Judging from the number of views of the last review, most of you are probably familiar with
what this hilt used to be. As I mentioned briefly in answering a question on that thread, that saber is no more. After this is posted I’m going to ask to have that thread closed as the story of that incarnation has ended and it has began life anew. For a variety of reasons it was completely rebuilt into the following:
LE Custom Prophecy
Guardian Blue
Obsidian Sound Board
Illuminated Switch
MHS #8 Pommel
In-hilt Recharge
After it became known that original saber was not possible / feasible / practical, and Alex and I had agreed upon its replacement, I had asked him about a saber for my Mom’s birthday present. She’s an unrepentant good guy so I knew it was going to have to be blue. Alex had originally offered me the above in place of my own, but while I had and have no real interest in a blue blade, I was already looking for a blue saber for the Mom, and… well, it just kind of worked out. I guess the Force was conspiring to get this hilt back to our family after all!
Here’s a shot of the switch, powered off.
The Prophecy family remains in my opinion the height of saber beauty and the LE the very best of them. You can see that the switch fits the aesthetic.
Perfectly. The silver color compliments the scheme already established, even better than the original, and the slim profile greatly benefits its hand feel. If there’s anything at all “wrong” with the Prophecy series is that with the covertec knob and standard switch, combined with all the machining, it can be a little lumpy in your hands. This switch goes a long way to improving that.
I’ve taken pictures of the saber with the 24” Heavy Duty Standard Edge (by far my favorite blade) and the 24” Heavy Duty Ultra Edge.
Standard Edge:
Ultra Edge:
Obviously, and as talked to death, a personal choice. At least in Heavy Duty, (I don’t have a mid grade ultra edge with which to compare) I prefer the look of the standard edge in all colors, BY FAR. The upper shot just looks so much more like a true lightsaber. Here's a close up to show you what I mean.
See how much thinner the "beam" looks coming out of the emitter? Also, you may notice that only one of the Prophecy’s two peepholes light blue on this saber. I think, but do not know, that this probably because of the space that is taken up by the speaker, sound card, recharge port and so on since the Prophecy series isn’t designed for any of this stuff.
The powered on switch, peep hole and blade when seen together are breath taking. The color above appears, as always, brighter than in real life, but also lighter in hue. The true color, even for a contrary blue dismissing asshole like myself, is simply gorgeous. Taken as a hole, the LE Hilt, the switch, the color, is, well. I mean. It's just perfect.
What else can you say?
Here’s a shot of the pommel and recharge port:
Readers of this hilt’s original configuration will note the absence of the pulsing accent LEDs. They were green, and given the uniform look of the switch, are not in the least missed. They’d have been out of place. I hope they found a nice home and think of us fondly.
Similarly, readers of my past reviews know how much I like the recharge ports. There’s nothing negative to say about them. This version, as in its original life, and as in my son’s LE Initiate, has an indicator light when in port and plugged into the wall. It fades from red to yellow to green as it charges. When the light is green, the trap is clean.
Wait.
But hey, what’s with those vents in the pommel? What do you need those for with a Prophecy? Well, as a rookie on the scene back a few months ago, this hilt was equipped with a Hasbro toy saber sound card. It sounded good. You know? Pretty darn good. But, uhm… Now it’s a lot better. Behold:
| <![CDATA[<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ajqYEXOZxI" target="_blank" class="aeva_link bbc_link new_win">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ajqYEXOZxI</a>]]> |
At about 1:10 when I point the thing at my messy closet it looks like I'm holding an f'ing for real deal light saber. ch'Bong!
I should note before the question is asked, that if you look carefully at the post dates on the previous saber's reviews, you’ll see a lot of time has passed between receipt, return, and this review. There’s a number of reasons for this. This saber was given to my Mom for a belated birthday present about three weeks ago. I told her to bring it with her when they came over for the Fourth (which we celebrated on the Third… we’re old, cut us some slack.) I took the opportunity to snap some pics and take a video. I asked my Mom to pose with it, maybe fighting her grandsons, but, well… you try and get YOUR Mom to pose with a lightsaber for a picture she knows will be on the internet.
The other reason for the delay is that I assume, after having received the original back for repairs and so on, Alex, knowing the Obsidian Boards were on the way, decided to hold onto the saber in order to upgrade the sounds. He did this at no real additional cost.
In case you were wondering, yes, the wait on this saber was worth the Obsidian upgrade.
Now, because the Prophecy is not set up for this sort of thing, and because of the recharge port, there’s no access to the board. This doesn’t matter for a couple of reasons. The first, it’s my Mom’s saber. She’d never do anything like that anyway. The second is, Alex set it up at what he described as some good defaults and I’m not sure I’d change anything. Admittedly I don’t have a lot of time with it, but it seems pretty dialed in to me. Most folks would consider the next comment a non-issue at worst, and a big positive at best, but the thing is
loud. If this was my saber, and if the Obsidian Board can do such a thing, I
might make it a little quieter. Maybe. But then I'd probably turn it back up, so, who knows.
I have only one critique of the Obsidian sound board, and even then it is more a caveat. I haven’t heard anyone else mention this and I think it's worth getting out there. Twice, once on each Obsidian board with which I have had experience, it has suddenly stopped responding. I think, but don’t know (again, I have very limited time with them) that it has happened both times with rapid on/off/lock up state changes. When it happens it won’t turn on at all. Panic ensues! But, all you do is just put the thing down for a few seconds, around 10 or 15 or so, it seems to reset, and then it works as normal, with no further issues. Like I said, basically benign, no fix required, but, since all involved experienced an “Oh my God it broke!” moment I thought it was worth it to prepare my readers / prospective buyers.
"Don't Panic."
That’s it folks! Let me know if I glossed over anything or if you have any questions.
