Anybody have experience with this filter?  I bought one for my missus for Christmas and all the online reviews were favorable, and I know Katadyn makes a solid product.  Just interested in your guys thoughts on this filter.

Thanks!
PatG

We used one in the BWCA this past summer.  Overall, it was a good filter.  No one died or spent the week vomiting/sitting on the thundermugs

The ceramic pre-filter for the slower of the two settings gets filthy pretty fast –– it went from white to a medium tan color over the course of nine days.  Not using the prefilter SIGNIFICANTLY speeds up the filtering process, which is worth noting if you have large volumes of water to filter.  Make sure to pay careful attention to how the prefilter piece fits into the assembly, as it is possible to close the filter in such a way that you're pumping water through and completely bypassing the filter (my friend discovered this at some point while we were up there –– I don't exactly remember the details of it).  

It comes with a little storage bag, but if I were buying my own, I'd find some sort of padded bag to keep it in; we found a crack in the filter housing while we were on our trip, presumably from something contacting the filter in the pack.  The crack we discovered wasn't anywhere critical and didn't affect the filter's function at all, but still a concern for future consideration.

Definitely nice being able to screw the filter right to the top of a Nalgene –– I believe they have attachments to fit other varieties of bottles.  

All in all, we had good luck with the Vario.  Served us well for over a week.