Anyone who owns a Suunto Vector (or Core) watch ?

[Top-Gear-24]

Just wondering if there's anybody here who owns a Suunto Vector watch (or a Suunto Core) to hear what they think of it.  I'm thinking about buying myself a Suunto (to have something else, next to my Casio GW-9200 Riseman and my Casio PRW-1300Y Pathfinder).

Hope you guys can help  .

[jzmtl]

Core all black, big but light, reverse display is cool but a bit hard to read in dusk without backlight. Lots and lots of function, heck even has a dive meter and you can push the buttons underwater.

It's great if you use the functions or like its style. I'm not hardcore enough to need it so mine's been sitting in the drawer. Keep wanting to sell it but never got around to.

[kkokkolis]

I always wanted a Core or a Tissot T-Touch but the Casio Pro Trek was much more reasonable and helped me overcome it. Now that with a 3G Smartphone I have compass and GPS and real time weather everywhere I need one even less and still swim with my Casio. But this Core is so beautiful!

[lowtech]

Just a teaser, as this thread was picture- less



My Mariner. I own a Vector to.

Great functionality, but I wear them next to never as my wrist is a little small and I´m so used to my G-Shocks functions.

From what I have heard and experienced:
Battery is easy to replace
Crystal scratches easily
30 m WR rating is very conservative - known to withstand more pressure
Readings are accurate, especially because of the alti-lock which reduces altitude- drift in changing weather

[Top-Gear-24]

Thanks for the replies guys  .

@ lowtech:

I went to the local outdoor shop today to see the Vector in real life, I tried it on and indeed, it's a big watch, but since I'm quite a big guy (194 cm/100 kg) it felt quite good on my wrist, and much lighter than my Casio Riseman (or even my protrek PRW-1300Y).  It felt a bit like my Polar S725 (my bicycle watch), which is also quite a big/thick watch, but also very light.

The battery was one of my concerns, because at the moment I'm spoiled with the solar powered Casio's, but when you say that it's easy to replace the battery yourself, the "non-solar" thing is no longer a problem.

I also heard that the altimeter is more precise than the ones on the Casio's (these are way off sometimes ... ), reading your answer I'd say you also confirm this, right ?

WR rating is less important for me, as long as it can survive when I put my hands into a mountainriver, or a swimm in the pool it's ok for me, anything under 2 meters deep and I won't be looking at my watch because I will be too busy drowning ....

Thanks for the help guys, if there's anyone who would like to add something here, please do  .

[jzmtl]

I assume you already know how the altimeter works in watches. The core has three modes. Altitude lock which assumes you aren't going up and down, so any change in air pressure is due to weather. Sea level pressure lock which assumes weather doesn't change and you are moving up and down. Then the auto mode starts in altitude lock unless there's a very fast change in pressure (faster than 99% of natural weather change), then it switch to pressure lock.

It works well most of the time, but fast changing weather and moving at same time can throw it out of whack.

You can set reference any time by input altitude or sea level pressure. The watch doesn't give you actual pressure like Casio does, but that's not particularly important anyway.

[kkokkolis]

I think that since you own Casio's the Cores are a better choice because they are dressy. I would wear them on a suit any time, especially the black one.

[jzmtl]

One thing I don't like about core (or any other watches) is proprietary lug, so you are stuck with their strap. Some core comes with lugs as part of strap (like above photo) but those pivot on both ends, so you can't use a nato/zulu strap with it.

[kkokkolis]

Just a little enabling if you don't mind.

http://www.tissot.ch/?collections

[Zed]

I had a black and yellow vector or was it a core  well i found the revers display hard to read with my bad eye sight and put off by the 30m wr,ended up selling it as prefered my protrek prg40. 

[lowtech]

Jzmtl is right in explaining the Altimeter / Barometer.
Casios are sometimes off because they misinterpret fast weather changes as altitude change- the sensor itself is pretty accurate.

The Battery can be changed with a coin/washer. Suunto sells kits with bvattery, new seal and new cover cheaply, so even if you mess the cover up, it´s no problem.

I am with Zed - The Negative display can be hard to read, although it looks really nice.

There are aftermarket solutions to fix other straps to the Core andSuunto sells a Velcro strap for teh Vector whose holders/lugs will also accept NATO /ZULU straps.

Thank you for remembering me of teh Core and teh Tissots, Guys.  Dirty enablers...
To compensate i´ll put at least some batteries in my PRG 40 and my Vector this weekend.

[Top-Gear-24]

Thanks for the help everybody  .

Jzmtl is right in explaining the Altimeter / Barometer.
Casios are sometimes off because they misinterpret fast weather changes as altitude change- the sensor itself is pretty accurate ...

I knew that sudden weather changes were the biggest problem with the Altimeter/Barometer on the Casio's, and I read somewhere that the Suunto's were more accurate but I didn't know if this was true.   

Because in the end, the problem with using barometric pressure to measure altitude remains, if the weather suddenly changes, so does the barometric pressure, and thanks to Jzmtl I now know why the Suunto's are more accurate (more accurate is not entirely correct, if I understand it correctly, you can "help" the sensor by telling him the weather or your altitude is not changing).

Is this feature (the locking of altitude/weather) only available on the Core, or is it also there on the Vector ?  If you can't do this on the Vector, than the Vector is probably not so different from my Casio's when it comes to "accuracy" I guess ...

I was thinking about buying the Vector because I can get it at a discount price, while the Core is about 120 € more expensive.

P.S. And no, you can't trick me in buying a Tissot  .

(not yet at least ...  ).

 

[kkokkolis]

P.S. And no, you can't trick me in buying a Tissot  .

(not yet at least ...  ).

 

Did I mention that Tissot is SWISS? 

[Top-Gear-24]

First of all, thank you all for your input, you guys are the best  .

And I can tell you guys that I've made a decision, so here's my new ABC watch ...










... building tension ... 





















So, I decided to go for the Core, because it offers more options than the Vector, and I found this one in a local Sportshop for 50 Euro's more than the Vector.  And since my birthday is coming up (next month) my wife said I could use some extra funds  .

[derekmac]

Oh man, what a great looking watch!   I really NEED one of those, but sadly, my watch fund is sitting at $0.00


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