Maxpedition Centurion, or How a Police Patrol Bag Could Find a Home at a Lan Party

Police Officers can carry a lot of gear, and there's a category of bag, known as "patrol bags", designed for them.  These bags have lots of space, lots of organization, and generally fall more into the "luggable" category of bags: bags maybe moved from home to station to patrol car, but not really carried long distances.  Maxpedition has entered the field with it's Centurion Patrol Bag, a high-end (it retails for $199.99), heavy-duty beast of a bag in a variety of colors (this article looks at a khaki model):

How could a techie use a bag like this?  It's not like you would carry it around campus or lug it around at a trade show.  Mobile "pro" techies (Geek Squad, anyone?) could certainly find it useful for their "fix-it patrols", but I looked at the bag with another techie use in mind... how about as a LAN party bag, or a semi-mobile home workstation storage bag?  Many of the shots below will address this--hence all the geeky contents--but hopefully there are shots enough to satisfy anyone interested in the bag.

To put things in perspective, let's compare the Centurion to some other bags.  I use 17" laptops as desktop replacement machines, so I've always needed a big bag for them.  I have been using a Maxpedition Aggressor "Tactical Attache"; this shot shows the Aggressor in front of the Centurion:

Stealing an idea from Milspecmonkey and his review of the Sabrecat where he stuck the precursor Proteus inside (see his Maxpedition review page--scoll down a ways), here're some shots of the Aggressor *inside* the Centurion; from the top:

and the front:

To put things in an every-day carry perspective, here's a shot with a Maxpedition/Countycomm Nucleus Bailout Bag, the Centurion, and the Aggressor:

and the Nucleus sitting in front of the Centurion:

From all of the above, you might think that the Centurion is the brute, size-wise, of the Maxpedition line, but their Balthazar Gear Bag is, while a "simpler" bag, actually larger in some dimensions:

The Centurion can be carried two ways.  First is it's  "wrap-grip" handles:

The two loops on the left are designed for something like a large flashlight or billyclub or the like, but can also be used for an umbrella.  The MOLLE/PALS webbing gives you plenty of options for attaching extra pouches, and the handles are long enough to allow for decently sized add-ons.  The wrap-handle works to keep the handles together, and is decently comfortable, but if you've got the bag loaded up you're not going to want to carry it long distances by the handles:

As you can see above, there's also a generously sized shoulder strap:

The strap attaches to two centrally placed plastic D rings, one on each end of the bag:

The strap also has a reversible shoulder pad.  One orientaion is color matched fabric:

The reverse is a rubberized non-slip surface:

Turned out like this the pad grips your shoulder better (good when heavily loaded), but turned in it griips the strap some and helps to keep the pad from slipping.

The bottom of the bag has five rigid plastic "feet":

Centered on the front of the Centurion is a large compartment with an organizer and ID flap mounted on it:

Under the flap is an organizer/admin panel:

The two left-most slots can hold larger items than standard pens/pencils:

The "pocket" itself is actually a pretty large compartment:

As you can see it's got two sizeable slip pockets, and the base is over an inch deep. This next shot shows the pocket with a sizeable binder cover (5-5/8” x 7-1/2”) and a hand-held weather alert radio, and a fair amount of room left over.

In the spirt of the "LAN Party" theme, this pocket is more than big enough to hold a Nintendo Wii:

On either side of the central front compartment are two "open mouth" pockets.  The taller pockets can fit standard Nalgene bottles, or could hold hand-held radios:

As you can see in the shot above, if you fill the bottle/radio pocket, the "lower pocket" is too tight to really use.

The top of the taller pocket has a paracord drawstring to tighten the mouth of the pocket:

I'm not really sure what the lower pocket could be useful for, but it's there if you want it:

Both ends of the Centurion feature identical large zippered pockets/compartments:

The Centurion is deep enough that you could use the MOLLE/PALS webbing to mount something at least as wide as Maxpedition's/Milspecmonkey's Monkey Combat Admin Pouch (MCAP):

As is usual in Maxpedition bags there are heavy-duty YKK zippers and extensive use of paracord:

The zipper on the end pockets isn't at the top of the compartment, but is instead partway down, so if you want to put anything as tall as the compartment inside it, you'll have to pull the "lid" of the pocket over the top of the item:

(An aside: inside the pocket you can see the weight-bearing webbing strap for the shoulder attachment point--the strap the D ring is attached to won't be tearing away easily.)

Here's an example of an item that's too tall to just drop into the end pockets:

On the other hand, the pockets make a great place to put accessories (game controllers, power bricks, spare laptop batteries, etc.):

The back of the Centurion features two large "loop fields" for patches or other "hook" backed add-ons mounted on a unique modifiable pocket:

Like the side pockets, the back pocket(s) zipper isn't at the top of the pocket, but part-way down:

While this makes it a bit awkward to get taller items into the pockets, there are two benefits: first, the zippers aren't at the top, but on the side, which makes it a bit more weatherproof.  Second, something behind the "lid" and the pocket isn't going to be easy to pull out quickly, so if you've got the bag in a public area it'll be harder to filch things by simply unzipping and grabbing them.

