Peak Design Everyday Backpack

Interior

Main compartment

The interior is available in its entirety if required by removing all dividers. The standard setup however (in my pre-production sample), has the three dividers installed to have a roomy top section (accessible through the top flap) and two smaller sections for lenses + camera. This has the third divider pushed against the bottom of the bag, which makes for an extra buffer at the bottom of the bag. This is how I carried the bag during the week, when I had limited camera gear (K-3II + HD35/2.8 macro) and lots of office gear (mouse, cables, scrum ball, head phones, ...) with me. For weekend use, I loaded the bag with camera and multiple lenses, so I pushed the dividers up into the bag giving me a smaller top section and 3 smaller sections. If you want to take out the dividers, more options are possible.

Dividers

The backpacks come with a new type of dividers. The ones in the Messenger folded down one or two levels (in my Messenger I have them all up or two levels down). However the new Backpack ones only fold down one level, albeit one either or both sides of the back. So you can have one large compartment between dividers or divide it ⅓ - ⅔, ⅔ - ⅓ (same as with the Messenger folding down two levels) or even ⅓ - ⅓ - ⅓, the latter with the central section obviously not directly accessible from the side, so actually more options. Also, the divider flaps are double, so you can fold one down while leaving the other upright. On the Messenger dividers, folding down means joining with the neighbouring compartment. On the Backpacks it does not necessarily thanks to these double flaps. One downside of only folding one level down is that the folded section doesn’t necessarily reach all the way across to the adjoining divider, allowing smaller stuff to drift to lower or upper levels, unless you put the dividers relatively close to one another, which may not accommodate larger lenses. Same as with the Messenger the dividers start out a bit sturdy, but I expect this to improve with use as I noticed on the Messenger.

One note when you want to reposition the dividers: make sure to align them with the lateral markings inside the bag to install them level. I found these markings are there for a reason. When you attach the velcro just quickly for one specific configuration and don’t take care to align properly, you lose some flexibility, since pushing up or down the dividers will sort of twist them. Although this twisted setup may even suit some gear as well...

Inner pockets

The top compartment has a magnet closed pocket on the front side. I haven’t used it yet, but I guess that could be fine for filters. Both sides of the bag have several differently sized inner pockets in stretch material. These are separated from the main compartment by an additional cover closed by a zipper. This keeps the clutter out of the main compartment, but it does mean opening two zippers to access these pockets from the outside. Easy enough when opening the outside from the top (my preference anyhow), from the bottom it’s another thing. The whole bag is symmetrical except the layout of these inner pockets. Only one side has smallish pockets for batteries of memory cards (colour coded red or black for “used” and “ready to use”). Unfortunately for me, this is the side that faces down when I sling the bag along my left side, which is how I always sling my bags (I had to reverse the strap on the Messenger for this, easy thanks to the online video Peak Design made about this). This means I would have to take off the bag to swap cards or batteries, or put these on the other side in the not so suitable larger inner pockets.

Laptop compartment

Divided in three sections, the larger section just managed my old fat Lenovo ThinkPad T420; a very tight fit because it’s thicker than foreseen the specs of the compartment. But a fit nevertheless. There’s a tablet compartment and a smartphone section as well, though loading all three might make things cramped, esp with the ThinkPad taking up more space that it’s supposed to. I just put my ebook (Kindle Paperwhite 1st gen) in there. The inner material stretches to allow for more (such as my fat laptop), but note that takes away room from the bag’s inside. This does allow the bag to keep its elegant looks I suppose.