Madecat_Vapes Review : Smok E-Priv Kit

[madecat_vapes]

Hello VU! Today I am reviewing for you the Smok E-Priv Kit! Following a string of, in my opinion, decent devices, Smok has hit the scene again with yet another dual 18650 device, this time taking styling cues from a car engine. Can Smok continue to run smoothly, or is it time for a pit stop? Read below for my evaluation.

I have used the E-Priv Kit for 3 weeks now and feel I can give a fair assessment of its quality.

This device was sent to me from Smok for the purpose of a review.

E-Priv Specs
Dimensions - 85mm by 47mm by 31.88mm
Weight - 194.5g
Dual High-Amp 18650 Battery - Not Included
Wattage Output Range: 1-230W
Voltage Output Range: 0.5-9V
Charging Voltage: 5V
Charging Current: 1.3A
Min Atomizer Resistance: 0.05ohm
Temperature Range: 200-600F
Supports Ni200 Nickel, Titanium, and Stainless Steel Heating Elements
MEMORY Mode
Zinc Alloy Construction
1.45 Inch TFT Full Color Display
6-Color Screen Adjustment Setting
Hinged Bottom-Loaded Battery Door Access
Atomizer Recognition
Battery Series Connection
Puff Monitoring System
Short Circuit Protection
Over-Heat Protection
10 Seconds Cut-Off
MicroUSB Port - Firmware Upgrades​

TFV12 Prince Specs
25mm Base Diameter
28mm At Widest Point
5mL Standard Juice Capacity
8mL Maximum Juice Capacity - Convex Glass Extension
Stainless Steel Construction
Top-Fill Rotary Design - Lock Button Mechanism
Dual Adjustable Airflow Control at Base
810 Cobra Resin Ultra-Wide Drip Tip
V12 Prince Coil Structure
0.2ohm V12 Prince Dual Mesh Coil - rated for 50-80W
0.17ohm V12 Prince Max Mesh Coil - rated for 80-130W​

Current Color Options

Contents
E-PRIV 230W Box Mod
TFV12 Prince Tank
0.2ohm V12 Prince Dual Mesh Coil
0.17ohm V12 Prince Max Mesh Coil
Spare Glass Tube
Anti-Slip Tank Ring
MicroUSB Cable
Spare Parts Bag
Instructional Manual​

Operation
6 click fire button: turn device on
5 click fire button: lock device
Hold + and -: lock device
Hold + and fire button:
In Wattage Mode: choose preheat setting
In TC Mode: choose preheat wattage
Hold - and fire button: choose firing mode
3 click fire button: enter settings menu. In settings:
click fire button to scroll to next menu
hold fire button to select next menu option
+/- to adjust menu option
3 click to enter menu, click fire button 3 times, select YES, long press fire button: turn device off​

Pics
Instaglam

Contents

E-Priv

510

Back

Styling

Latch

Battery Door/Tray

Screen

Mode Settings

Puff Settings

Screen Settings

Power Off

TFV12 Prince

Drip Tip/Top

Fill Port

Airflow

Bottom

Handcheck

 

[madecat_vapes]

E-Priv Mod​

Smok's affinity for releasing new devices every month or so brings us one of their latest devices, the E-Priv. The main focus here is the "engine" styling, and while it doesn't really bring anything innovative to the market, Smok is seemingly continuing to make decent devices. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's jump off this review and start at the best place possible: the top.

Top/510: Right off the jump, you can't help but notice the "shoulders" sticking up a bit past the 510 plate. I thought this was going to be an issue fitting larger attys on the E-Priv, but really, with how slim the mod is front to back, you can't really fit anything larger than a 27mm atty anyway, so it doesn't really make a difference. The 510 pin is spring-loaded and gold-plated and the threads are pretty smooth.

