The Brooks Review

Month: August 2019

  • Benchmade Mini-Griptillian

    I’ve been needing to review this knife for a while. This is especially bad since I love Benchmade knifes and think they are one of the best knife companies out there — eat your hearts out Spyderco fans, Benchmade is superior. I’ll give you a simple reason: most Benchmade knives are ambidextrous, most Spyderco knives are made for right handed people.

    Anyways, the ‘mini-grip’ as it is known is often heralded as one of the better, if not best, everyday carry knife options out there. It’s versatile, inexpensive (relatively), and well made. Let’s see how it stacks up…

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  • Synik vs GR1 vs CPL 24

    Many have been asking me to compare Tom Bihn’s new bag against the GR1 and the CPL 24 I recently reviewed, but those 1:1 comparisons can make it hard to remain in perspective of all the bags out there. So I think a better way to look at this is in the common context of use cases and what is best for those. I’ve broken this down to four categories, and let’s talk about which is best for each before we wrap up with an overall look at things. I’ve also limited this to just the Synik 22/30, CPL 24, and GR1 21/26 as those are the best backpacks on the market currently. ((Prove me wrong, seriously.))

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  • Member’s Journal — 8/26/19

    This week: toggling Bluetooth, vibrating to keystrokes, what is harmful, a potpourri of computing notes, and 10 things about Houston.

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  • Member Journal — 8/19/19

    This week: why I no longer trust The Wirecutter, socks for sock less shoes, my thoughts on paper and pen note taking, Keyboard Maestro 9, iOS 13 thing I love, and Gruber wakes up.

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  • Tom Bihn’s New Synik 22 and 30

    Note: Tom Bihn sent me these bags to gather early feedback, and allow me time to review them fully.

    For almost a decade, Tom Bihn’s Synapse lineup of backpacks have found themselves among the top performers for true backpack nerds. I had my father review it last year and I posted my review a while later, but despite the fact that those are all recent posts — it’s been around.

    The chief request of Tom Bihn over all those years of success with the Synapse has been: to make it a clam shell opening. You see with backpacks there’s three camps of people: those whose prefer top-loading backpacks (roughly what the Synapse is, but more Shadow Guide), those who prefer a full opening clam shell like the GORUCK GR1, and of course there are those with no preference who don’t actually qualify as backpack nerds. The Synapse always sat a bit in the middle, never quite satisfying any one group, but roughly working for every group. In that way it was clever.

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  • Member Journal — 8/12/19

    This week: a reckoning for activity trackers, yep, iOS 13 reactions, iPad OS thoughts, my iPad workflow update, and lax enforcement.

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  • GORUCK GR2 On Sale

    While the GR1 (even in black) has hit $295, the GR2 is at an insanely low price of $355. I have a 34L already but I took this opportunity to pick up a 40L. Can’t beat that price.

    If you have a 26L GR1, get the 40. Otherwise get the 34L, fantastic bag.

  • Members Journal — 8/5/19

    This week: where does my iPad usage stand, what is an expert, social media and moderating it, anxiety driven apps, and a touch of Silicon Valley ‘disruption’.

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  • Whoop and Activity Trackers

    As members are aware, I recently ordered a Whoop 3.0 activity tracker. This marks the first time I am dipping my toes back into activity trackers since I gave up my Apple Watch. So it is worth talking about what my hopes are, before we dive into this device/service and ultimately wrap up with general thoughts on activity trackers all together.

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