Will the Archon by Aspire Rule the Roost?

With its stunning ergonomic design colourful appearance and the ability to pump out 150 watts of vaping power the Aspire Archon looks set to become a must have in your vape arsenal.

Powered by two 18650 batteries – 5 button controls and with a ton of features including a nifty little personalisation feature it’s little wonder many reviewers are loving it.

Archon in Greek means a ruler or magistrate – so has it become the King of my mod collection?

Or have I sentenced it to a life at the back of my vape cupboard never to see the light of day again?

Let’s take a closer look.

In the Box

The standard black Aspire packaging most of us have come to know so well.

Inside you’ll find:

• 1 x Aspire Archon Mod
• 1 x Micro USB charging cable
• 1 x User Manual
• 1 x Warranty Card
• 1 x Scratch & Check Sticker of Authenticity

Not a lot in the box if I’m honest and you’ll need to buy the two 18650 batteries separately.

Whilst short the instruction manual is to the point and covers pretty much all you need to know.

Archon Specs

• Wattage range: 1-150W
• Output Voltage Range: 0.00-8.50V
• Resistance parameters: 0.1ohm – 3.5 ohm (both wattage and tc modes)
• Continuous fire time: Adjustable from 5s-15s
• Firmware updates available via micro-usb ports
• Dimensions: 23.4 X 62.7 X 88mm
• Battery required: 2 x 18650 with capable of 20 Amps continuous drain
• TC range: 200-600F/100-315C

Good to see firmware upgrades with Aspire announcing:

There will be many hot new features released

There’s also a plethora of built in safety features which is fantastic to see:

Archon Safety Features

• Automatic cut off
• Short circuit protection
• Low resistance protection
• Overheat protection
• Overcharge protection
• Over discharge protection

There’s also a simple to set-up child-lock mode where popping in a password means the device can’t be fired by anyone but those in the know – another great touch.

Despite being powered by the dual 18650 batteries pass-through vaping and charging via the USB cable is available – however it’s not something we’d recommend.

Key Features

Apart from the safety features – the firmware upgrades and the fact it cranks out up to 150watts there’s a whole raft of features on this box mod.

So let’s start with the quite brilliant 5 button controls.

We have the usual suspects – the fire button – up and down buttons but the Archon also has two others just below the fire button.

These are W and T respectively standing for Wattage and Power.

Thanks to these simple to find and use buttons you no longer have to click and scroll endlessly through the menus to switch between temp and power modes.

A quite simple yet brilliant feature that I found as a relative newcomer to temperature control vaping to be an awesome touch.

For those of you with big lungs the continuous fire time can be adjusted and then we come to the nifty little personalize mode.

Here you can change what name is displayed on the super-bright and very clear 0.86 OLED screen – as you can see I popped in EcigClick – nothing but original me lol.

Of greater interest to the more advanced vapers out there is the three personalized ‘power curve’ slots.

Here you can fine tune your vape experience by setting in stone exactly how you want the Archon to fire your chosen coil.

For instance you might need to get your coil too heat up quickly before leveling out or vice versa.

All in all the Aspire Archon delivers for all levels of advanced vaping.

Design and Build Quality

As you’d expect from vaping giants Aspire the build is pretty much flawless.

Made from zinc alloy and tough plastic it’s surprisingly light and feels great in the hand.

A note of caution – I’m a clumsy sod and the Archon has a quite lovely but slippery texture – I managed to drop it getting it out of the box as it slipped out of my hands – luckily only onto the carpet – so do be careful!

The battery compartment is held in place by x4 strong magnets and should there be any rattle – as I found in the first few moments of use – a simple gentle squeeze of the cover tightens everything up nicely.

Design wise it gets its inspiration from the Aspire Plato AIO device and is very reminiscent of the Innokin Coolfire series.

As a fan of those I can hand on heart say this mod looks better – feels better and weighs about the same despite x2 18650 batteries.

Coming in just under 24mm wide it’s not the widest mod capable of operating up to 150 watts so those of you with larger drippers and tanks will find an overhang – bit of a shame really.

Now to the colours!

It comes in three designs – Black and Yellow [the one I received] – Navy Blue and Yellow and Grey and Yellow.

The yellow on all the mods comes on the banding around the mod itself which is a continuation of the extremely well designed battery compartment.

I’ll be frank here.

You’re either going to love it or hate it.

Yellow is of course Aspire’s colour so I can see why they’ve chosen it. It certainly stands out and adds something to the design – I’m kind of torn over it.

One moment I love it – the next I don’t – call me the Marmite kid – like I said you’ll love it or hate it – but great to see the designers thinking a little differently.

How Does The Aspire Archon Perform?

The Archon performs like an absolute dream.

The 5 key layout for instance is a simple yet superb feature that allows you to quickly and easily switch between power and temp modes.

The menu itself is refreshingly easy and the clear as gin screen makes everything sharp and intuitive.

Even a bumbling clumsy fingered old sod like me was able to whizz through setting power curve controls and personalizing the name.

I keep banging on about the ease of switching between power and temp mode with the addition of the W and T buttons – but honestly they make life a whole lot simpler trust me.

As to vaping on this beauty it handled everything I threw at it from the Evo at 70 watts to an RDA at 120 watts with no lag whatsoever.

I do not currently have a sub ohm  tank or coil that can handle 150watts – so 120 was where I maxed out but judging from other reviews and just using the Archon I have no doubt it will easily operate at that high wattage.

In temp control mode using the Cleito stainless steel SS316L temp control 0.4ohm coils at 475C I had no dry hits and the device refused to fire on empty – can’t expect better than that.

What I Like

I love the 5 button control – makes life so very much easier.

In temp control the Archon is simply fantastic and there are definitely no dry hits or burning.

I’m having a day where I quite like the yellow banding and overall I love the design and it really is extremely comfortable in the hand.

Battery life for me at a steady 70 watts is excellent – for the record I was using a pair of 3000Mah 3.7v XXX batteries kindly given to me for the purpose of this review by EcigaretteDirect.

I really like the battery compartment – this might sound a bit daft but this one is clean and a delight to look at!

The screen too adds to the overall look and feel of the Archon it’s clear and bright with the menu refreshingly simple to use.

What I Don’t Like

As I’m now very much into RDAs and RTAs I think more than a few vapers are going to be a bit miffed at the width of the Archon – at 23.4mm you are not going to get one of the new breed of super-tanks on there without considerable overhang.

That is the Big Baby tank from Smok – so you get an idea what I’m on about

Final Review Verdict

I’ve read somewhere the Archon is a ‘sophisticated device which is suited for advanced users only.’

I can see what they mean HOWEVER I am nowhere near an advanced user and found this a delightfully simple device to use.

Sure it has a ton of bells and whistles but none of them are what I’d call suitable for advanced users only.

I wouldn’t recommend this mod to a newcomer to vaping but someone looking to get into sub ohm and temperature control vaping with a rudimentary knowledge will find this a dream device.

The fact it takes two 18650 batteries shouldn’t put you off if you follow safety advice and safe battery management tips NOR should the fact it is capable of churning out 150 watts put you off.

As you can see I’m happy in the 50 to 100 watts range and whilst you’re not harnessing the Archon’s full power – who cares?

Should you wish to – then you have the chance to

Pros

• Great design
• Up to 150 watts
• 5 button controls
• Superb screen
• Excellent in-built safety features
• Handles temperature control vaping superbly
• Child lock
• Customizable power curves
• Customized ‘name change’
• Decent price

Cons

• The width means some tanks can expect overhang