www.watchreport.com/2006/03/review_of_the_m.html
I've been waiting for this watch for a while now, so it's a real pleasure to finally have the opportunity to review it. The Casio Pathfinder PAW1200 is what I've referred to several times as the ultimate Pathfinder, perhaps the ultimate Casio, and certainly one of the most advanced digital timepieces in the world. What makes the Casio Pathfinder PAW1200 series special is the fact that it brings so many features together into one watch. I'll get into plenty of detail on each individual feature shortly, but most notably, the PAW1200 series is the first to bring together the triple-sensor functionality of the Pathfinder line (compass, barometer, and thermometer), atomic time calibration, and solar power. I have several solar-powered watches, several atomic watches, and a few triple-sensor watches by various manufacturers, but the PAW1200 is the only watch that I know of with all of these features. And as if that isn't enough, the PAW1200 series is what Casio calls a multi-band atomic watch, which means it will calibrated with almost every atomic clock in the world (details below). Ok, now for a feature breakdown: * Multi-band atomic timekeeping. The PAW1200 series will pick up time calibration signals transmitted from Mainflingen (Germany), Rugby (England), Fort Collins (Colorado), Fukushima (Japan), and Fukuoka (also Japan). The radius of the time signals are large enough that all of North America, Japan, and Eastern Europe are well covered. The watch knows the frequency to listen on (and what time zone you're in) by your selected home city. It will attempt to calibrate up to six times each day starting a midnight, and again every hour until it succeeds. I have had the PAW1200 for about two weeks now, and it has successfully calibrated on my wrist every night on its first attempt from my home in San Francisco. You can also force the watch to calibrate with a manual receive function, however I've found that it rarely receives a strong enough signal during the day to calibrate successfully. You can check the last signal reception results in receive mode which will indicate the date and exact time of the last successful calibration. Casio watches are accurate to about +- 15 seconds per month without atomic calibration, so with calibration, your watch should never be more than a fraction of a second off. The batteries in the PAW1200 series are recharged by a solar cell just below the crystal around the parameter of the watch. Fully charged, and with the power-saving function enabled, the battery will power the watch for about five months with no light. Although all the Casio manuals I've seen for solar watches are full of warnings about keeping your watch exposed to light and not letting it hide under your sleeve too long, all the solar watches I have seem to gather light very efficiently, and are almost always fully charge. The PAW1200 is no exception despite all its additional functionality. The PAW1200 series has a built-in digital compass which will indicate magnetic north (or geographic north, if you adjust the calibration for your magnetic declination), the direction the 12 o'clock position of the watch is facing, and the angle between the 12 o'clock position and magnetic north measured in degrees. The bearing is displayed graphically using six blue lines on a separate LCD floating above the watch's primary LCD. All measurements continue to be updated for 20 seconds after the first measurement is displayed at which point the last measurement remains visible. The PAW1200 series can measure the barometric pressure, and display it in both hectoPascals (millibars) and inches of mercury for us yanks. While in barometer mode, the PAW1200 series also displays a barometric pressure graph which charts the pressure over the last 30 hours (measurements are taken at the top of each even-numbered hour). Positive slopes (going up from left to right) generally indicate improving weather while negative slopes (going down from left to right) generally indicate deteriorating weather. While in barometric mode, the secondary LCD is used as a pressure differential pointer which indicates the relative difference between the current barometric reading, and the previous reading. The barometric pressure and the temperature are displayed together on the PAW1200 series. While in barometer mode, the temperature is displayed below the barometric pressure, and can be configured to use either Celsius or Fahrenheit. The range is -10DEG C to 60DEG C, or 14DEG F to 140DEG F * Altimeter. There are two ways in which PAW1200 series can measure your altitude. First, it can use the watch's barometric reading to estimate your altitude based on preprogrammed values stored in the watch. The other technique is to allow you to specify a reference altitude. For instance, if you want to measure the height of a hill, you can set the reference altitude to 0 at the bottom, climb the hill, then take another reading at the top to tell you how high the hill is. Setting a reference altitude is generally a more accurate way to measure your altitude because it automatically takes current barometric conditions into consideration which can easily throw the first method off. In other words, with the second method, the watch is measuring the change in barometric pressure rather than trying to map a given barometric pressure to a preprogrammed altitude. The range of the watch's altimeter is -700 to 10,000 meters, or -2,300 to 32,800 feet (both meters and feet are supported). While in altimeter mode, the watch will measure your altitude every 5 seconds for the first three minutes, then every two minutes after that. Like barometer mode, the altimeter also has an altitude differential pointer which graphically indicates the difference between the current altitude, and the last altitude measurement taken. Not only does the PAW1200 series measure your altitude, but it will also let you save records of your ascents and descents. The watch stores three types of altitude records: periodic records (up to 40), a current session record, and a historical record. The breadth of altitude recording capabilities is too great to get into in detail here, but believe me when I say that they are extensive. In addition to 40 periodic records, the watch also records the month, day, and time of the session, your high altitude, low altitude, total ascent, total descent, and your relative altitude change. The PAW1200 series doesn't just measure your altitude and allow you to record your altitude in three different ways, but it also allows you to set an altitude alarm which, when the watch is in altitude mode, will sound during both an ascent and a descent when the specified altitude is reached. No digital watch is complete without a world time function -- especially a watch that can pick up time signals all over the world. The PAW1200 series has the standard Casio world time functionality, which means it's pretty good. It allows you to choose from 30 cities by name (actually abbreviation), and lets you toggle between daylight saving and standard time with a single button. The resolution is 1/100th of a second, the maximum time is 9 hours, 59 minutes, and 59 seconds, and it supports one split time (for two finishes). Another digital watch feature I insist on is the countdown timer. Countdown timers are great for cooking frozen pizzas, counting down to the end of eBay auctions, and measuring your kids' timeouts. The countdown timers on the PAW1200 maxes out at 60 minutes, and has an auto-repeat function which will automatically restart the timer up to 10 times. The countdown timer also has a progress beeper which, when activated, will cause the watch to beep at various intervals as time expires in order to provide a little extra drama. The alarms on the PAW1200 series are pretty straightforward. If I could add one feature to this watch, it would probably be at least one programmable alarm, which is an alarm that allows you to set the date in addition to the time. It's usually easier for me to set an alarm on my watch than pull out my phone and set a future event on my calendar. Casios don't typically have programmable ...
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