The interesting feature of this compartment is that it is adaptable--it can be two pockets or one.  In its standard configuration, it's two pockets divided by a velcro closure:

Pull the velcro strap free and you get one long side pocket:

Each section of the back pocket has bellows folds built in, allowing for expandability:

The underside of the main compartment's lid sports three zippered mesh pockets:

These pockets are large enough to hold CD/DVD jewel cases, mice, or game controllers.  Because the lid itself has some "depth", putting items in these pockets won't cause them to intrude down into the main comparment (unless you really load them up).

The main compartment itself is, well, huge:

In the shot above the ruler is lying on a stiffening panel velcroed onto the bototm of the bag to help it keep the compartment open and adds to the stiffness of the whole bag.  This panel does lift out if you want:

Sewn onto the back of the inside compartment are two expandable pockets with elastic tops; these are made of a lighter material appropriate to the inside of a bag:

To give you an idea of the "floor space" in this bag here's a shot with it holding a Wolf King "Thunder Wolf" gamer keyboard flat on the bottom:

The sides of the bag have strips of velcro "loop" material you can use to attach internal dividers:

The smaller divider has velcro "hook" strips on both sides of its flaps, which lets you adjust the size of the secondary and tertiary divisions.  Oddly for a bag designed for police there aren't any large "loop fields" inside the bag for mounting things like internal holsters, but it doesn't really impact me at all.

Foks who go to LAN parties often have small-form PCs instead of laptops.  The shot below has a small amp about the size of one of these small-form PCs.  It also has a 17" laptop--theoretically, a smaller flat panel monitor could fit in the same space as the laptop (again thinking towards a LAN party):

The Centurion wouldn't work for anyone traveling by plane (like pro video gamers)--you couldn't carry it on, and you probably wouldn't want to check it with your gear inside it (a hard case yes, a mostly soft case no).  I don't have a LAN gaming rig like that, but I instead use a 17" laptop as a mobile desktop replacement, so I tried moving my set-up from the Aggressor into the Centurion:

While the Aggressor could easily hold the laptop and the hint book, it couldn't have held the gamer headphones; the Centurion holds the headphones easily, and protects them from getting crushed.

I mostly use my laptop in the living room or family room, don't have a desk in either room, and do have a curious toddler.  It turns out the Centurion makes a great "mobile storage" case for my gear, and better one that is wife-approved:

I can fit my 17" laptop, m gamer keyboard (not visible behind the laptop), the headphones, mouse, hintbook, and laptop tray, and there's plenty of room left.  In fact, my wife sometimes puts her MacBook and separate mouse in the case as well, and there's still space left over.  In my setup I can leave the laptop plugged in to recharge (I leave the powerbrick outside the bag), even with the lid closed.  When I'm sitting in one of those chairs I the Centurion is rigid enough that I can set my laptop down on top of it if I need to get out of the chair.  Using the Centurion like this also helps me keep my stuff together in one place, and protects it.  My wife likes the fact that I don't have computer bits strewn around the room, and if I want to I can zip the lid closed to keep curious toddler fingers away from the computer (at least until he really figures out zippers--when that happens I could even put a small lock on the main lid zipper pulls, which are designed for just such a lock.  If I do go on a road trip, or need to take my rig somewhere, I can throw the powerbrick inside one of the other pockets and away I go.  Right now I've still got plenty of room left in the bag; if I really wanted to I could pack in the wife's laptop (or maybe a Playstation 3 if I had one), the Wii, some CD/DVD wallets, and even a lot of documentation.  The tough materials also resist abraision from shoes, kid, and cats, and the waterproofing has already helped deflect some of the contents of a can of pop.

I've been using the Centurion in thise role for almost a month now, and I can't imagine going back to another solution--I've got everything I need to use on a daily basis right where I need it, and as I start other programing projects (or start playing new games!), I have room for the materials I'll need for the project--manuals, media, etc.  Yes, the bag is pretty expensive, so you'll need to weigh that against its construction and features.  I can't imagine, though, that a lower-end bag would really provide me the functionality and features I've come to rely on in the Centurion.

 Update #1, 10-11-2009:  As per these new FTC rules, the bags discussed/shown in this article were:

• Maxpedition Centurion:  Sample provided by the manufacturer
• Maxpedition Aggressor:  Sample provided by the manufacturer
• Maxpedition/Countycomm Nucleus Bail-out Bag:  Self purchased
• Maxpedition Balthazar:  Sample provided by the manufacturer