Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

After much research, I purchased three of these, two black and one red, all small/medium, for a recent 17 day trip to Europe. My husband and I used the black ones and my fifteen year old daughter used the red one. They worked beautifully! We each took four outfits, plus the ones we wore, so five total, two pairs of shoes, plus toiletries (my daughter took her full size flat iron), hoodies/jackets, and raincoats. While my daughter and I each had a separate (Travelon) bag, my husband put his electronics (iTouch, 10" Kindle Fire) in his backpack. I also put a full size heavy duty plastic zip top file folder in mine with all of our travel documents, tickets, etc. (in the laptop sleeve). We did very little shopping as that's not our thing, but my daughter did pick up a pair of high tops in Paris and had no problem bringing them home. We moved from cooler weather in Paris and Salzburg to warmer weather in Venice and Rome, necessitating a wide ranging wardrobe. Using Eagle Creek packing cubes, I was able to pack the following in my pack: a pair of jeans, a medium length skirt, two knee length skirts, a pair of gym weight capris, four tees, a pair of PJs, five pairs of underwear, one bra, two pairs of socks, a car coat length heavy hooded LL Bean raincoat, a pair of Toms, two toiletry bags (a TSA one and another), a small make up bag, a bag with ten medication bottles, a large heavy plastic zip top envelope with all travel documents and tickets, and a small bag of misc necessities (small USB cords, small caribiners, etc.). The bag weighed about 15 lbs packed and I had plenty of room left. On the return trip, I easily found room for a very well bubble wrapped small ceramic gift item, a t-shirt, and a boxed shot glass. I could certainly have brought more home. My six foot tall husband packed, using cubes, a pair of jeans, three pairs of cargo shorts, PJ pants, four tees, underwear, undershirts, a raincoat, a pair of shoes, his dopp kit + TSA bag, Kindle, iTouch, charging cords, plug adapter kit, and had room to spare. His packed bag weighed 17 lbs. Converting these bags from backpacks to duffles, to take on and off planes and some trains, was a breeze. The back panel unzips and rolls down, securing with Velcro at the bottom and releasing the straps. In reverse, just separate the Velcro, tuck the straps and zip up. The process is very fast and very easy and we found the bags easy to carry with the handles or the messenger bag strap. A key for me is that I also found that the messenger strap didn't get in the way when I was using the bag as a backpack, a plus since I didn't want to hassle with unclipping it and putting it back. We found these to be very comfortable. My stubborn fifteen year old whined about hers until she let her Dad adjust her straps and convince her to use her sternum strap and hip belt. Then she also found it comfortable! I won't pretend we used them every day, though. We carried them about every four days, from apartments through Metro stations, onto trains, and walking to apartments. We also carried them in airports and transporting to and fro. It was absolutely enough to get a sense of how they feel, but not a sense of their durability, though I expect they'd do very well. We were on Air Canada the whole way to and from Europe and had no problem carrying these on. I would recommend these packs without reservation. In retrospect, my husband would have gone with the next size up. He had no problems at all with the small/medium as far as packing it, but thinks he might have preferred the feel of the larger pack on his back. He has used this pack on two other trips and been happy with it both of those times, as well. We purchased the Osprey Porter 30 with the attached Daylite pack for my twelve year old and I'll post reviews for those, too.