Steampugs
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- Nov 14, 2016
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Hotcig R150s
"You can't polish a turd"
You know....technically you can, it involves baking it in the oven until it's hard, then sanding it with very fine sandpaper followed by wax and a bloody good buffing...or....rolling it around in your hand for a very...very long time. But, for the sake of argument...and because....if you actually follow either of the above processes you should probably be locked away somewhere quiet.....and padded....we'll say you can't.....sometimes.....even I wonder where the fuck I'm going with this.....I'd say bear with me, but I'm not totally convinced you should...
Wise words....erm....Samwise...
Anyways...
What turd am I actually talking about?....Well...to be honest, it's not really a turd at all, just something that we've seen soo many times before over the last 6 or 7 years that well...by default...it becomes a bit of a turd. Something forgettable, a regurtiation on the senses if you will - it's been seen in every colour, with every chip, with squonk, without squonk, with every possible combination of repetitive sameness that well....when I think of any other word to describe it... my mind interrupts me and tells me what it thinks it actually is..
Hey....I can't be the only person whose mind sounds like Britney Spears......can I?
Moving on...
The turd in question is in fact the aluminium box mod, I wouldn't even have to describe it to you, I could randomly pick one from the thousands that’ve been put on the market over the years, and ask you to draw it without seeing it, and chances are you'd be incredibly accurate, this thing...to put it mildly....has been done to death....and then dug up....and done again in some twisted necrophiliac ritual....
So...
Can you indeed polish a turd?....What can possibly be done to an aluminium box mod that we haven't seen already...many, many times? Well....enter Shenzhen Hot Technologies, AKA Hotcig, because when they were asked whether or not they could polish a turd...they simply replied..
"No....but you can roll it in glitter"
.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................
Welcome once again my steamy little bum sausages, back again with the same old shit, and yes....I mean that in every sense of the word. When I was told I was going to review another Aluminium box mod I wasn't exactly bowled over with enthusiasm...and the part of my questionable sanity that comes up with all this codswallop, upon learning of my acceptance of said device....was also nonplussed with this arrangement ...
That's right....my mental tantrums also sound like Tom Hiddleston......just me again?.......Right oh...
Now....this was my attitude right up until the moment that I actually found out which dual battery 'aluminium re-run' I was being asked to review, but then.....once I actually opened the rather exquisite if not slightly flimsy balsa wood box, my mind went from 'meh'....to..
Because the flirty party of my psyche simply oozes with flamboyant silky smoothness and unadulterated irresistibility ...and....pffft, who am I kidding? In reality I'm about as smoldering as.......well......erm...
Startlingly accurate....
Still....I hadn't been this happy to see a turd since the last time I spent 3 days on postoperative morphine...if you know....you know.
SO!.....I've probably rambled on for too long as it is - let's take a look at this so-called highly polished, glittery, alloy turd before we all lose the will to live. Courtesy of my long term Eastern lovers Heavengifts, may I present to you...the Hotcig R150s..
To say that I have a soft spot for highly detailed engraved metal...is a shit load of sugar coating.
Now, before I start, I have to tell you that I was put in a very unique position with this mod, through no fault of my own. You see...when the package arrived a couple of months back I was actually sent down a path of utter bewilderment, sure....I loved it when I opened it with all that deep swirly loveliness, but...I had that 'feeling'....
And to be honest....despite the overly flamboyant appearance, it all seemed....a bit...familiar?...Not just because it was another aluminium box mod...but because I knew I'd seen this before.....ages ago....
So....I got on the old interwebz and before I knew it I was seeing posts of Mark Fagan reviewing the very same mod whilst naked in the shower.....now there's a sentence I never saw myself writing. And him being naked in the shower, you might think, was the strangest thing about that post...but you'd be wrong. The strangest thing about that post was in fact....that it was three years old.
What.the.actual.fuck.
Why am I being sent a device that's been on the market longer than I've been an internationally known award winning reviewer (oh...you had to do it didn't you).....What?...It's like...my full name now....anyway, I went back to Heavengifts to ask politely WHATTHEFUCKISGOINGON....to which I was calmly told "Yes...it's the new version, with the colour screen"
To which I replied....
"It hasn't got a colour screen...and it's exactly the same as the old version...I know this, because I've just watched Mark Fagan naked in the shower"
It was a while before I got a reply, but when I did, it soon became apparent that I had in fact been sent the old version - the R150, released in 2016 - and then had to wait another couple of weeks for the new super duper upgraded version to arrive....
What you have there is 3 years of aluminium box mod evolution......'turd'.
So...you can see how easy a mistake this was to make. Same size, same form, same buttons... I mean even the flimsy balsa packaging was identical...so....what indeed....is the difference....?....Well....this..
The all important 'S' .......yes sir....this is the R150s.....and what does the ‘S’ stand for?....Actually, I don't know....sausages probably.
The Lowdown (finally)
The R150s is a dual 18650 powered 150w aluminium box mod, all kept in check by Hotcig's HM waterproof chip set. Just like the R150 of three years ago....it has the same engraved design, the same power, the same full TC suite and is exactly the same in almost every single way....except one...
This one has a colour screen.
Now.....I'm gonna lay my cards on the table. Apart from the screen.....I don't know of any other difference between the R150 and the R150s. I have searched - I haven't been lazy - but details about the new version are sketchy to say the least - I mean, on their own website they're still touting the R150 and the 'S' version is nowhere to be found?.... Maybe it's because the screen IS the only difference and they're slightly embarrassed that it's taken them 3 years to implement such a low resolution upgrade...who the fuck knows? But then again....when a turd looks as pretty as this, you could turn your attention to another well known saying...
"If it ain't broke.....don't fix it"
Sure...it's a true statement, not with me you understand, I'm more of a "if it ain't broke, fuck with it relentlessly until it dies a horrible death" kinda guy.....but for the sake of this review, I'm going with the more popular version, and this is the attitude I took when comparing the two...
Like a fight between two robotic Liberace's....
Now, like I said, the mod itself is largely unchanged. It's still made from a solid chassis of aluminium, and it still has two magnetic panels either side, one for the batteries...
and one to push the batteries out (no ribbon)
Obviously this is being touted as 'changeable magnetic side panels'.......and as far as I can see the extra panels available for purchase don't match the rest of the mod in the slightest, so why would you?...It would look fucking ridiculous. As it is...I think it's rather beautiful.....don't change the fucking panels.
And these are removable via a groove at the bottom for those of you with child's fingernails..
Down the front we have all the components in exactly the same place as that drawing you did, I mean where else would they be? You have up and down, the fire button, and the micro USB, the only thing that irks me about this, is that the buttons are once again made of plastic. I would have much preferred these to be matching alloy, but that's personal preference. I guess the 'S' budget didn't stretch that far....what with all the upgrades they did.....(sarky)
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