thanks to Wacky Gochoco  for review

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Review #2
(added 2nd October 2007)

Here's my new photo bag. It also doubles as a laptop bag. Finally, I now have a bag that will hold everything I want for travel including a tripod. My other bags didn't deal with tripods very nicely. They usually interfered with access and forced me to spend a lot of time removing the tripod from the bag in order to simply change a lens.

This bag has many many pockets and attachment points for expandability. Everything can easily be accessed. The construction and material are high class. Additionally, it has a nice rustic look that combines old-world charm and look with modern design.

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This is a view of the main camera compartment. It fits a D200 body with 70-300/4.5-5.6 VR lens attached, an 18-70/3.5-4.5 DX lens off to the left side, a 50mm f1/8D is in the upper right and a 50mm macro converter in the lower right. Everything fits with plenty of room to spare (even for additional lenses) and I'm also able to store any combination of lens attached to the body with room allowing for the unmounted lenses to still fit.

I won't bother with views of the other compartments. Suffice it to say that there are plenty of pockets in this thing. And there's a top compartment that's padded (only on back and bottom though) and can be expanded which can be used to store small items of clothing, food/snacks and other sundries.

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The bag has plenty of attachment points and allows for the tripod to be easily attached to either side. Two straps are provided. I used one for the bottom and the other for the middle. The straps have metal cinch buckles that work remarkably well despite their antiquated look/design. I also have a black 1" wide nylon web with a parachute buckle. The tripod is pretty secure attached like this. It does take a little more time to attach and remove than with my other bags but then again, it's also more firmly held yet still doesn't get in the way of getting at the rest of the bags flaps and pockets. The only thing it does block is one of the two (one on each side) bottle holders. These bottle holders retract and stow away inside a pocket on the side of the bag. I originally tried using the right side bottle holder to hold the tripod legs but it didn't seem to hold things as securely.

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The bag has a laptop pocket behind the main compartments. The bag claims to be able to hold a 17" laptop (17" 4:3 format screen) and this is a little misleading. Many people complain that they purchased the bag but were unable to carry their full sized laptops or even a midsized widescreen laptop. I personally don't find this to be a problem because [1] I dislike widescreen (WXGA) and [2] I wouldn't want to carry anything but a subnotebook anyways.

The laptop inserted here is my work laptop, a Dell D610 which is still too big IMHO. It's about the biggest laptop that will fit and probably not something I would carry around normally unless I'm on-call.

You can also see here a glimpse of the flap/pocket where the bottle-holder is stowed. The bottle holder can also be used to hold other big round cylindrical things like telephoto zoom lenses. My 70-300 VR lens will fit in there quite nicely. It is however unpadded so it's not something you'd want to normally carry the lens in at all times unless the lens is in a padded bag. However, it's good for easy access to a quick lens change during a shoot.

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The D610 barely fits but it does fit. 

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It's not a huge laptop but it's not petite either. However, it's the laptop supplied by my employer. My personal laptop is much slimmer, lighter and smaller. I only used the D610 in these photos to show the maximum size of laptop that will fit in the bag.

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As you can see the zipper does close. I only left it slightly unzipped so you can see the corner of the laptop inside.

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And here's the zipper almost completely closed. You can tell that it will. And you can barely see the corner of the laptop inside.

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The bag to the right is the National Geographic Earth Explorer Medium Backpack. It's my carry-all bag. I can strap the tripod to the side and there's a back pocket for my laptop as well as an upper expandable compartment for a small lunch, compact binoculars, jacket, medium-sized stuff and other travelling/hiking accessories. I also keep a couple of lenses such as my Nikon 200/4 with 2x TC attached up there.

In the main camera compartment, I'll usually have the long lens to the left, the 50mm in the upper right and a medium zoom in the lower right. I have also configured the bag to allow me to hold the camera body with any of my lenses (including the longer lenses) attached while still being able to store the rest of my lenses in the other spots.

The bag to the left is my lightweight setup which I use when the backpack would be too obtrusive. The bag is a National Geographic Earth Explorer Midi Shoulder Bag. It can hold almost all of my lenses (70-300, 18-70, 10-20, 50) including my 70-300 zoom. It cannot however hold the camera with that zoom attached. There's enough room to hold essential accessories (extra battery, cleaning kit, two-way radio, etc...) too. There's also a small slide-compartment on the back for a small notepad and other flat items. I usually hang my jacket from one of the strap take-up loops.

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This is the new version of the National Geographic Earth Explorer Model 5162 Medium Photo/Computer Backpack. I got the new version to replace my older version because my new laptop would not fit through the side opening of the laptop pocket of my old backpack. As you can see, it's almost identical in appearance from the outside to the older version. The main difference is on the inside. )

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The biggest difference is that you can now load a laptop through the top compartment. This gets around the size limitations of the side zipper. It was a tight squeeze to fit a 14.1" normal aspect ratio laptop through the side compartment. I was also able to fit a 14.1" widescreen through the side but it required a fair bit of wrangling and acrobatics to do so. Anything bigger would not fit.

In the camera compartment is my standard "travel kit" of lenses and body.

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Here's a 15.4" widescreen laptop (Lenovo T61p with extended battery) going through the top. This is pretty much the largest laptop that will fit. Note that the side-zipper still exists and smaller 14.1" laptops will still be able to fit through the side opening. So there are two ways to access the laptop compartment for smaller laptops. I also use the laptop compartment for folders and papers when I'm not carrying a laptop.

 

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This is a view looking down into the upper compartment. Here you can see the T61p fully inserted. There's a padded flap that goes over and velcros to the side of the internal sleeve. The lens to the left is my Nikon 200/4.

Also in here from left to right is a stick of deodorant, folded-up rain-cover for the bag, tin of Dust-Aid for emergency sensor cleanings in the field, compact binoculars and power supply for the laptop. There's still plenty of room for other stuff. I usually throw in some energy bars, a two-way FRS/GMRS radio, sometimes a book and occasionally a folded up light jacket.

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The upper pouch attached to the side is a Tamrac filter pouch. The smaller pouch is usually where I keep my spare batteries and CF cards. It's a cell phone holder from a Targus laptop computer bag.

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This is my standard travel kit. It consists of my Nikon D200 body, Nikon 70-300/4.5-5.6VR, Nikon 18-70/3.5-4.5G, Sigma 10-20/4-5.6, Nikon 50/1.8D and Nikon 200/4 AI-s with a Vivitar 2X Macro-Focusing Teleconverter attached.

You can also see my Manfrotto 190XPROB with 486RC2 (covered by a Zing neoprene lens bag) attached to the side via three web straps (with quick-release buckles) I purchased at a local sporting goods store. I find these straps more convenient to use than the straps supplied with the bag.

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Another view of my camera equipment inside the camera compartment. All my lenses except for the 200/4 are in this compartment. The 200/4 is kept in a lens bag in the upper compartment.

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Here it is all buttoned up and ready to go. There are plenty of external pockets where I can store my charger, lens cleaning supplies such as a brush and rocket blower, USB cable and card reader, first aid kit, grey card, wireless remote shutter release, mini Maglite, Gerber folding knife/multi-tool/pliers, spare body caps and lens caps, filter wrench, bungee cord to hang the bag from the tripod for added stability/counterweight, and other various small knick-knacks. Also not shown are two bottle holder pockets (one on either side of the bag) that stow away inside their own pocket when not in use. They can also be used to carry bigger lenses that won't fit inside the bag nicely. However, the one on the side with the tripod cannot be used when the tripod is attached.

Thanks to Jake Khuon (khuon) for review 

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