I'm a relative newcomer to the A2 crowd as well, and i've gone through all the standard phases of A2 ownership;
1; New-Toy-itis; "This is the COOLEST flashlight EVAR!!!!11one!"
2; Second Thoughts; "wait a minute, what does the A2 do specifically that makes it *worth* $150-200?, my <insert flashlight #1> and <insert flashlight #2> do the same things as the A2 and are *less expensive* to boot...."
3; Regret; "this thing was a waste of money, maybe I should *sell* it?..."
4; Usage; "well, if I'm thinking of selling it anyway, maybe I should actually *USE* it for a bit first, see if I really want to sell it and take a loss, or just chalk it up to a learning experience..."
5; Understanding; "I finally *GET IT*, the A2 *IS* an awesome light, it's a perfectly *balanced* illumination tool, low LED puts out just the *right* amount of light for most general use, and the high-beam has a nice balance between flood, throw, and color rendition, it may not be the brightest SureFire, or the longest running, but it's *just right* for 90% of most flashlight needs, it really is a stellar light
and finally....
6; Satisfaction; "Now that I have, use, and understand my A2, I have no "need" to buy any more flashlights, if I get the urge for a new light, I simply look at my A2, ask myself 'what will it do that my A2 won't?', and 90% of the time, the desire for the new light simply vanishes...."
Basically to make a long post longer
, the A2 is a rare light, it's something you need to spend *time* with actually *using*, not White Wall Hunting, actually *using* it, if you try to evaluate the A2 on a short-term basis, you'll likely not "get" it, and come away unsatisfied, give it at least 3 weeks to a month of actual *use* before passing judgement on it, it's meant to be a "balanced" light, it's not blisteringly bright like a P61 equipped SF, it's not an ultra-long runner (although the LED's *ARE* pretty darned efficient), and the beam pattern isn't the flawless SF beam pattern so beloved of WWH'ers, it *is* what it *is*, the *perfect*, balanced EDC for those that actually *use* their lights as tools
Now that i've spent a good amount of time maligning and generally badmouthing the A2, but in a good way
, let me cover it's *good* points, and there are many;
It's the perfect length for EDC, it fits my hand perfectly, the body disappears into my palm, the tail-cap sticks out far enough for comfortable use of the momentary/twisty one-handed, the bezel sticks out far enough from my hand to give an unobstructed beam, by comparison, when holding my G2 and 6P, the bezel of the light is partially hidden by my hand, the knurling on the A2 has the right balance of grippability without being too aggressive, the 6P's knurling is a little smoother, and the G2's checkering is smoother still
The incan is remarkably efficient, i've been using the light pretty much constantly for the past few weeks incan burn-times typically range from momentary to 10-15 minutes at a stretch, i've lost count of the amount of time i've used the LED low-beam, and after all of that, the incan beam is just as bright and white as the day I took it out of the packaging, the batteries ZTS at 60% even after a bunch of heavy use, the regulation circuit, documented so admirably in JS's A2 "Überthread" does a remarkable job of keeping the incan beam bright and white throughout the battery life, I was skeptical, to say the least, of all the vaunted performance numbers of the regulated incan, but they're true, the regulated incan works, is reliable, and is a brilliant bit of engineering
The low-beam LED's on paper are *laughable*, 3 lumens, an artifacty yellow/blue beam, typical of Nichia 5MM's, it's no WWH winner (although the incan beam does throw a kinda' cool "Biohazard"-y beam pattern), but you know what?, in *real life* use, it doesn't matter, the 3 lumen LED beam is in the form of a wide, soft flood with a slightly brighter hotspot, but it clearly leans more towards the floody side than throw, that 3 lumen flood does incredibly well with dark adapted eyes, and is quite usable rooting around in dark computer cases as well, the wide flood is far more usable than you'd think, and the color balance of the Nichias aren't too bad for general use either, and of course, being LED's efficiency is a given, i've been able to take batteries that ZTS at 0% and get usable light out of them with the A2's LED beam
This is my first SureFire with Hard Anodizing, and it's holding up remarkably well, yes there are tiny spots on the "points" of the knurling that are starting to get silvery, but that's expected as HA doesn't adhere well to "edges", it's going to happen with use, and it's less than 1% of the light in total, the other 99% of the light looks as good as the day it came out of the packaging, I even like the slight color mismatch on the bezel ring, bezel and body of the light, gives it a more functional, more stark, "military" look
This is also the first SureFire I don't feel comfortable letting the Unenlightened use, yes part of it is the fact it's a $200 flashlight and I don't think my cow-orkers would treat it with the respect due an expensive tool, but the other part is the fact that it's just such a cool light, and I know for a fact that my cow-orkers wouldn't truly be able to appreciate [Gollum] The Precioussss [/Gollum] the way I would, that's okay, I have a P61'ed 6P and G&P 3W LED'ed G2 that I can hand out as loaners, that is when I don't have my MagLed 3AA on me
If you're willing to give the A2 a chance, not just a quick test, give it an actual *chance*, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised