Review of the Casio GW-1100 Analog G-Shock Tough Solar Waveceptor

I reviewed this watch’s all-digital little brother about a month ago, and found it to be a good watch for someone who needs something durable and inexpensive. If you’re really into Casio G-Shocks, though, you’ll definitely want to look at something more like the GW-1100 and its peers.

This is a big, bold G-Shock that’s just about as feature-rich as they come. It’s not exactly a lightweight, inconspicuous timepiece, but people don’t wear G-Shocks when they want their wrists to go unnoticed. Despite its size, weight, height, and the fact that there are ten noticeable screws keeping this watch water and dust-tight, I think it actually manages to convey a touch more class than your typical G-Shock.

Features of the Casio GW-1100 Analog G-Shock

• Solar powered. The face of the watch, behind the hands and in front of the four LCDs, is a good-sized solar cell which easily keeps this watch’s battery well charged. A couple of minutes of direct sunlight each day is the best way to keep a Tough Solar G-Shock happy (normal incandescent, and even fluorescent, lighting can also be used, though you’ll need substantially more of it), however Casio claims that a fully charged battery will power this model through normal use for up to seven months. I don’t have time to sit in the dark for seven months to test this theory, but I will say that even after prolonged disuse (so many watches, so little time), whenever I pick it back up, the battery has always been nearly fully charged, so my guess is that Casio’s claims are accurate. You don’t want to let the battery completely discharge, though, since it takes 24 hours of direct sunlight to fully recharge it which is not an easy feat unless you happen to be orbiting the Earth.
• Battery charge indicator. The LCD at the 6 o’clock position will let you know when you’ve been cooped up in your dark basement for too long, and that it’s time to get out into the sunshine for a little recharging.
• Power saving function. When not exposed to light for a prolonged period of time, the watch goes into power saving mode which means the LCDs turn off and the hands stop moving. Once it detects light again, or a button is pushed, or the watch is angled toward your face for reading, it awakens again. The LCDs come back on, and the analog hands scurry back into their proper places. Neat trick.
• Atomic timekeeping. This watch will calibrate itself up to five times a day using a radio signal broadcast by the cesium clock in Fort Collins, Colorado (or one of the two atomic clocks in Japan, depending on how the watch is configured). Calibration attempts are made at 1:00 a.m., 2:00 a.m., 3:00 a.m. and 4:00 a.m., and if none of those were successful, again at 5:00 a.m. (if nothing else, this watch is persistent). It chooses late night/early morning with the assumption you are asleep, and the watch is sitting peacefully beside you, dutifully facing Fort Collins near a window. The watch also records the date and time of its last successful calibration, so don’t worry about trying to stay awake to monitor it’s progress.
• Signal strength indicator. Very handy for finding the optimal spot to let your watch soak up the time calibration rays.
• Analog and digital time synchronization. This means that the hands on this watch are actually just an analog representation of the digital time. This may seem obvious, but Casio actually makes analog/digital watches where this is not the case. You can set the analog hands to be inconsistent with the digital time, but they will still be in-sync, just with an offset between them. I have another analog/digital G-Shock that arrived with the hands way off for some reason, but it was quite easy to get them synchronized, and they have stayed in-step ever since.
• World time. 30 cities (29 different time zones) around the world.
• Five alarms. Each is an independent daily alarm. Nothing special, except that there are five of them. Naturally, there’s an hourly time signal, as well.
• Auto-repeating countdown timer. 60 minutes is the timer’s ceiling, and it repeats up to nine times. You can turn the auto repeat function off in which case, the left-most LCD (the one at the 9 o’clock position) displays 1/10 seconds rather than the number of times the timer has repeated.
• Stopwatch. Measure elapsed time, split times, and two finishes up to 99:59′:99″.
• Electro-luminescent backlight. That means only the LCDs are illuminated, not the entire face of the watch. This watch also has an auto illumination function which means, when activated, it will illuminate automatically if you hold the watch parallel to the ground, then rotate it more than 40 degrees toward your face. It’s even smart enough not to activate itself if it senses that there’s enough light in the room that you shouldn’t need it. Pretty slick.
• Water resistant. 20 BAR (20 ATM, 200 meters, or 600 feet).
• Shock resistant. According to the manual, “The watch can be worn on the wrist during any hard sports. (Use care not to allow the front glass to butt against any hard objects.)” Although they don’t specify, it should be ok to wear during “soft sports,” as well.
• Scratch-resistant mineral crystal.
• Accurate up to about 15 seconds per month. Not exactly an engineering marvel, but consider this: 15 seconds per month is roughly .5 seconds per day (worse case scenario), so if the watch calibrates nightly, at any given time, it should never be more than a half second off, and most likely much less than that. Not bad.

