VK530 by VSticking
INTRODUCTION
I believe most of you should know what a YiHi chip is by now. They have one of the best chip besides the dna chip. YiHi chips can be found mainly in mods like the ipv series, SXMini series and VK530 etc. They are one of best chips but also one of the most expensive ones to buy. One of the down side is some may find it expensive to own one but they also want to get a feel of the mod that is run by YiHi chips. That's why today I am introducing you to a mod that is run by YiHi chip and at the same time, cheap and affordable; the VK530 by VSticking. The VK530 looks very similar to the SXMini G Class in terms of their outer looks but they uses different YiHi chips. The VK530 is powered by YiHi SX530 whereas the SXMini G Class is powered by YiHi SX550J.
How well does the VK530 performs? Let me talk more about it, show some pictures that I took and give you my final thoughts.
SPECIFICATIONS & FEATURES
Height: 92.5 mm
Width: 48.3 mm
Depth: 34.6 mm
Powered by YiHi SX530 Chip
TFT IPS HD Screen
Output Power: 5 - 200 W
Output Voltage: 1.0 - 8.0 V
Output Joule: 10 - 120 J ( 212 - 572℉ / 100 - 300℃ )
Standard Resistance: 0.1 ohm - 3.0 ohm
Joule Mode Resistance: 0.05 ohm - 1.5 ohm
TCR Value: 0.00050 - 0.00700
Firmware Upgrade / Charging Via USB Cable
Temperature Control - Anti-Dry Burning Tech
Temperature Control With SS316L / Ni200 / Ti 01 / SX Pure / Manual TCR
Flavor Mode: Soft, Standard, Powerful, Powerful+, and SXi-Q-S1
New Innovative Tech: SXi-Q Control System - Customize Your Own Taste
Customize Your Own Wallpaper
SAFETY FEATURES
High Input Voltage Protection
Low Voltage Protection
Low Resistance Protection
Reverse Battery Protection
Overheat Protection
Short Circuit Protection
COLOR OPTIONS
Skull with Silver
Camouflage with Gunmetal
Carbon Black
Mesh Black
J-Graffiti with Silver
J-Graffiti with Gold
White Deity with Silver
Color Options / Credits: DHgate
WHAT YOU WILL RECEIVE
1 x VK530 Mod
1 x Micro USB Cable
2 x Battery Door Protector
1 x User Manual
1 x Warranty Card
VK530 Packaging
What You Will Receive
VK530 COMPONENTS
510 Connector
Power Button
TFT IPS HD Screen
Joystick
USB Port
Battery Cover
OVERALL LOOKS & FEEL OF THE VK530
I got myself the camouflage mod. The 510 connector has a huge silver plating surrounding it and is able to fit up to a 30mm atty. The silver plating is sitting flush on the mod so any atty that is on top of it will have zero gap in between them. The power button, screen, joystick and USB port is all located on the front side of the mod. The screen is circular and is surrounded by the gunmetal finish. The joystick is small circular stainless steel ball. On the bottom is a spring loaded battery door with a lever to it. On the back has a VSticking logo to it. The mod itself looks very simple and there is nothing complicated to deal with. One thing that I want to mention about the color options of the mod is some of the colors, for example, Graffiti, White Deity and Skull looks very child / teenager appealing. Companies should stop making mods with these kind of design in my opinion. We are all grown adults and we don't need anything fancy on the mod, on the packaging just like how eliquids are regulated to not have all these child / teenager appealing designs on it. Just a simple solid color is enough. But these are just my opinion, some may think it looks normal but it's fine. I am just voicing out my thoughts.
The first look of the mod doesn't seems to be very comfortable in the hands. But once you hold it, the ergonomics is there and the fire button is placed in the right spot. It won't be an issue for both left and right handed users because your thumb will just rest on the fire button automatically without you have to look for it. The fire button feels springy and strong and it is very clicky. To be honest, I am still not used to using the joystick on the mod because it is quite difficult to adjust the settings sometimes. The joystick just don't feel as good as when I am pressing on a button. I'd prefer buttons at any time of the day. As for the spring loaded battery door, when the lever is pulled, the battery door will spring up immediately without any delay. The spring on it is very strong and secure just like on the Aegis Legend. It is way easier to close the door on this than on the latter. The texture on the mod feels rubberized but don't be fool when I said rubberized. It has a slippery feel to it so when holding onto the mod, you must pay extra cautious to it as it might slip out of your hand anytime if you ain't holding it tight enough.
