Oh, boy... Pig, are you familiar with the expression "opened a can of worms"? That's what you just did with this question, but I'll try to answer it without offending the Provari owners on this thread, whom I like very much.
Let's look at this more broadly: *every* device we vape with is basically a lithium ion battery, a case of some sort that the battery fits into, a connection (usually a 510 connection, sometimes an 808 connection), and maybe some bells and whistles, like a variable voltage chip, battery overcharge/discharge protection, or an LED screen. That's it. Every single one of us is using some variation of that. Right?
Here is what you're paying for when you get a Provari - the time it took to develop it, the materials and workforce that made the casing and installed the chips, the fact that it's made in the USA, and a really nice warranty. And, mostly, the fact that you can say you own a Provari.
Those are all good things. I wouldn't turn a Provari down if someone gave it to me... I've held one, and it's a sexy piece of gear. But that said, there are plenty of mods on the market that do the exact same thing. The *main* thing people are paying for when they get a Provari is the US manufacturing (which is a good thing to want to support) and the warranty (which is great).
But contrary to what some (not all) Provari owners may claim, how it *functions* is not exclusive to Provari. It is, at its core, a casing with some chips in it that you slide a battery into, just like every other mod.
One thing that was a big deal when Provari first came out was the fact that their chip did not have pulse width modulation. Put simply, many variable voltage devices, your SID included, achieve that variable voltage by varying the interval that the mod fires at, instead of varying the actual *voltage*. The mod fires at a straight five volts (usually), but then turns off and on very quickly to lower the overall voltage to wherever you have it set. You can read more about this and see some charts here. Many people call this "the rattlesnake effect," because the rapid on-off-on-off pulsing sounds like a rattlesnake. Some people like it, many do not.
Provari was one of the first mods to have a straight voltage chip that does not pulse fire - if you set it to 3.7 volts, it fires continuously at 3.7 volts, not at 5 volts with pauses to keep you at 3.7.
However, there are now other, more affordable mods out there using the same chip (as well as some that are even more expensive than the Provari). The MVP2 can be had for $40 and has a straight voltage chip - it's one of the reasons I got one.
I'm not telling you any of this to bash Provaris or Provari owners - as I said, if someone offered me one, I'd take it! But the only things *exclusive* to Provari now are the name, the US manufacturing, and the warranty... and since you may or may not be in the US a year from now, the warranty may be of less use to you than if you do manage to stay here. (I'm sure they would still service it, but I'd be awfully nervous about shipping a mod that pricey all the way back here, waiting for it to be fixed, waiting for it to come all the way back to me, etc. A lot can happen when international mailing is involved, as I'm sure you know well.)
If you can afford a Provari and you want to support US manufacturing and have that "status symbol" and a really solid piece of gear, by all means, buy a Provari. But the only thing it will do that your SID doesn't is that continuous voltage, which you can now get from an MVP2 (which is an equally solid piece of gear) and many other mods out there.
When it comes to APVs/mods (aka the actual battery and casing you use to vape), at the end of the day, it really is just a battery with a case. Everyone will prefer and have the budget for different kinds, but me using an MVP2 doesn't make me "more advanced" than someone using a stick battery... it's still just a battery with a case.
Toppers (the tank/carto/clearo/RBA that your juice goes in) are a little different; you will often hear someone say that they "advanced" to a dual coil tank, or a carto-tank, or an RBA. This isn't because it's a contest, or because one vapes better than any other (again, everyone has different preferences). It's because each of those things has a learning curve, and in the case of rebuildable atomizers, some safety concerns that you need to educate yourself about before diving in. Most of us start with cartomizers because most of us started with "cigarette like" devices. Cartos are easy, you just saturate the filler with liquid, screw it on and vape it. To use a tank, you have to learn about tanks (where the coil is, when to change it, how to change it, how to fill it). To use a carto-tank, you have to learn all of those things plus how to slot a cartomizer (or which companies do the best carto-punching for how *you* like to vape). To safely use an RBA, you have to know a little bit about how Ohm's Law works, how to wrap a coil, how to install a coil, how to detect a short, how to fix a short, how to use a multimeter, etc. None of these things are *hard* to learn, nor as overwhelming as they sound, but there is a natural progression - most people learn how to fill a carto before they learn how to fill a tank, and then they build on that knowledge to, if they so choose, move to carto-tanks, RBAs, and the like. So that's why that's thought of as "advancing."
The only real "advancing" you can do when it comes to the *battery* is a variable voltage/variable wattage chip, a *better* VV/VW chip (one that doesn't use pulse width modulation), or a bigger battery.
The rest is, as they say, window dressing (i.e. the image you project).
And I say all of this as someone who hates the *look* of the MVP2 and immediately put a wrap on it to make it look like a TARDIS (spaceship in the British sci-fi show Doctor Who), and who chose my new RBA based 75% on what it did, but 25% on how cool it looks... so there's *nothing* wrong with caring about how your gear looks. Just be aware how much you're paying for looks/name, and how much for function. With the Provari, you get both, but you do pay for that.
(Edited to add): It's important to point out that Provari is not the only mod out there selling function *and* looks *and* name. Kato's Hammer is another example, and there are plenty, plenty more. My main point in telling you all this is price rarely equals better *function*. It may equal cooler looks, better machining, or a cool name, but a battery is a battery and a casing is a casing. The rest is bells and whistles (like whether it has a chip and what kind, or whether it looks like an awesome hammer of doom or is a hand carved pipe.)
I too expect to be peevish but relatively patient... I've got plenty of other juice to vape.
I'm not worried about my order, it'll get here when it gets here. I've just been spoiled by MBV's supersonic shipping speed and was hoping it *might* be here by Friday... but next week is fine by me. A little tip... you can request OOS flavors as your free sample. I did that with Pumpkin Cookie this time around because I've been wanting to try it for a month or two now, but it's always OOS when I get paid. MBV can't *guarantee* they'll fill an OOS request of course, but they've always come through for me so far. The free sample on orders over $15 is 15ml, so it's enough to tide you over.
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