Sorry about not posting for a week – it was a grueling period being almost entirely on the road – CLE in Minneapolis and Dallas. But, back to business and back to posting and in this case, on one of my favorite topics – “The Quest for the Perfect Laptop Bag.”
I have yet to find the perfect laptop bag. But it’s certainly not because I haven’t tried. My basement at Kodner Central is like a veritable museum of laptop traveling technology. It’s a bit embarrassing to admit, because it smacks of serious obsessiveness, but I must have 40ish laptop bags of varying sizes and shapes. But none has really been “just right.” There have been pricey bags from companies like Briggs & Riley, multiple Victorinox bags, Tumi, and of course the traditional laptop tote players like Targus, Kensington and others. There have been rollers, backpacks, shoulder-carried bags. There’s been black leather, black nylon, red nylon. Some have been cavernous monster bags that could swallow a five year old child. The others have been experiments in down-sizing and totable weight. None have felt “right” however.

Until a couple of weeks ago. I was in Portland speaking at the International Municipal Lawyers conference when I drove past a great luggage store that I had visited the year before. While wandering the aisles in the latest chapter of “The Quest” I found a very interesting bag and wheeled cart that caught my attention. The bag was actually very similar to the Victorinox black leather shoulder bag I was carrying – that common black soft briefcase shape. But it was the car that grabbed me – it was a very compact, collapsible and ultra-lightweight cart that slipped through the luggage handle slot in the back of the bag and then clipped onto the top of the bag. A very clever design that seemed like it would only work with that particular brand. The manufacturer was EVM, and the series called MVision. I would have thought I had heard of ALL laptop bag brands ever in existence, but apparently not in this case.

How a company developing such an innovative series of laptop bags and mobile accessories could have escaped me is incomprehensible. I rarely get surprised in this arena, but what a pleasant surprise this has been. What I’ve acquired is the MVision Roller system and the MVision WL500 laptop bag (okay and just in case, I got their TP400 laptop backpack too – because it also connects to the MVision Roller and who knows when it might be needed . . . okay, I admit it, this is the OCD part of this story). The WL500 is an incredibly well-thought out laptop bag. Fabricated from glove-soft black leather, the quality is Victorinox-caliber. Street price was $153 from Provantage.com (MSRP is $319). What makes it unique are several things.

• QuickDraw magnetically sealed front-side compartments for really rapid access to phones, PDAs, keys, etc. – sure it’s a bit of a security risk, but it’s unbelievably handy v. having to reach down, using two hands to unzip a compartment
• The best layout of various little internal pouches, zippered mesh gadget holders, routing for iPod headset cables and AC power cables – best compartmentalization I’ve ever seen
• A QuickZip compartment that provides a larger access panel (zippered) to get to the internal compartments for pens, cards, etc.
• The mounting system to turn into an roller using the MVision Roller
• Lightweight – it weighs in at about 2/3 the bulk of the nearly identically sized Victorinox shoulder bag I have

In the picture to the right is the WL500 bag and the MVision MRoller collapsible cart. Distribution isn’t especially widespread, although they do sell through many airport Brookstone locations including O’Hare. If you buy directly from them, they have a “no hassle” 30 day return/refund policy. More to report as I torture test the EVM MVision WL500 and MRoller in the crucible of my life on the road. But so far, I’m really, really impressed.

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