Buttons: For buttons, the E-Priv has a fire bar along one side of the device + and - buttons below the screen. While the fire bar takes up the entire side of the device, it cannot be activated at its lowest point. You can, however, get a decent press for about the other 80% of the bar. The bar itself is nice and clicky but doesn't have much travel to it. I feel like this could be an issue if it is in your pocket, unlocked. It may cause some accidental fires, so definitely take note of that. Also, there is no indication of which side of the mod is the fire bar. This isn't bad once you have used the device for a little while, but it could be confusing in the beginning.

The + and - buttons are long bars that run across almost the entire front of the device. The way they are setup you would think that the one marked "+" (the top one) and the one marked "-" (the bottom one) only activate their respective choice along the entire width of the bar. Since they are so close together, it felt very uncomfortable trying to make sure I only pressed the one button that I wanted to. However, the bars don't work that way. The left side of both of the bars are your "-" and the right side are you "+". So you don't have to worry about only pressing either the top button or the bottom button. This actually works out better and I'm glad they went this route.

Screen/Menu: The screen on the E-Priv is a decent sized, color screen that displays your puff counter, individual battery bars, wattage/temp, elapsed time of last hit, resistance, and current voltage draw. It's pretty much got everything you would need to see. One thing I would have liked to see is individual battery percentages. I feel like more manafacturers need to start doing this. Also, show me the voltage for my settings, rather than a ramp up while I'm taking a hit. I don't really look at my screen while I'm hitting the device, so this number is useless as it always shows 0.00 when not in use.

The Menu of the E-Priv is fairly straight forward. Triple click to enter, then use your +/- buttons to select your setting. Long press the fire bar to move to the next option on the screen, and short press the fire bar to move to the next setting screen. Pretty standard stuff here. My one complaint is that in order to turn off the device you have to enter your settings menu, press the fire button 3 times, hit + or - to select YES and long press. I would've much preferred a 5 click of the fire button to turn off the device, but they have set that as locking the device. This is completely unnecessary as holding + and - at the same time locks the device as well. So they have two shortcuts that accomplish the same thing. Not sure if this is an oversight or what, but it's rather superfluous and unnecessary to have burn two shortcuts to do the same thing. Other shortcuts include holding the fire button and + to choose your preheat setting in Wattage Mode or "preheat" setting in TC (it says Preheat, but it's really your TC wattage) , and holding the fire button and - to choose your firing mode. I like that they included these shortcuts as these are likely going to be the most used options.

Battery Compartment: The battery compartment style is latch and hinge and Smok really seemed to have this nailed down pretty well. It's very similar to how it is on the Species V2 and I really liked how they executed it there. It's more of the same on the E-Priv. The latch button is a nice stiffness and holds the latch shut very securely. The hinge on the door is spring loaded and there is absolutely no play in the hinge while it's open. The battery compartment holds the batteries securely and there is no rattle with the door closed. Battery orientation is clearly marked on the inside of the battery compartment and on the door. I would've liked to see the orientation stand out more on the battery door as it's just molded into the plastic. Some kind of contrasting paint would have been ideal.

Size/Styling: The E-Priv is the size of what we have pretty much become accustomed to seeing from dual 18650 device. It's a little bit larger than the smallest dual battery device, but it still manages to be comfortable in the hand. It also has a bit of weight to it that helps make it feel like a solid device.

The styling of the E-Priv is made have stylings of an engine. It definitely has a bit of an industrial look to it with numerous exposed screws along the top and down the back. On either side of the device is says V12, just in case you forgot that this was supposed to resemble an engine. I'm not the biggest fan of the styling on the E-Priv. If you're looking for an "engine" mod, the Augvape V200 has accomplished this better than the E-Priv. It's not that the E-Priv looks terrible, it's an okay looking device, I just like the V200s styling better if we're going to compare "engine" mods. The paint on the mod is really sleek and looks like a high quality, sports car paint job. It's got a nice sheen and metallic look to it. It's probably the best part of the styling all together.

