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Comment by joshe | Hacker News Reader

Lots of people are mentioning UVC, Steripen https://www.amazon.com/SteriPen-Adventurer-Opti-Water-Purifi... has worked great for me for over 10 years. No funny taste and to me easier to use then the pump or squeeze filters. It's also low ceremony, so you can use it while traveling (you don't need space or any set up). I mostly use it for backpacking.

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That's pretty neat. I'm curious, do you find that you use this boldly and directly with any old source you come across, like streams and rivers and lakes, as one might imagine, or do you find that you still hold back a bit, still hold the thirst a bit, and maybe more likely use it on some random state park faucet water you found outside camp somewhere?

I used a UV pen when I went backwoods camping in Rocky Mountain National Park and didn't have any issues. I would fill up a big water bottle directly from a lake or stream. You have to stir it in the water for about 60 seconds. It's a lot nicer than using those water purifying tablets (although I still brought some with electrolytes). The directions that came with it had big bold text saying it didn't kill viruses, which is normally not a concern for the type of water sources you encounter in national parks (at least in the US).

Edit: Changed "UVP" to "UV Pen" to clarify.

Not at all, trust it entirely on clear water. The UVC tech is very effective, they've got nice technical papers on it. And it's widely used for larger scale water treatment and very well understood.

If anything, the convenience is a factor in drinking more. It's so easy that I can do a bottle on a quick rest stop by a stream. I leave it handy so maybe 30 seconds to pull it out, and a minute for the uv to shine. (For muddy water it should be filtered enough first to make it clear, but I don't experience that.)

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