Earlier this year we the new Korean company com.PACT announced the release of its first slider called Square Slider. We had a chance to play with an early version of this unique extendable slider and have a few notes to share.
The idea of a slier which can extend isn’t new. A few years back the innovative Turkish company edelkrone came up with the first extendable slider called SliderPLUS. Since the original version of this slider was introduced the company came up with an improved version 2 and a pro version which is capable of handling heavier loads.
A while back we had a chance to play with the the SliderPLUS and we really liked the design and functionally of the slider. The only possible drawback was that this slider was only capable of working (extending) when mounted on a tripod/light stand. For many applications this isn’t a problem, however in our experience we sometimes just want to put the slider on a table or even right down on a flat ground and do a quick shot. In this case the SliderPLUS design will not offer any extendability.
Now, a young Korean manufacturer called com.PACT has a solution that will not force you to always work on a tripod/light stand when you want the full length of your compact slider. It is called the Square Slider (see our original article here) and over the past few months we have used it extensively in different situations leading up to this review.
The com.PACT Square Slider
Here are a few general specs for the Square Slider:
- Self weight – 1.7 kg/3.7 lbs (our test unit was actually close to 2.1kg).
- Carrying capacity – 3 kg/6.6 lbs (the company demonstrated well over 4kg).
- Length closed – 260mm (10.2 inches) – these are our measurements – the company also has a slightly longer version on its website.
- Max movement – 550mm (21 inches).
- Price – $400.
We have to mention that the version that we have been using is an early one and had some issues (which you will see later on), we have talked to com.PACT and we know that they already have a newer (improved) version which we hope to test in the future.
Small but not that light – Square Slider
Build quality
The Square Slider has an all metal body and feels pretty solid. The unit is rectangle (no big surprise given its name), but what slightly did bother us about the external design are the edges – we would prefer to see those a bit less sharp.
The unit is composed of two parts – the base – which has no less than 6 connectors (three 1/4 20 and three 3/8 – two in the center and two on each side). The second part is the moving unit which slides from side to side (leaving the base part still) creating a space of about 55-56 cm (com.PACT claims 60cm but this isn’t what we measured).
In the heart of the unit is a surprisingly thin belt which assist the movement of the top plate. You do get another extra belt in the package (this is the only other thing which comes with the slider). To us this design seems way too thin and indeed the belt on the SliderPLUS is thicker.
The unit stands on 4 feet which are basically screws with rubber tips which you can extend separately (we will talk about this design in the next section).
The Square Slider has no less than 3 locks. for us this design seems to be completely redundant.
Who needs 3 different locks?
In general the unit feels well made, compact but definitely not lightweight. Next we want to see how this innovative design really functioned.
Usage
We have been using the Square Slider for several months now and many of the slides you have seen (and are going to see soon) here on LensVid were done using our prototype unit. Although we played with many sliders during shows and other events, the Square Slider is actually the first slider that we have tested over an extended period of time (we promise this won’t be the last).
Thin belt – com.PACT Square Slider
The first thing that we noticed when we first start using the Square Slider prototype is how noisy it is (you can hear this in our video). This is also the first thing we asked com.PACT about and they are fully aware of this issue and supposedly already addressed it.
The second thing that we looked at was the smoothness of the slide. Now, although this is our first slider review it isn’t our first slider that we used and although the Square Slider isn’t bad, we feel that it has some room to improve before it can reach the smoothness level of the SliderPLUS (it is possible that the fix to the noise issue also improved the smoothness of the slide – but we will have to test this with a unit which isn’t a prototype).
The legs of the Square Slider was the third issue we ran into. Now to be fair – we didn’t like the legs on the SliderPLUS as well but that slider needs a tripod/light stand in most cases anyway so this isn’t such a big issue. The biggest selling point of the Square Slider is its ability to slide (and extend) on more or less any surface so the legs are important. However the leg design isn’t optimal – especially because you need to change the height of each leg (instead of two at a time on many other sliders).
com.PACT did provide a bauble level on the top plate – which is nice but even with the level – making sure that the slider is leveled isn’t that much fun and it can sometimes take a while. The finale issue with the legs was the tips. They are rubberized – which is good. However we quickly discovered that they tend to stain surfaces – this is unacceptable – and must be fixed in the finale version of this unit.
Metal build – com.PACT Square Slider
Last but not least the top plate which has a 3/8 connector for your head also had a couple of issues – first the connector can’t be retracted for travel (like the one on the new SliderPLUS units which is pretty cool), this means that in your bag it might scratch something if you are not careful. The second thing is the plate itself – our ballhead simply scratched it when we put it on top of the plate – we decided to use a hard disk plate we had to make sure that the plate and the head will not be in contact but com.PACT really need to find a better solution here.
Conclusion
The design of the Square Slider has a lot of potential. Unlike the design of the Edelkrone SliderPlus, the Square Slider ability to extend does not depend on being mounted on a tripod or a light stand and it can just as easily extend on any flat surface. We see this as a big advantage and we used it on a table or on the ground many times. As far as we know this is the only slider in the world that can extend on a flat surface.
com.PACT Square Slider With the LX100
The Square Slider is indeed innovative but the version that we have tested (as we noted several times before) is a very early model/prototype unit. As such, we feel that com.PACT still has a bit of work to do. After all Edelkrone already has 2 or 3 generations of its SliderPLUS to iron out all the small problems they originally had.
We would love to see a new simpler leg system (one which also doe not leave rubber residue on the surface), a friction control mechanism, maybe a thicker belt and a single locking mechanism (instead of 3) but most importantly the noise and smoothness of the unit needs to be better.
Talking to com.PACT we brought up this issues and they promised to look into them (especially the noise issue which according to com.PACT was already resolved in the new version). Having a compact slider you can easily carry with you is great and the ability to extend it on any surface can be a real hit – it is now up to com.PACT to make the Square Slider into one.
We liked
- Extends to twice its own length (even without a tripod/light stand).
- All metal build.
- Extremely compact (especially for a 55cm slider).
- Relatively inexpensive.
Still needs improvement
- Prototype is noisy (com.PACT promised to fix this in the release version).
- Smoothness can be improved.
- Legs mechanism could be improved.
- No real friction control.
- Thin belt.
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Iddo Genuth 
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