Sinistar
En-Route
- Joined
- Sep 9, 2016
- Messages
- 3,712
- Display Name
Display name:
Brad
Quick Review
A solar powered analog+digital standard watch with an actual touch screen. Very light given its size. Touch screen is under utilized and a few European vs US quirks when configuring the display. Dual time zones, chronograph, barometric pressure, altimeter and compass. The watch hands serve as both feature and compass pointers. I like it but wish they would remedy a few things. Probably too big for people with small wrists. Price recently reduced to $420. I threw a couple gift cards at it and final price was $340 after taxes.
Quick Video (not mine)
Skip to time 00:30 and you can see the digital display and how the hour and minutes move to assist in the features. This is the one I wanted but still too much money.
Longer Version
I don't know much about watches. I am definitely not a collector. This is actually the second watch I have ever owned. I like it and will keep it.
Started With A Digital Watch
The first watch I bought is the Suunto Core. At $130, the Core is a decent digital watch. I never really used the barometer or compass. The altimeter is kinda cool. It does work in the plane, being off just a bit (as expected). However I find the altimeter far more interesting to use when doing light hiking or driving. My biggest gripe with the Core is that it eats batteries. But I also want the analog feel.
Analog + Digital Watches
There are starting to be a few analog watches with digital displays in the face. It works for me but I can see how a pure analog watch lover would hate it. Even Breitling has a few offerings including this one that also has a 121.4/406 emergency transmitter!
What I Like About The Tissot And Makes It Unique
#1: The Touchscreen: No, not a smart watch touchscreen. Far from it. If your preference is for the smart watch this is not for you. The touchscreen on this watch is for simple feature selection and nothing else. What that does buy you is less pushers so only (3) on one side where many chronographs have pushers on both sides.
#2: The Hands: On the Tissot T Touch watches the hands are not directly coupled to the movement. They can be commanded to any location. The best example is the compass. When you active the compass the hands line up to form a long pointer and continuously point north. Unlike a liquid compass needle the hands do not get stuck. When outside the compass works pretty good actually. To me its a gadget that could be handy in a emergency situation I guess. The other thing the hands do is point to the selected feature and rotate out of the way of the digital display temporarily. They look nice and for short periods of time the night glow is fantastic.
#3 Solar Powered: This was a major feature for me. No more digital watch battery problems. Supposedly this thing can run all day on 7 minutes of sunlight. Plus the battery really extends that.
#4 Wears Nicely: It was a bit big so I just figured it would wear heavy on the wrist. Nope. Its great. Obviously the titanium helps. The pushers are tucked in nicely and only on one side. And the wrist strap size is about perfect. If anything just 1mm or 2mm narrow for my wrist.
What Did They Screw Up (In Order):
#1: The price. This just seems like it should be a $600 watch (list) and sell for $425. But the list price is usually over $1100 and then discounted to the $780 range. If they fixed up the other items below maybe it would be worth $100 more.
#2: The touchscreen. Here you have this great interface and it is so lightly used. Often you push the main pusher, touch the screen once and then back to using pushers. Why not have a menu option to use the touch screen to start the timer, etc.
#3: Menus/options. So you want DD/MM/YYYY and 24hr clock. Not gonna happen! You either get MM/DD/YYYY and 24hr or MM/DD/YYYY in 12hr. Another one is the barometric pressure and altimeter. They allow altimeter in meters or feet. But have no option for barometric pressure - always on hPa. There's a few more but you get the point.
#4: Sunrise/Sunset: Not available
The Suunto has that option and I was surprised how often I used it both flying and in general. Seems quite simple to implement in a super tiny baby little micro.
#5: Negative Display: With strong light behind the watch or evening before sunset it is a bit hard to ready. In bright sunlight or room lights it is fantastic. It does have a back light option though.
#6. Night Glow On Watch Hands And Hour Marks
I don't use many watches so I expected it to be intense for a long period of time. Mentioned earlier, the first 15 minutes are intense. Then within 15 minutes or so it has faded to a much dimmer glow in the dark. I can see it. It is usable. But as an example, taking the dog out after dark its easier to active the digital back light than take a few seconds for eyes to adjust and see the subtle night glow.
