Since this thread seems fully hijacked by now...
All in one solutions are really nice, till they aren't. The problem with integrated anything is that when one function fails, you often lose all the rest, too.
So there you are on a trip and your Air2 decides to die. You are VERY unlikely to find another to replace it while it's serviced. So, you then need to find a new LPI, a new second stage and then utilise them safely, which may or may not be a problem but is definitely not optimal.
One of the MAIN reasons I advocate BP/W for my students is not about trim and neutral weighting, but modularity. A conventional jacket BCD is very tricky to repair or replace parts that are broken, more often than not on the older ones you end up buying a whole new one. OTH, you can almost always find a compatible wing / LPI / harness / STA or what have you, from any one of a multitude of vendors.
With an Air2 or equivalent, aside from the logistics of gas sharing (not optimal but not a death trap, given a bit of realistic practice) if you ever have issues, it gets really expensive to replace or maintain. If the LPI housing cracks after a few years due to UV and salt and abuse, you are buying a new LPI and a new second stage and a new hose if your brand / model isn't still around.
They seem great at first (I had one for a few years while I tried to self-learn minimalist gear) but they have not IME turned out to be all that good of a solution in the end.
All in one solutions are really nice, till they aren't. The problem with integrated anything is that when one function fails, you often lose all the rest, too.
So there you are on a trip and your Air2 decides to die. You are VERY unlikely to find another to replace it while it's serviced. So, you then need to find a new LPI, a new second stage and then utilise them safely, which may or may not be a problem but is definitely not optimal.
One of the MAIN reasons I advocate BP/W for my students is not about trim and neutral weighting, but modularity. A conventional jacket BCD is very tricky to repair or replace parts that are broken, more often than not on the older ones you end up buying a whole new one. OTH, you can almost always find a compatible wing / LPI / harness / STA or what have you, from any one of a multitude of vendors.
With an Air2 or equivalent, aside from the logistics of gas sharing (not optimal but not a death trap, given a bit of realistic practice) if you ever have issues, it gets really expensive to replace or maintain. If the LPI housing cracks after a few years due to UV and salt and abuse, you are buying a new LPI and a new second stage and a new hose if your brand / model isn't still around.
They seem great at first (I had one for a few years while I tried to self-learn minimalist gear) but they have not IME turned out to be all that good of a solution in the end.