I purchased a Paramo Alta 2 about 4 years ago, it might be five, it cost me £250 fro0m Go Camping.? I assume the Alta 3 is not that much different? I like the Alta 2 longish sleeves, not elasticated which I prefer, I liked the hood and I like the body length of it, it covers my bottom. The outside and inside chest pockets worked well.
The hip pockets didn't work that well when wearing my rucksack. What I was not so keen was even the small size felt biggish on me (easy to live with though) and I felt it was 'heavy' (just me I'm sure!) and I was never totally sold on the idea that it was 'waterproof.' I proofed it quite a few times but was never really sold on this as a solution. It always seemed to get quickly wet on the inside, did it leak or was it just condensation, I was never totally sure? It was also, for me, too hot as a jacket in the warmer months so I quickly put it aside to wear in the colder months. I stopped wearing it about 18 months ago when the zip failed, just not prepared to spend about £50 to get it repaired.
By then I'd persuaded myself that I prefered a single skin jacket so bought a Marmot Precip, for me a much better option. But I was also strongly thinking a lot differently about keeping dry, keeping warm and keeping cool so have now moved on by dividing all of my clothing into two distinct groups, one group to do with cold, wind, heat and dry weather, the other group is how to deal with all types of rain, with or without wind at the time. I now use a cheap Champion long coat, cost me £15 and after my last few days of hiking in lots of wind and rain my coat works extremely well.
From my experience over the past few days (I experienced a lot of HEAVY showers!) rain is not really a problem! Its all to do with how you view it and plan for it. I belive its all of the other weathers that are the problem to plan for. One item that was always lacking in my wardrobe was a windshell, now that I have one (a Rab Vital) I consider it my most important item of clothing, by a mile!