The backpacking gear market is saturated with super-compact, ultralight canister stoves, but the new Primus Firestick looks quite different from the pack. The 3.5-oz (99 g) burner folds down into a cylinder that's smaller than an 8.4-oz can of Red Bull, sliding easily into a pocket or backpack pouch. When it's time to pour some boiling water into a pouch of dehydrated chili, the stove fans out to hold your pot like an upside-down tripod.

After our initial fascination with the Firestick's cylindrical shape wore off, we realized that many existing triple-prong backpacking stoves already pack ridiculously small and light, flipping and twisting into palm-sized gizmos that can all but be carried on a keychain. We're thinking of models like the MSR PocketRocket 2, Snow Peak GigaPower 2.0 and Primus' own Micron Trail.

So why reinvent the form factor?