Casio PRW-2000 PAW-2000 watch Review

My wife bought me a Casio PRW-2000-1ER Pro Trek watch (PAW-2000 Pathfinder in some regions) for Christmas. Well I chose it, so it was no surprise, but she wrapped it and put it under the tree...

The PRW-2000 is a so called 'ABC' watch. That is, it has Altimeter, Barometer (and Temperature) and Compass functions. To that, Casio add solar-power plus synchronization with Atomic clocks world-wide via radio signal. Sunrise-sunset times, world-time, stopwatch, timer and alarms, and automatic Electo Luminescent (EL) illumination complete an impressive feature list packed into a tough (but not g-shock standard) 100m water resitant package.

So why did I choose it, and what are my impressions so far?


Though clearly designed for those engaged in outdoor pursuits, the PRW-2000 is slimmer than previous models, and whilst still a large watch, it doesn't look out of place as an everyday watch (especially given large watches are quite fashionable at the moment).

And that is what I chose it for - an everyday watch. I have an expensive 'dress' watch, but that isn't something I want to wear all the time. Instead I had been wearing an early Casio Waveceptor watch, but the strap recently broke, and the cheap glass (plastic?) and case were showing their age.

The ABC functions were not high on my list of priorities. But having got used to having the perfect timekeeping of the waveceptor I did want Atomic clock synchronization, and I could see the benefit of solar power. However, now that I need reading glasses, I also wanted a watch that was very easy to read - without having to put my reading glasses on. Whilst traditional clock hands would have been fine for telling the basic time, there was no way I could read the small dials or even some of the small digital displays that feature on some of the other Casio waveceptor watches, or Citizen AT models. Though they would have met most of my requirements, the displays on the Casio GW-2500-1AER or Citizen Skyhawk AT were just a bit too small. I did consider the Tissot T-Touch range, which have very readable displays, but they don't have the Atomic clock or solar functions.

I find the PRW-2000 ideal though - it has much larger digits that most watches and so I find I can use all the functions without needing my reading glasses. The small writing around the display is too small however, but once you are used to the watch, you have no real need to read them.

Compared to some earlier ABC watches, the PRW-2000 has a fairly clean design without too many protuberances. Though I went for the resin strap version, you can also buy a titanium case and band version - the PRW-2000t-7ER - or a more dressier version - the PRX-2000T - with sapphire crystal glass. Though you might have a hard time tracking one of those down outside of the far east.

So. What about that long list of functions? How do they perform?

Atomic Clock Synchronization.
My original waveceptor only synchronized with the UK and German atomic clocks. The PRW-2000 now adds the clocks in the US, Japan and China.

Here in the UK I have no problems with it successfully synchronizing every night. Though the date and time of the last sychronization is shown, it doesn't however show whether it is from the UK or Germany, both of which I can receive. However, it doesn't really mater I guess.

As I do travel I am looking forward to seeing how it performs elsewhere, particularly in the US.

World-Time
You set your 'home city' from a list of 48 cities in 33 time zones, and then can display your home time along with the local time in another city in the world-time mode.
This is simple enough to use, but the list of 48 cities seems a bit small.
The city codes are based on IATA airport/City codes. Some are fairly obvious like NYC = New York City, but where is YEA? I had to google that one (Edmondton). Some like NYC and LON are city codes rather than specific airport codes - typically where a city has more than one airport.
The display also shows the home time and local time using pointers to a 24 hour dial around the edge of the display.

It would have been nice if you could have a dual time setting on the main display, but as it is, you can only toggle that between displaying in the top left corner the year, day, or a recording of the barometer.
Sunrise/Sunset Times
The sunrise and sunset times can be displayed for any date, not just today. As well as the digital times, the pointers also indicate them on the 24 hour scale.
The times are meant to be displayed for the current home city, or any other city can be selected. However, even though my home city is set for London, the latitude/longtitude settings were for Berlin, and hence the times were wrong. Fortunately, you can set the latitude/longtitude manually, and this is necessary anyway unless you are in one of the 48 preset cities - not that this seemed to help in my case.



Compass Display
The PRW-2000 has a two layer display. The compass overlays the direction pointers on one display, and the digital readout below them. (this is the same on the pointers discussed above).
It also records bearings, so in this example it is showing the last bearing as 243 degrees, and the current as 153. The pointers show north with the thick 3-bar pointer, and the memory with the single pointer.
You can calibrate the compass with appropriate magnetic declination settings for your current location.
Accuracy seemed fine, though I could only compare it with other electronic compasses I have (iPhone 3GS and a GPS unit)

Barometer Display
The barometer displays the current air pressure and temperature, as well as a graph of the air pressue readings in the top left. The pointer shows the difference to the last reading.
This seemed to match my local weather forecast perfectly, so I guess it is OK. It is calibrated at the factory.
The temperature requires you to take the watch off for 20-30 minutes to get an accurate reading, so as many have commented with such watches there doesn't seem much value in this function. But I guess if you are off exploring, it does give you a method of recording the temperature during your rest breaks if you want to log it for some reason. But I would worry about forgetting my watch each time I stopped!

Altitude Display
As the altitude display is based on the barometer readings and air pressure can vary it really needs a reference altitude to be input first in order to get an accurate reading.
When I first got the watch the pressure was low and it was showing my altitude as 175m even though I live at 75m. Now the pressure is higher, it is showing my altitude at 50m.
Hence the altitude is most useful when you go out hicking for the day and can set a reference altitude off a map taking into account the current air pressure at the beginning of your climb.
There are various settings to record altitude at different intervals so that you can record your climb.

Stopwatch/Timer/Alarm functions
There's not much point showing pictures for these here as the functions are fairly obvious I would hope and there's nothing particularly unique about them on the PRW-2000. You can find the pictures in my flickr gallery along with many others at a higher resolution than used here. There are five alarms, but I didn't think it was very loud. You wouldn't hear it in a noisy environment.

Electro Luminescent (EL) Illumination
The PRW-2000 has an EL panel that can be configured to light up automatically when you tilt you wrist more than 40 degrees in low light conditions.
I found this very useful, though in the default setting it doesn't stay illuminated for long, but this can be changed - though presumably using a lot more power if you use it a lot.





On the Wrist
As I said earlier it is a big watch. Here you can see it on my 6.5" wrist. I find it very comfortable. There is plenty of adjustment in the resin strap. A couple of resin 'cushions' for want of a better term on the back of the watch seem to mold the watch to your wrist and help with the comfort.

The solar power function does warn that the watch obviously won't be charging if it is under shirt or coat sleeves. I did wonder if this was going to be an issue as unless I am wearing short sleeves in the summer, then much of the time it will be covered up. (who would wear jackets or shirts where the sleeves finish 3" above your wrist?). However, it hasn't been an issue so far. It comes fully charged out of the box, and it has indicated as on medium charge each day since even though it hasn't got a huge amount of sunlight.

Conclusions
Overall I am very pleased with the watch. It has more functions than I will probably ever user, at least regularly. The main functions I actually wanted it for - big clear display, atomic watch synchronization,and solar power, seem to all work as well as I could have hoped for.

Photo Gallery
There are a lot more photos and at higher resolution in my flickr gallery

Retailer
For anyone who is interested, mine was purchased from the British Watch Company, who have it at the lowest price I can find in the UK (£186 at time of writing), and gave excellent express delivery with tracking. Recommended.