Paintball

[VonOrt]

To adress some of the things brought up here.

I bought the gun brand new at world cup. It has been cleaned and lubed before every time I took it out to shoot. Through my team there has been contact with Mac Dev and they have no idea what is wrong. Also the gun has been sold to a team mate recently. He bought it knowing full well what problems I had with it. I would not sell a non functioning marker without disclosure of the fact. Since he has received it he had a new bolt, and the board reflashed by NOX. I'm not sure what his results have been since then. The fact that they have a new bolt out for it already tells me they knew they had an issue. But nobody wanted to say anything about it.

My reasoning for this post is not out of anger or spite. But rather to inform people that everything is not roses with this marker. All you ever see is everyone bregging about the new gun they have. I personally would of loved to have written a review singing the praises of this product. But when I get a product that does not meet expectations, I think we as a community owe it to everyone to say so. Unfortanatley in the PB community anytime someone speaks out against a product they get bashed and the hate flows. One of the reasons I like MCB so much. It's not like that around here. Would I ever owne another MD product? Very doubtful. For the outlay of cash I feel there are better more reliable products available.

[Frink]

Wow, saw the reception you got in the MacDev Forum on PBN.

I think in summary:
-It looks like you got a lemon.
-For $1,000 you shouldn't get a lemon, but it was from the first production batch.
-Sounds like no one actually contacted MD to try to fix the problem.
-When the person that you sold it to contacted MD, they fixed the problem with the V2 bolt upgrade.

So overall a bad experience, but could have been handled differently and come to a happy ending.

[VonOrt]

Yeah Frink, it was pretty much what I expected from Peanut butter nation. Actually a couple of the people were half way civil. And maybe my review is a little bit rough. But its not a happy time when you drop a grand and you get lemons. Least they could do is give me a squeezer to make some lemonade and bottle of Rasberry Rum.

[Grivooga]

Weird. For the price it shouldn't have happened but it did and it sounds like you didn't give them a chance to make it right. The new bolt isn't a major revision. They just added a small bevel to the inner lip. Hardly a ground up redesign of a fatally flawed component. One of my teammates has a Droid and I have an 06 Borg. Both shoot amazing. My teammates Droid is the smoothest quietest gun I've ever used. Personally I like my borg better for the super-easy tools-free maintenance (not that it needs much) and cleaning but the Droid is a super strong contender and would easily be my gun of choice if I didn't already have a Cyborg. He has the revised bolt so I can't really say anything about the first batch other than what I saw in the booth at World Cup (which was impressive). I follow the Macdev forums pretty regularly and yours is the first horror-story that I've seen. Almost all complaints I've seen for the Droid are from people that expect to get advertised efficiency out of the box. Like the Cyborg before it Droids get better over several cases. It's possible that your Droid was just a bad nut but before coming to that conclusion I'd guess that it was a combination of settings (did you double-check dwell?) and the old-style bolt. Which was revised after a small subset of owners reported problems.
My borg easily outshoots any other gun in realistic use. Maybe some Egos can theoretically cycle faster, I've seen a friends SL77 push a Magna to the limits of its feeding ability and it wasn't very impressive except for the sheer speed (he has a SL8R now so maybe we should repeat this). My borg is quiet and consistent up into the high 20s before it starts to max out. I've got it to full-cycle with eyes-off into the mid 30s by changing the reg balance but then it'd be as loud as the Ego and I like the quieter sound signature that comes with the less aggressive reg balance.
People like different guns for different reasons. Macdev gun are some of the best IMO but that doesn't mean that everyone will like them. The Borg isn't the prettiest gun out there but the ergonomics are top notch especially if you're a big guy and don't like "tiny" guns (have a 6'2" guy hold a Mini with a 70ci stubby tank sometime and you'll probably see what I mean). The things I love most about my borg may not matter to other people. I hate "tight" guns. My theory is if you've forced me to be tight then I must have missed an opportunity to get you and you've swung the field against me. I'd rather have a stable shooting platform with all the right characteristics for the run and gun. I don't need to be an especially fast runner if I can shoot my own EFFECTIVE cover fire. My borg is a stable shooting platform that seems to naturally draw itself into a comfortable, easy, and accurate posture because my gun fits me excellently. The Droid is similar it's made to be fast consistent and stable. Not as efficient but wow it's stable. I don't know for sure what was wrong with the OP's Droid but I'm sure it was a fluke or user error and that MacDev would have fixed it.
All high-ends have some give and take. No one has made a Jesus gun yet though some fanboys may say otherwise. MacDev guns aren't perfect. There's room for improvement in both the Cyborg and Droid. Your post is evidence for that and the criticism is heard and understood by the manufacturers. I have total faith that the next iteration of the Cyborg will be drool worthy. IMO the Droid is already the best overall spooler I've seen and with a few improvements (apparently QC) could probably dominate the high-end spooler market.

