Streamlight ProTac 2L Professional Tactical

I bought this for my wife to keep in her car. It's a solid little light with some neat features. It has proven reliable and easy to use and I'd buy another any time.

I received the Streamlight Protac 2L a week ago. It far out performs Mag light, Duracell, and Pelican flashlights. The center beam is bight and free of any dark spots and the peripheral beam is more than sufficient. This is a compact power house. The taillight switch isn't as tricky as some may convey. You just have to 1) read the directions and familarize yourself with it. I take it everywhere. It comes in handy at work, at home, and in uneasy situations. Buy it, you'll love it. By-the-way, the delivery time was amazingly fast.

I bought this guy to replace a Polytac that I somehow managed to lose and that I was, in turn, lost without. My main light is a Streamlight Stinger but I need a small backup light that I can always carry since the Stinger is too large to wear comfortably all the time. This light is great. Typical Streamlight quality without the ultra-premium price tag. It is VERY bright at max, the strobe is nice and disorienting, it's sturdy and feels good in your hand, and the tailcap switch feels solid. Only a couple minor negatives: a. It is very lightweight. Along with the light weight (I had to double check to make sure it wasn't a polymer flashlight when I first took it out of its package), it's fairly skinny...not much bigger around than the included lithium batteries. It's also a shorter light (which I wanted), and if you take it all together and it's just not a very substantial tool. Not a big deal, but I wouldn't have minded something a bit more solid. b. The switching system. This is what I knocked a star off for. I can understand why Streamlight did what it did here, but the pattern doesn't work best for me. Click once and it comes on in high mode. Click again, and it strobes. Click a third time and it goes to low. I would have MUCH preferred it started low, then high, then strobe. It's not a deal breaker and I'll get used to it, but I really don't like it much. Also, like I mentioned above, the switch feels positive and sturdy, but it's a long-throw and clicking through that long throw 5 times to get to low-mode is mildly irritating. c: The included pouch is pretty cheap and I'll be trying to find a molded nylon pouch to replace it. I honestly worry about the security of this light while hanging on my belt, but I've had no problems with it (other than mental ones, that is). All that aside, it really is a great light and I'd buy it again if I had to do it over again.

This is a fantastic little flashlight! It is very lightweight and fits comfortably into a shirt pocket or pants pocket without weighing the pocket down terribly. The three light settings are cool also. On the bright setting this light is incredibly bright for its size. The dim setting is nice for when you don't need a real bright light and want to save your battery. I'm not sure what the strobe setting is really useful for but my kids love it. Negatives are pretty mild. The beam cannot be focused like you can with a "Mag Lite". It would be nice if you could adjust the beam but it really doesn't hurt the usefulness at all. Learning to work the switch to get the different light settings takes a bit of practice but most get the hang of it pretty quickly. The unusual CR123A batteries are a bit inconvenient also but the battery life is pretty long so it's not a big deal if you're not using the flashlight very often (like me). I bought one for my brother-in-law. He's one of these guys that is really hard to buy for and he loved it! A really cool little flashlight that I highly recommend.

Purchased the Streamlight with 2AA batteries too. I think the advantages of this one are (1) it has a stronger intensity light, (2) one does not have to worry about the batteries leaking during storage in the flashlight. The CR123A batteries have a ten-year battery life so you can keep the flashlight w/batteries in the glove compartment of your car for emergency use. Granted, the batteries are more expensive than the AAs or AAAs, but when you pay so much for a quality flashlight, you don't want the batteries to leak and ruin your flashlight. I have Inova, Fenix, and Streamlight flashlights. The Streamlights are good for the money. I would not say one manufacturer's flashlight is better that the other; its what matters to you as terms of what you regard as important to you in a flashlight.