Able To Fit Up To 30mm Atties
Spring Loaded Battery Door
Overall Looks Of VK530
BUILD QUALITY
Build quality of the overall mod is good. The rubberized texture on the mod is well made as the color did not fade off and it didn't get any scratches after months of using it. The silver plating 510 connector does get scratches due to the constant screw and unscrewing of atties. The button and joystick is very responsive and none of them rattles. They are held in place very securely. The screen didn't get any scratches so to those who are worried about getting scratches on your screen, you don't have to. Battery door as mentioned earlier, is very secured held together by strong springs. Although it has a little play to it when it is open, but it doesn't have the feel that it will break easily when come under pressure. Once the door is closed, no rattling can be heard or seen at all. The paint on the base dropped off a little and it is because of again, wear and tear. I would always put my mod upright so there will be friction between the base and the table.
VK530 NAVIGATION
The VK530 is not the easiest mod to navigate but is also not the hardest. This is because there is only one joystick and most of the navigation are done through the joystick. You can only rotate the joystick in 4 different directions; up, down, left and right.
Let's get into the navigation of the mod:
To turn it on / off, click the fire button 5 times. While turning on, the screen will show 'VSticking' after that, 'Powered By YiHi SX530'.
On the front page of the screen, the following information can be seen:
- Wattage ( W ) / Joule ( J )
- Temperature Control ( Temp Control )
- Input Voltage
- Battery Life
- Memory Mode
- Resistance
- Output Voltage
- Variable Wattage Mode
Main Screen
Push the joystick to the left brings you to 5 memory modes. They will flash on the top right of the screen:
- M1
- M2
- M3
- M4
- M5
Push and hold joystick to the left for a few seconds will bring you to 'NOVICE' mode. What that does is it will disable all modes. It will only give you wattage mode for the ease of using this mod without meddling or accidentally pressing into other modes.
Push and hold joystick to the bottom, it brings you to bypass mode. Your wattage on the screen will be replaced by 'BYPASS'. Push and hold joystick to the bottom again to get back into wattage mode.
Push the joystick to the right brings you to your variable wattage mode. VSticking called this the "flavor mode" because it gives you the pre-boost setting to give you extra power and flavor. It is located on the bottom right of the screen, just right above the resistance. It will show you different modes every time the joystick is push to the right:
- Soft - Gives you a weak hit
- Standard - Gives you a normal hit like any normal mod would hit
- Powerful - Gives you a warmer and a little extra flavor boost
- Powerful+ - Gives you a vape warmer than the 'powerful' mode and a little extra flavor boost
- SXi-Q-S1 - This is your wattage curve and you can set how you want your vape to hit.
Push the joystick up doesn't bring you anywhere. Its only purpose is to scroll through the menu system and to increase your wattage / Joule / temperature.
Press the joystick once and it will bring you to change the values in these several modes:
- Wattage ( 5 - 200 watts; 0.1 increment below 100 watts, 1 increment above 100 watts )
- Joule ( 10 - 120 J; 0.1 increment below 100 J, 1 increment above 100 J )
- Temperature ( 100 to 300°C / 212 to 572°F; 1 increment )
Press the fire button 3 times, it will lock the mod while showing you the time, date and day. You cannot adjust the values or fire the mod. Press the joystick once will turn the screen off but still remaining in locked mode. To unlock it, press the fire button 3 times and it will shows 'unlock' and hit the fire button once more.
Lock Screen
Press the fire button 5 times, it will lead you to the menu screen. The menu screen will show the followings:
- System Off - When entered, it will show 'System On' & 'System Off'
- Adjust Date Time
- Adjust Temp - Adjust from 100 to 300°C in 1 increment
- Adjust Unit - When entered, it will show '°C' & '°F'. Change to your preferred unit
- Select Coil - When entered, it will show 'SS316L', 'Ni200', 'Ti01' & 'Manual TCR'
- Setting TCR
- Compensate Temp - Adjust from 000°C to 050°C in 1 increment
- Standby Time - Let you set the preferred timing for your screen to turn off
- Brightness - Let you adjust the brightness from a scale of '1' to '10'
- Wallpaper Select - Gives you a variety of wallpapers. 10 wallpapers to be exact
- Exit
10 Different Wallpapers
PERFORMANCE
Battery Life
The battery life on the VK530 is impressive. It is a dual 18650 mod and it can last a day and a half longer than any of the mods I owned. I realised that the input voltage next to the battery indicator will have its values constantly changing. I guess that it is showing the live voltage for the batteries in the mod.