[Steelrat]

Well, after reading the responses on PBN, I think I'll continue to avoid Macdev. The products aren't bad, but everytime a new one comes out that forum acts like it's the Second Coming. Not that other subforums don't do the same, but I avoid their stuff too. The droid is, I'm sure, a fine marker, but people act like it's the most amazing thing ever, and that it can shoot faster, with less recoil, is hyper efficient, cures cancer, and can transmute lead to gold.

[93civiccpe]

^^ Yeah.. very true Steel, but think about the sport we play. It is dominated with "hype" and unfounded claims. Everyone wants to believe that their marker is the best thing out there and they don't want to hear otherwise. Plain and simply, when you get to that upper echelon of markers there really is very little that separates them. The MacDev community does really have a strong and protective following, but so does AKA, AGD, PPS... etc. They've all gotten their battle wounds, but when looking at modern electros, AKA no longer produces them, nor does AGD... we've got MacDev. (Don't harp on me, I have several vikings/mags I put against any other marker). But the point is, MacDev is one of the few companies of "good guys" which Smart Parts hasn't run into the ground. So there is still a choice for new markers from a good source that isn't so popular with the "agg" crowd that a lot of old-timers like myself try to distance themselves from. Plus, it made me feel "warm and fuzzy" inside when they basically stuck it to Smart Parts by creating a single tube spooler that is much more efficient and nicer than the Shocker, and doesn't infringe on SP's patents. (I was there at cup when the SP guys with a lawyer came over and requested that the macdev guys show them the internals of the droid..)

Now, your problem sounds like the v1 bolt that has caused a lot of people problems. It was something that probably should have been caught during testing the marker, but I believe MacDev is giving the upgrade free for buyers who were unfortunate enough to get one of those first run droids. I agree that for the price you don't want problems, but it seems like they've found it and are doing their best to make it right.

I am the last one who would spend $1000 on a new marker... just too hard for me. But I had an opportunity to sell my dc milled viking and a barrel kit in order to pick up a droid, and I did it. Why?? Well because I had made the mistake of selling my cyborg, so I had no Macdev markers in my possession. I still have mags & other vikings, and I was interested in trying one of these out. I got mine in time to play this past weekend with and I had verified that it was coming with the v2 drivetrain. Well, I couldn't have been happier. Even without the reg being broken in it was between +/- 4-5 bps at the start, and +/- 3fps after a case. I didn't have a single chop, single break, single problem. I said more times that I can count that day that it was one marker that I would never sell. My friends kept joking on me because I've owned and sold a ton of markers, and they didn't believe me.

I'm really sorry to hear about your bad experience. I am hoping that it was the v1 bolt causing it and I hope you can check with your friend and give us an update. For me, it is going to be my new workhorse so I hope if your friend does still have a problem that you can update us as I want to ensure that the problem is solved so the rest of us will have that knowledge as well. Thank you for the write-up.. I think you learn a lot more from the negative ones than the positive ones, as you find the problems which leads to fixes.

[Steelrat]

I have noticed that a bunch of the old AKA crowd have migrated to the Droid. Who knows, maybe I will give it a try...

[93civiccpe]

LOL.. if you're ever in VA or one of the surrounding states you'd be welcome to try out mine.. =). Honestly, I don't know of any compelling arguement for buying one over a milled viking with rt valve. Both will be light, quiet, efficient (more so on the viking side), little to no kick, and fairly small (edge would go to the droid). For me, I wanted another Macdev marker and the idea of finally owning a good spool valve marker was intriguing. But I couldn't say it's better than a milled rt viking.. because performance wise they are both going to rip and have very little flaws. The one thing that impressed me and my buddies the most was how far forward the reg sits on the droid.. without a hopper or tank it feels a little odd, but when they are on it.. perfection. The weight distribution and room for your hand (even hurcules hands..) is really nice and well thought out.

I think the reason a lot of the old-skool guys are trying them out is for years we've been collecting the AGD markers and AKA markers & etc and using them, milling them, keeping them competitive. We did have the cyborg, but in all honesty it isn't that different from a viking. (Please, i know the differences but in valve type and operation you don't have a big difference). Finally we now have a brand new high-end choice that we don't feel too guilty about buying.. by a company that has a reputation of building quality markers and regs. We've been collecting and trading and creating milled beauties for a while now and finally we can buy something new.. at least that's what got me... =)

[himurax13]

I was going to go that route, but so many nifty looking Vikings have been selling for cheap lately ...

[sniper97]

Originally Posted by himurax13

I was going to go that route, but so many nifty looking Vikings have been selling for cheap lately ...

Briefly considered a Droid, but I figured wait 2 more years and they will be selling for around $300 and my Viking will continue to hold it's value.