...or just use your smartphone
A solar powered analog+digital standard watch with an actual touch screen. Very light given its size. Touch screen is under utilized and a few European vs US quirks when configuring the display. Dual time zones, chronograph, barometric pressure, altimeter and compass. The watch hands serve as both feature and compass pointers. I like it but wish they would remedy a few things. Probably too big for people with small wrists. Price recently reduced to $420. I threw a couple gift cards at it and final price was $340 after taxes.
Quick Video (not mine)
Skip to time 00:30 and you can see the digital display and how the hour and minutes move to assist in the features. This is the one I wanted but still too much money.
Longer Version
I don't know much about watches. I am definitely not a collector. This is actually the second watch I have ever owned. I like it and will keep it.
Started With A Digital Watch
The first watch I bought is the Suunto Core. At $130, the Core is a decent digital watch. I never really used the barometer or compass. The altimeter is kinda cool. It does work in the plane, being off just a bit (as expected). However I find the altimeter far more interesting to use when doing light hiking or driving. My biggest gripe with the Core is that it eats batteries. But I also want the analog feel.
Analog + Digital Watches
There are starting to be a few analog watches with digital displays in the face. It works for me but I can see how a pure analog watch lover would hate it. Even Breitling has a few offerings including this one that also has a 121.4/406 emergency transmitter!
What I Like About The Tissot And Makes It Unique
#1: The Touchscreen: No, not a smart watch touchscreen. Far from it. If your preference is for the smart watch this is not for you. The touchscreen on this watch is for simple feature selection and nothing else. What that does buy you is less pushers so only (3) on one side where many chronographs have pushers on both sides.
#2: The Hands: On the Tissot T Touch watches the hands are not directly coupled to the movement. They can be commanded to any location. The best example is the compass. When you active the compass the hands line up to form a long pointer and continuously point north. Unlike a liquid compass needle the hands do not get stuck. When outside the compass works pretty good actually. To me its a gadget that could be handy in a emergency situation I guess. The other thing the hands do is point to the selected feature and rotate out of the way of the digital display temporarily. They look nice and for short periods of time the night glow is fantastic.
#3 Solar Powered: This was a major feature for me. No more digital watch battery problems. Supposedly this thing can run all day on 7 minutes of sunlight. Plus the battery really extends that.
#4 Wears Nicely: It was a bit big so I just figured it would wear heavy on the wrist. Nope. Its great. Obviously the titanium helps. The pushers are tucked in nicely and only on one side. And the wrist strap size is about perfect. If anything just 1mm or 2mm narrow for my wrist.
What Did They Screw Up (In Order):
#1: The price. This just seems like it should be a $600 watch (list) and sell for $425. But the list price is usually over $1100 and then discounted to the $780 range. If they fixed up the other items below maybe it would be worth $100 more.
#2: The touchscreen. Here you have this great interface and it is so lightly used. Often you push the main pusher, touch the screen once and then back to using pushers. Why not have a menu option to use the touch screen to start the timer, etc.
#3: Menus/options. So you want DD/MM/YYYY and 24hr clock. Not gonna happen! You either get MM/DD/YYYY and 24hr or MM/DD/YYYY in 12hr. Another one is the barometric pressure and altimeter. They allow altimeter in meters or feet. But have no option for barometric pressure - always on hPa. There's a few more but you get the point.
#4: Sunrise/Sunset: Not available
The Suunto has that option and I was surprised how often I used it both flying and in general. Seems quite simple to implement in a super tiny baby little micro.#5: Negative Display: With strong light behind the watch or evening before sunset it is a bit hard to ready. In bright sunlight or room lights it is fantastic. It does have a back light option though.
#6. Night Glow On Watch Hands And Hour Marks
I don't use many watches so I expected it to be intense for a long period of time. Mentioned earlier, the first 15 minutes are intense. Then within 15 minutes or so it has faded to a much dimmer glow in the dark. I can see it. It is usable. But as an example, taking the dog out after dark its easier to active the digital back light than take a few seconds for eyes to adjust and see the subtle night glow.
...or just use your smartphone