Navigation
The navigation of this mod is confusing at first but as you use it longer, you will find that it is actually quite simple to use. One thing I don't like is the scrolling speed. It scrolls too fast to the point that you will always miss the value you want to set by a lot and you have to reduce the numbers again or vice versa. Having a fast scrolling speed is a good thing, but this scrolls way too fast. The fonts on the screen is too small on the main screen because the screen is small. It is really small that you have to look at it closely to know what it is writing. Sometimes, the words will blend in together with the wallpaper that you will come to a point whereby you can't even see what it is on it.
How It Vapes
The firing speed of the mod has a slight lag to it unlike the Smoant Charon and Naboo mod as they ramp up almost instantly. But for the VK530 is not as fast but the hit is very consistent. If you want a little faster ramp up time for this mod, change the settings to either powerful or powerful+ for a better vape experience. The power and powerful+ settings give a really warm vape on my Lotus RTA and I did notice the ramp up time for that is a little faster than when I am using it in standard mode.
This mod reads resistance of coils accurately because of the chip they are using. I do not have any equipment to test as like I said, I am not an expert nor do I know how to use those equipment. But YiHi has been well known for the accuracy beside the DNA.
I did not use the temperature mode for this device because I am not a temperature mode user and I am not an expert in using it. I will leave this portion to the other experts like DJLsbvapes and Anthonyvapes.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I think the VK530 is a budget mod that is suitable for people who don't want to purchase the YiHi mod because of its astronomical price tag but still want the premium look of the mod with a YiHi chip inside. I feel that the navigation of this mod is not the easiest because it only has a joystick to do the job. I will mess up with menu system often because I cannot really remember which direction I should move the joystick to adjust the settings. The mod is customization with 10 different wallpapers for you to choose from and I like it! The mod itself feels really ergonomics in the hands with the fire button placing at the right spot but I don't like the slippery feel on the rubberized texture. Chances of dropping the mod will be higher. If I were to bring a mod outside, this wouldn't be my go to mod because of its size, it is thick and gets heavy when batteries are inserted and this also brings to the point I stated above; the slippery feel. I don't want to drop it outside and bring it back home with any possible scratches or dent to the mod. I really don't understand why companies have to make mods that looks really child / teenager appealing. Some of the designs of the VK530 mod, for example, the Graffiti, doesn't look adult-ish in my opinion. I would rather companies make a solid colored mod as compared to those designs. But all in all, this mod is not bad as it has a pretty good battery life and a very consistent hit. So to those of you who are looking for a cheap high end mod, the VK530 by VSticking is the one you are looking for!
If I were to get another VSticking mod, would I buy it? Half yes and half no. Why yes? Because why not? It's a cheap high end mod and in my opinion, it is a steal! The ergonomics is great and is also one of the best feeling mod I have hold to date. Battery life can get me through maybe 3 to 4 days or so and this thing hits really consistent.
Why no? Because the font is making my eyes go blurry. The slippery feel is holding me back from getting another one if I had the chance to.
I will leave this for you all to decide whether or not you should buy it.
WHAT IS GOOD
- Battery Life
- Consistent Hit
- Fit Up To 30mm atties
- Cheap Price Tag
- Ergonomic
- No Rattling On Doors & Buttons
- Able To Customize Wallpapers
WHAT ISN'T
- Scrolling Speed Is Too Fast
- Does Not Round Robin
- Slippery Feel On Rubber Texture
- Lag In Firing Speed ( Subjective )
- Other Design Looks Child / Teenager Appealing ( Maybe it's just me )
Thank you for taking the time to read my review on the VK530 Mod by VSticking. This is TheOneVape_Review, signing off.
REVIEWER DISCLAIMER: I only type reviews during my free time so some products may take quite some time to be posted up. All products are used for 2 weeks or more.
PRODUCT DISCLAIMER: The VK530 is not sponsored by any companies or shops. All products I reviewed are bought with my own money.
PICTURE DISCLAIMER: All pictures posted in my threads are purely taken by me and only me. Do not use without my acknowledgment or giving any credits.
