Casio G-shock Wave Ceptor Digital Watch - GW-002E-1VER

I bought this watch to replace a previous G-shock watch which I've had for over 10 years. The old watch still works, but looks very tatty now. I work in heavy engineering with sledgehammers and air impact tools (windy guns) in daily use. These are normally fatal activities for normal watches.

This toughsolar/waveceptor version was irresistable for the price, at just under half the rrp it was a bargain.

The watch seems to be up to casio's usual high standards and looks and feels quite solid. The new composite construction makes the watch considerably lighter than the old all steel body of the previous g-shocks. Whether it's as rugged is yet to be proved!!

The solar powered battery seems to be the dream power supply for watches, meaning no more trips to the jeweler. In the time I've had the watch, the handy battery charge indicator has never dropped below full, considering it spends most of the day under overalls, I find this impressive. Casio say the watch can live in darkness for up to 8 months from a full charge.

Equally impressive is the automatic light, tilt the watch towards your face from a horizontal position and the green backlit display comes on for a couple of seconds. As a powersave function, this only works when it is dark enough. This feature can be turned off and the light activated manually by pressing the prominent "g" button on the front of the watch. Another powersave function is that the display turns off after an hour or so in the dark, pressing a button, or bringing it into the light brings the display back on in an instant.

The icing on the cake for me is the waveceptor atomic radio updated timekeeping. Mine came set for germany, this is the default setting, turning my hometown back to london gave the correct time. The watch updates itself every morning at about 3am. There is a signal strength indicator on the display, supposedly to help put the watch in an ideal position for the update, but mine is always on full, even though I live 200+ mile from rugby. The watch is always spot on time, and even put itself back an hour this morning (the clocks went forward today!).

All the usual casio features are also present, 5 alarms, hourly chime, stop watch, worldtime, and a countdown timer, which is sadly only an hour.

All in all a fab watch, and I'm hoping to get 10+ years service from it.

I'm a bit of a watch 'addict' to be honest, and seem to get bored of them very quickly and shift them on. I've had a couple of G-Shocks, and I seem to get bored of them very quickly, despite their famed construction and durability. This watch, however, is the perfect 'spare' to my main watch. The beauty of this watch is that it will sit quietly in the draw for days / weeks, and you can forget it's there. Then when you need it for the weekend, just whip it out the drawer. The minute the solar panels detect light, it wakes the watch up, and because of the atomic time keeping it will be accurate to the second. The auto light is brilliant, in so much that the watch will only light up when you turn your watch to check the time in dim / poor / no light. At all other times just leave the function activated and your battery will be spared. The functions are a little basic by todays standards. The 4 alarms are a little excessive, but the snooze function is a god send for me. The 24hr stop watch is great to have, but the countdown timer is only 60 minutes, and can only be set in minutes, not seconds. The time zones are a nice extra feature to have. The display is simple yet classy, the dark grey charcoal effect strap and case look great, and it is very light making it extremely comfortable on the wrist. I'd be happy to use this as my main watch, but my Omega takes precedence. A great watch that is beautifully understated, getting the basics absolutely spot on and not overcomplicating matters.

This watch is fantastic. Simply set it all up, which is more than easy to do, and forget about it. With the waveceptor and tough solar technology it will always be accurate and won't run out of power. It's robust, comfortable to wear, light-weight and looks quite nice. What else do you need. The only little niggle I have is that the countdown timer can only be set in 1 minute steps, so you can't let it count down from e.g. 6min 30sec. But that is really the only thing I would like to see improved. 200 metres water resist, I think when I'm at a greater depth than that I am in trouble anyway and don't worry about the time anymore ;-) I really like it and got it for £47.99 from The Watch Hut through Amazon. So don't pay too much ... Strongly recommended :-)