through a lot

I bought this pack for a music festival, and to later use for hiking and camping. First time I filled the hydration pack the zipper that holds the bladder in broke. The slide that holds the bladder shut also came off several times spilling water, which might have just been from the zipper being broken and not properly holding the bladder in tight. It also was harder to close and took more time to fill than my friends that had the more common screw cap style bladders. There's a reason this is the only bag with the slide to close it, because it doesn't work that well. A lot of my time was spent looking for the hydration engine pump on the ground, since it constantly fell off, eventually making the hydration engine useless after losing it.Overall, a disappointment besides the backpack being as large a normal backpack and having excellent storage. I was excited that I was getting such a good deal on such a highly rated pack, but now I'm happy I bought it on sale so I don't feel as ripped off by the awful quality of this bag. Maybe, I just got a lemon.

I loved the pack but after only 2 weeks it started leaking from the drink spout. I found also that the pressure from pumping it up was not giving that much water flow so I was not drinking as much water, which is a bad thing. Switched to a camelback HAWG.

I actually prefer water bottles to hydration packs most of the time. In particular, when cycling, carrying anything on your back is just asking for trouble, and it's makes my back hot and uncomfortable. Hiking is another story. Here, you need a backpack to carry ancillaries anyway, you're upright so the back doesn't get uncomfortable, but it's still hot. Furthermore, hydration packs are hard to clean, difficult to share between people, and end up gunky. I usually end up buying new hydration packs every so often because of this, or just buying hydration pack compatible backpacks and then buying new bladders every so often, which is cheaper but still not ideal. Bottles last me almost a decade, by comparison.Well, there was a Geigerrig Blowout on Amazon.com, so I snagged a Geigerrig 1200 for $50, about $80 off the usual Amazon price. The reviews were nice, and I was intrigued by the idea that there's a squeeze bulb that could pressurize the bladder, letting me eject a stream of water rather than having to suck on a bite valve. In fact, the motto for Geigerrig was "never suck again."My first use of the pack was disappointing. It was hard to fill, and I still had to suck on the bite valve, despite pressuring the bladder. On subsequent use, I realized a few things. First, there were quick release buckles on the bladder's pressurization port as well as output ports. That means you could quickly detach the bladder and fill it up from the tap. Not only that, the bladder opens up completely so you could dump ice into it, for instance.Next, the hydration bladder's pressurization bulb can come off the pressurization port. What this means is that before you pressurize, you must check the bulb's output valved. Otherwise, you risk pumping air from the bulb back into the atmosphere instead of pressuring the bladder. In addition, you have to ensure the valve screw is fully engaged. After doing all this, as promised, a push on the bite valve and you can get a nice stream of water, provided you keep pumping the bulb. Fail to do that, and you're back down to a trickle again, and you might as well just bite down and suck. In fact, biting down and sucking takes a lot less effort than pumping the bladder, so I'm not sure I'd use this feature much. In addition, pressurizing the bladder bloats the backpack a bit, which I feel, and is mildly uncomfortable. This is especially a problem when you've used half the water in the pack, for instance. In a word, this is more marketing than practical, so I suppose if you get into a water pistol fight while hiking, this would be just the bees knees for high capacity.The rest of the pack is well designed, with lots of pockets, etc. And for the price, it's a nice big pack that can carry a lot of stuff. The bladder is also huge at 100oz of water, well over what I can get away for nowadays.Do I recommend this pack? For the price I paid, yes. For full price? No way. And discount the value of pressurization. In practice, it's a pain to use. The ability to quickly detach and fill the bladder, however, is quite high, so that's worth paying a slight premium for, as is the ability ot use a dishwasher on the bladder.Very conditionally recommended.