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Comment by pmg101 | Hacker News Reader

It's the perfect product. I pick it up, I use it, it functions perfectly without thought.

It's a lifelong mission to find any such tech product.

Ever tried writing a few pages with it?

It requires too much pressure compared with gel pens, rollerball pens, let alone fountain pens (although the latter are not for everyone). It soon creates fatigue. And at least in my case I also make uglier handwriting with them that with gel pens, rollerball pens, let alone fountain pens.

It's an extremely reliable product to do what it does, as well as extremely cheap, but far from perfect IMO. I see it more as a last resort if nothing else is available.

So true. I hated using BIC ballpoint pens for this reason. I found the Pilot Rollerballs are my favorites to use. The 0.5mm size writes really smoothly.

I picked up a couple bolt action pens for some more heft and put the Pilot rollerball fillers into the pen to get a really pleasant writing experience.

Did you know the inserts would fit prior to buying the pens? I love the Pilot V5 RT, but constantly have stains around my pockets from them deploying as I move. I don’t carry Precise V5s because I’ve had one too many explosions with them.

This, and the ergonomics of a lighter pen, is the reason I prefer the capped Pilot Precise BeGreen pen, which accepts the same V5 cartridges. I'm surprised how relatively rare these have stayed when the retractable V5s are everywhere.

Thank you! I was completely unaware these existed!

I did know the inserts would fit prior to buying the pens.

I used to put some pilot pens in some Geocaches I maintain. No longer, they always get stolen. It's now pencils cut in half. Used to be Dixon, but I'm looking for a new pencil maker

My Newton MessagePad was like that --- just the friction of charging/replacing the batteries and the physical friction of the resistive stylus got to be too much for me --- I'd give a lot for its functionality on my (stylus-equipped) phone.

I used to have one of those - so so way ahead of its time.-

PS Also, the handwriting recognition was way ahead of the game.-

Newtons were enormous, having to lug it around was awkward, so I stopped bringing mine everywhere.

I like them. Don't use pens much, used to be a bit picky, either fountain pens or roller balls or gel, but they'd always leak or be dry or not be ready to roll when I needed them.

I had one Cristal pen that I managed to hold on to and use through at least three moves and 8+ years, until I finally ran it out of ink. It didn't get lost, destroyed, eaten (by puppies or humans), or quit working -- until there was nothing left of it. It was a small accomplishment, but one that I'm absurdly proud of.

`man cat` don't think i've ever been upset at its functionality (or ever read the manual to be fair)

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