The I.T. Life

I’m a big watch fan, the problem is I don’t have the money to buy the ones I really love. Now, even though the price for this citizen is TBA, it will be part of that list. The new Satellite Wave from Citizen features a sleek and modern design, with some pretty fancy tech to power it. Unlike atomic watches which use RF, Citizen actually picks your local time via a GPS. And like other Eco Drive watches, this is solar powered to keep it constantly running.

This is the stuff of science fiction, something you could imagine a top secret covert ops team wearing (Maybe Sam Fisher? Or Solid Snake?). What we have hear is a pair of snow goggles that can give you your gps map location, speed, altitude, caller ID, current playing song, and whatever else that those crazy Android developers can come up with, since these have a open sdk for the hardware, the sky (or the snow) is the limit. You can buy them here, but there not cheap (over $400).

Nike has stepped it up a notch with there new SportWatch; they have taken there very popular show based sensor (heck, my dad has one) and paired it with GPS technology by TomTom. The GPS will track your trip and the the Nike+ sensor will track the pace, distance, heart rate, etc and post them to NikePlus.com It is a pretty cool product for the runners out there… Thought it isn’t cool enough for me to want to start running.

I try to be fairly active outdoors, however I’ve never done enough to justify something like SPOT. For those that are not aware of what it is, SPOT is a device you take hiking, camping, wherever; you pay a small fee for monitoring and if you get yourself in trouble you hit the button, it transmits via satellite your GPS coords to the monitoring center, and they contact the correct (and nearest) authority. The big point of SPOT is to have a SAR team on speed dial basically. However, I have some beef about this; the reason is many SAR teams respond to the police, and thats it. However, that doesn’t make this any less useful. On top of those emergency services, SPOT can also send emails, SMS messages, Facebook, Twitter, whatever. You can basically keep track of your trip, and let your friends know where you are without messing around with a cell phone and reception. Very cool for sure.

Now, lets talk about the new SPOT Connect. A problem with SPOT is it is this great device, however you do all the configuring before you leave home, and you carry a device with basically 3 buttons (I’m OK, Help, and 911). You can set I’m OK to send facebook messages, or things of that nature. But that is it; no screen, nothing. So the SPOT connect takes the same GPS tracking and communication, and adds bluetooth; this way you can control it all from your smartphone. Pretty cool eh? Check it out.

So I’m drooling over new watches, and with my new active lifestyle and my birthday coming up in a few months, it might be the best time to make people know what I want. I’ve decided I want a Suunto watch. I’ve liked Suunto for years and they are a very well known brand, they started with compasses, and they still make great ones, but now they are into everything from you standard heart rate watch, to full military spec GPS watches. I’ve convinced myself I don’t need a GPS watch because I have a very nice unit already (though its not built into a watch). I have a belt clip so if I’m walking, and can get a handlebar mount for cheap if I’m biking, and if I’m kayaking its waterproof anyways. So anyways, this leaves me to some other features they offer that I want. First almost all watches come with a digital compass, altimeter, and barometer, so they can give you weather and everything, there great. Now the next feature I want is a heart rate monitor, and this is where I get myself into some trouble. The watches with HR monitors (in my opinion) are pug ugly. There basic, boaring, and look like any cheap Timex $30 watch. However, there is a watch, (the Core) that is a very nice watch, looks great (many styles actually, I want black/orange) and does all the basic altimeter, barometer, compass, etc however, it does not do HR. So, I’m between a rock and a ugly place. I can get all the data I want, but have a watch I will likely only wear when I am exercising, or a watch that is as attractive as my other watches, however doesn’t give me HR data. Now, I’m a gadget fan, and not a big all in one fan, so if I can find a pocket HR monitor or something like that, I may be convinced…. But for now, I’m sold on the Core.