| Best of class |
I already had a Freeform Neo Bird pen, and was not impressed, when I discovered the PenAgain. The PenAgain succeeds in most of the places where the similarly-priced Freeform fails:
- This pen is symmetrical. You can use it right-handed or left-handed.
- It's better-looking up close. I would still like a nicer-looking choice, but at least when I look at it up close, I don't see cheap silver-toned plastic. I also find the design of this pen to be more appealing visually.
- In general, it is easy to hold and control. The thin, rounded "arms" are comfortable, and nothing pinches or places pressure between my knuckles. This really is an improvement over "regular" pens.
Other good points:
- The plastic has a nice, satiny finish that feels very neutral (neither sticky nor rough) on my fingers.
- Refillable, so you can use other colors.
- The ink doesn't seem to mind being upside-down, though there's little point to actually *writing* upside-down with it, since doing so defeats the purpose of using gravity to help you hold the pen on the paper.
Minor gripes:
- It's slightly awkward for a smaller hand, though not as awkward as the Freeform pen. A shorter version, if possible, would be more comfortable and better balanced for a child or a woman with small hands.
- It's nice that it's refillable, but I'm not sure it will last long enough to need a refill. As other reviewers have noted, the PenAgain's combined clip/retractable tip is not particularly sturdy, and if it breaks, your pen is ruined. For this reason, I would say that it's probably a bad idea to use the clip for clipping.
Things that would make this pen a five-star product:
- A sturdier or more sensible tip/clip design; or, sell tip/clips separately or along with the refills, so you can get more use out of your pen.
- Make it available in smaller AND larger sizes, because I'm guessing that it's as awkward for a larger hand as it is for a smaller one.
- Make a spiffier model that you could be given as a nice gift.
- Someday, produce it in the USA! |
4 Rating
|
| brilliant idea, flawed execution |
These pens are a joy to use. I can write for hours with one without cramping - and as a student, this is something that I have to do on occasion.
Unfortunately, the construction of the pen is imperfect. In particular, the mechanism that allows the tip to be concealed or revealed by sliding a retractable cone forward or back is fragile; a tiny tab that fits onto a slot on the body of the pen is all that keeps it from being stuck in the forward position.
With ordinary daily use, I broke the open/close mechanism on two of these pens in two months; and, once it breaks, the tip of the pen is always hidden and therefore useless.
I still have a few of these pens that haven't broken yet, which I'll reserve for special occasions like essay exams (and always with a more traditional pen as backup).
I would be pleased to buy many more of these once the design problem is fixed. |
3 Rating
|
| Very unique design, works great. |
A friend gave me one to try and I immediately thought of my aging mother. She has advanced arthritis and her hand shakes. It is so bad that she uses two hands to hold a pen and the result is very shaky. Her mind (at nearly 90 years old) is not as sharp any more and she learned how to use this pen in just a minute or two. The first time she tried to write anything with it was amazing. She used only one hand and produced a signature that was easily readable and nice and neat.
She has been using it for word puzzles and is making nice neat boxes and letters. She wants more and now so do I. (I'm hoping it will ease my carpel tunnel problems.)
My only gripe is that they only come in one ink color. |
5 Rating
|
