[brain]

first we had ruyan.. they have a patent on a fancy ultrasonic atomizer but somehow it never made it into the marketed product.. this was roughly three years ago..

the first products were not cigarette shaped.. more along the lines of a luxury cigars and pipes.. they didnt come cheap.. in fact they were expensive with expensive consumables..

they came with a five year guarantee.. the guarantee was financed by the high profits on the consumables.. this high cost of the consumables in itself limited the amount of use the device would get..

the market they were aimed at was the better off smoker.. they were never intended to replace tobacco products simply supplement them.. things to be used in the restaurant and places where real smoking wasnt considered socially acceptable.. in essence occasional use.. they served the purpose they were in intended to at a high price.. the perfect present for a rich wife to buy for her gadget loving hubby..

so what went wrong.. well.. people copied the original device.. people bought the copies for reasons ruyan never intended them to be bought for.. a full time replacement for real cigarettes..

some sellers followed the original ruyan high price long guarantee concept.. but there is a move away from this as people do not wish to be locked into the high priced consumables now that cheaper alternatives exist..

so we have a product designed for occasional use being used all day and every day as a full time tobbaco replacement..

a product being used for a purpose it was never intended to be used for.. a product with a very short life span if given heavy use.. a product with major built in problems..

batteries that dont last very long before they need replacing.. atomizer that follow the same pattern..

this would not be so bad if people bought these things knowing the problems.. to be honest i dont even think most of the sellers know the problems..

so we have what seems a wonderfull device that in reality fails a lot of its users.. and its sellers.. they have to take the come back for regular parts failures..

so along comes the "screwdriver".. it only exists because none of the more common products serve the purposes people want of them.. something that simply works and with reasonably cheap long term running costs..

the screwdriver is built to satisfy the needs of the heavy user.. it uses (cheap) off the shelf atomizers.. liquids and carts.. in short a long haul smoking system thats as good as current technology can provide at an affordable cost..

[the iron horse]

So?

What's the verdict on e-cigs?

I have not tried one yet.

[rhcookie]

Originally Posted by the iron horse So? What's the verdict on e-cigs? I have not tried one yet.

I smoke Capri Magenta 120s ...very slim and small. I had the opportunity to try an electronic cigarette in a local mall. It was size of regular cigarette and heavy....
I couldnt do electronic cig just because of size and weight. The smoke was satisfying but I was total opposed to the size and weight.

[MoonlightSonata]

I tried a "Krave 500" disposable Menthol ecig a month or so ago. It wasn't too bad, the taste was okay, but it felt so light, I wanted more of a "hit" from it. It didn't last that long either, unfortunately. It said 500 puffs but that depends what a "puff" is. It was pretty cool, and I could see it supplementing things but it still felt different. It should also be noted however that while ecigs supply nicotine, and/or give you the psych aspect, tobacco has other alkaloids in it that pure nicotine doesent. Things like MAOIs and others that I don't remember. I bought it for about 15$ which was probably the only big downside. That's about half the cost of a reusable, but I just wanted to try it. I think a different one such as the ones seen on this site would be better, but I kinda hate the idea of something else that needs to be refilled constantly and you have to pay/order atomizers, cartomizers, or cartridges (think printer cartridges or whatnot). I guess if you didn't use it too much it wouldn't be too bad, and I guess sometimes it probably isn't much different than paying for more cigs but eh, then you gotta wait (order) as opposed to picking them up somewhere, its just a little off-putting. And stores seem to be more expensive than the internet. Anyway, I think they're good, you can get hits in where you otherwise couldn't get away with smoking, basically what people usually say, they're probably right. I think it made me cough a few times too, but I could be wrong. As the poster above said, it's slightly bigger than your average 100 cig, but the bothersome part is its heavier, I couldn't even hold it in my mouth without using my teeth or hand for support. It felt kinda like a heavy thick pen. Still, I'm open to them and if I ever get the money to try a higher quality one I probably will. This is only my experience, YMMV, etc.