Reviews of Crumpler THE SINKING BARGE Laptop Camera Backpack (Dark

Customer Ratings:

I bought this bag since I was traveling with a camera and laptop for a few months and wanted a non-dork looking bag. The bag looks good, but I found it lacking in everything else.

Here's the gear I was looking to carry:

-Apple MacBook Pro 15"

-Nikon D40

-Nikkor 18-55mm

-Nikkor 55-200mm

There are 3 zippered compartments: Let's say the one closest to your back when you're wearing it is Main, the middle one that holds your camera gear is the Middle, and farthest pocket is Mini.

The Main compartment has an area for your laptop and an area for some magazines/docs, both covered by a velcro flap. The rest of the room can be used for random crap, but the more you put in, the harder it is to open the velcro flap to get your laptop out.

The Middle compartment has a removable bucket to hold your camera gear. It also has a couple of netted pockets for random cables and cards. All of my gear fit in this area, but when the camera is in there...

The Mini pocket becomes completely stretched and unusable. You can't even put a pen in there. Anything stiff in there would bend as it's being pushed out by the Middle pocket.

All of the outside zippers are thick and feel secure, and are have fabric folded over them so they're hidden. This is great in crowds: I was traveling around crowded parts of Asia and never felt afraid that I wouldn't feel someone unzipping one of the pockets to steal something. But it sucks for daily use. There is just no way to open the bag fast, you have to take it off and fiddle with the zippers. I know it's a tradeoff, but make sure you understand that tradeoff before getting it.

For daily use with a laptop and no camera, the bag never felt bulky, but it did feel like overkill. For daily use with a camera and no laptop, it felt too big to be carrying around for a day trip.

The only times I liked using the bag were when I was packing to get on planes since it held all of my electronics. But once I landed, I had little use for the bag.

One last annoying thing to keep in mind if you're traveling a lot: There's no convenient place to hold travel docs and a cellphone that you need to access frequently, say at the airport and through security. It would have been nice to have an extra zippered pocket on the side to easily slide things into.

I ended up selling the bag after a few months. Let me know if you'd like to write anything else about the bag in the comments.

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I recently purchased this as a gift with the D300 and battery grip. Carrying all that camera weight was always an issue for taking out the camera for long trips. We tried it out at the Botanical Gardens and I ended up carrying it. It had the D300 with battery grip, 1 medium lens, 2 large lenses and the SB800. WOW what a relief on my shoulders! I used to carry the Tamarac Velocity 9 and I would always cramp up! This was a relief! After four hours of carry time....no pain at all. It's also easy to manage, its a good bag...also has plenty of pouches to store lens filters, card readers, cards, and cords.

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This is my second Crumpler bag and the quality is everything I expected. My only complaint is the space. From reading other reviews, I thought I would have enough room in this bag for my Canon 40D w/24-105 mounted plus another lens and flash. It barely fits. Don't expect to get anything more into the photo compartment.

Honest reviews on Crumpler THE SINKING BARGE Laptop Camera Backpack (Dark

I got this not too long ago and am amazed at how much I've been able to cram into it. I can easily stow my 15 inch MacBook Pro and 8 inch Eee PC into the Laptop portion with enough space left over for maps or other small books. The camera compartment easily fits my small DSLR and 2 lenses and has a little pocket for memory cards and other accessories. Everything fit snugly, but I wasn't lacking for space. If that isn't enough, there's a smaller compartment on the outside that could store whatever other odds and ends you've got on you.

The Sinking Barge also has very comfortable shoulder straps and padding on the inner portion. Although the bag is a bit heavy on its own, the weight is distributed nicely so you can carry it fully stocked for a few hours without feeling too worn out. I'd read in a review on another website that it is quite big for a backpack, but I didn't find this to be the case. I'm fairly short, but the Barge fits me better than most bags and doesn't hang in such a way as to strain my back. The bag is made out of a pretty durable nylon that should withstand a fair amount of wear and tear.

Although the Barge is a bit pricey for a backpack (although I got mine for ~$30 less than the current price on Amazon), it is definitely worth it for the durability, utility and comfort that it affords.