Performance: Well, it doesn't perform like a V12. In my review for the Species V2, I noted how it felt underpowered and the E-Priv suffers this same fate. In power mode, the device hits really soft where I feel it should hit better. It actually feels about 15-20 watts soft. Once you realize this and adjust as necessary, it hits really nicely. While it doesn't hit as fast as some other devices I've used, the delay is not too noticeable. Aside from hitting softly, it works quite smoothly. Over the course of use I didn't have a misfire or anything negative of that sort. It just works.

TC mode is a bit different. While I reviewed the Species V2 first, I believe the E-Priv came out first. TC worked really well on the Species V2, and maybe they didn't quite get it nailed down yet for the E-Priv, but it doesn't work as nicely. It just hits way too softly and I don't feel like it ramps up well. And while it does seem to have decent dry hit detection, it never hits well enough to call it a win.

TFV12 Prince Tank: The TFV12 Prince tank is yet another confusing addition into Smok's lineup of subohm tanks. If nothing else, we can call them consistent, but their naming scheme makes it difficult and confusing for people trying to find the correct coils for their tanks. It might be okay if they weren't shoving out a new subohm tank every month, but I think we're at the point where we don't need 10 new subohm tanks from the same company, especially since there's really nothing new or revolutionary from one to the other.

Anyway...

It's a pretty standard tank for Smok at this point: dual-adjustable airflow; hinge-style fill port with locking button; bubble glass; resin, dual o-ring 810 drip tip. They have joined the ranks of the Mesh following with a dual and single coil mesh option. These are very similar to the ones I reviewed for the TFV8 Baby V2, so allow me to reiterate:

Performance of the coils is very nice. I primarilly used the Prince Max Mesh single mesh coil and really enjoyed the flavor out of this thing. I actually liked it a bit better than the Freemax Mesh Pro single coil mesh, getting more flavor out of it and decent longevity. I put roughly 60ml of ejuice through the coil and when I decided to switch, it didn't look much worse for wear. At that point flavor was a bit reduced, but I probably could've put much more juice through it without it being gross. All in all, the performance was very good The Dual Mesh coil was also pretty good, although, not as good as the FreeMax dual mesh coils. Flavor was slightly better than the single coil option and longevity seemed similar.​

 

[madecat_vapes]

Final Thoughts
Pros

• Fits up to 27mm attys
• Spring-loaded, gold-plated pin
• Smooth threading
• Fire bar activation is almost the entire bar
• Clicky buttons
• Decent, color display with plenty of information
• Straight-forward menu system
• Button shortcuts are useful
• Secure battery latch
• Battery door hinge well executed
• Battery orientation is marked
• Decent size for dual battery device
• Paint is really nice
• Power Mode, while a bit soft, hits well when adjusted correctly
• TFV12 Prince coil flavor and longevity

Cons

• Potential to fire in pocket
• No indication of which side is fire bar
• No individual battery percentages
• Voltage reading is useless
• Too many button clicks to turn off device
• Uses two shortcuts to accomplish the same thing
• Should have used a contrasting paint to mark battery orientation on the door
• Not a big fan of the engine styling
• TC mode performance
• Subohm tank naming convention is confusing

While the E-Priv has some decent things going for it, it also has some setbacks. As a power driver (pardon the pun), the E-Priv is excellent, as long as you're sure to adjust for the soft power output. If you're looking for a decent low-end TC device, there are much better options out there. Honestly, with the Species V2 out in such a short time after the E-Priv, you're likely better off getting that (if you want a new Smok device) as it actually has decent TC. I guess the only real reason to get the E-Priv is if you really like the styling and aren't concerned about TC.



Purchasing

• Eightvape - $43.95
• Vaporl - $49.38
• ElementVape - $49.95
• VaporDNA - $49.99
• Sourcemore - $51.50
• Ecig-City - $59.99

Thank you...
...for your attention VU. I hope you all have a great rest of your week!



I want to give another shout out to Smok for giving me the opportunity to provide this community with this review. If you want to check them out, you can follow them on their Facebook or Instagram pages.



Also, if you want to keep up with me, you can follow me on Instagram.