The pages of discussion here have been very good. I have one or two questions/comments.

If anybody has one of these straws that do filtration - could you actually give us a field test report. I'd really like to know how easy it is to suck water thru the straw. For example, if I place the end of the straw in a puddle of water (cloudy water) and suck on the other end - how fast does water come through?

I have generally used filtration, and especially like Katadyn. The main drawback is that the water needs to have dirt/mud removed first or the pores in the filter will clog quickly.

Iodine tabs and other tabs are probably fine. In a pinch if I was desperate ... bleach too. It's just that the water tastes bad afterwards. You need some discipline to drink a lot of that stuff.

There's nothing wrong with good old fashioned boiling. Can't argue with that. I keep seeing different numbers for how long the water needs to be at a rolling boil.

Pete2