More on Atomic Timekeeping

I’ve had much better luck calibrating this watch than I had with the GW-300 for some reason. Both watches are equally capable of receiving the radio signal (according to both signal strength indicators), however the GW-1100 is much more likely to interpret the signal, and to do so much faster. I can almost always get the GW-1100 to calibrate the first time I try, however the GW-300 often requires at least three tries. I even tested both watches side-by-side a couple times, and the GW-1100 was always calibrated itself faster and on fewer attempts.

This particular model was purchased in Kyoto, Japan (the all-black is hard to come by in the US), and I was worried initially that it might not be able to receive the signal broadcast from the US atomic clock since it uses a different frequency than the clock in Fukushima. I was pleasantly surprised to learn, however, that this watch functions equally well in the US and Japan. The watch automatically adjusts based on your home city setting. If your home city setting is LAX, DEN, CHI, or NYC, the watch uses the 60kHz frequency broadcast from Fort Collins. If your home city is TYO, the watch uses the 40kHz signal broadcast from Fukushima, or the 60kHz signal broadcast from Fukuoka. This is a big improvement over older Casio atomic watches I’ve had which actually require you to set the frequency directly.

It’s worth noting that your home city setting is different from the world time feature. Your home city is used to determine the atomic clock broadcast frequency, and your offset from GMT (the number of hours difference between where you are and Greenwich Mean Time). Your home city is a setting as opposed to a mode. World time is a mode, and does not effect time calibration or the analog time. World time uses the LCD at 3 o’clock to show you what time it is elsewhere in world which allows you to keep your eye on the time in two different places as once — imperative for anyone who travels with any frequency.

There are certain limitations on your ability to receive a time calibration signal, both here and in Japan. You might experience difficulties receiving a signal while in a building, while moving, while near certain electronics, while under or near high-tension power lines, or while in the mountains. If you don’t already own an atomic clock or watch, and you are wondering if you will be able to calibrate where you live, you might want to buy an inexpensive atomic device at your local Target or Wal-mart just to make sure you can indeed receive a signal before spending $300 or $400 on a high-end atomic Casio. I’ve tested this watch on both coasts of the US, and found I was able to get a signal in both places.

Availability

The GW-1100 and related watches are not the easiest Casios to come by in this country, unfortunately, but they’re also not impossible to find. I had the all-back model shown here shipped from Kyoto, though I’ve seen plenty of the metal models (GW1000DJ-9, GW1200A-1AV, GW1200BA-1AV) both on Casio’s website and in a few mall watch stores. If you have a store in your local mall completely dedicated to watches (as opposed to a Sunglass Hut or something), they are likely to carry a limited selection. Retail for these watches is between $350 and $400, but they can be had for less online or after some negotiating.

What I Like About the Casio GW-1100

• Countdown timer! It hasn’t been until relatively recently that solar atomic G-Shocks have started appearing with countdown timers which is a welcomed update.
• Large solar cells. I found that this watch recharges much faster and much more easily than the GW-300, perhaps due to the additional solar cell surface area.
• Nice buttons. The buttons are big, easily accessed, and don’t require too much pressure. Decent feedback, too.
• Nice big hands. G-Shocks are built for activity which means they have to be readable while doing things like running or playing sports. In the digital world, that means big numbers with enough contrast to make them stand out. In the analog word, that means wide, easily visible hands, which this G-Shock definitely has. Notice how the hour hand is a different color than the minute hand, as well. That makes them easier to distinguish, which means the watch is faster to read.
• Audible mode cues. This is a subtle feature that most Casios have these days which I really like. The watch beeps as you cycle through different modes, and plays a beep of a different tone when you land back on the main time mode. That means rather than squinting at the tiny LCDs trying to determine which is the main time mode, you can just listen for the higher pitched beep, and in fact, don’t even need to look at the watch at all. After wearing this watch for a few days, the audible cues become second nature.
• Big and bad. The size of this watch doesn’t bother me. I like the mass, bulk, and sheer presence of this watch (especially the all-black resin model). It makes quite a statement, and seldom goes unnoticed among watch aficionados.

What I Don’t Like

• The band is not as well designed as the watch itself. In fact, it looks like it was designed for sumo wrestlers. It’s huge, and really needs to be trimmed to keep the unused portion from flopping around. I haven’t trimmed mine because I often eventually pass my watches along to other people, but if you plan on keeping yours for a long time, you’ll probably want to take as much as half to a full inch off the end of the band.
• Although this is a very versatile watch, because it only has one small LCD to support several different modes (the other three LCDs don’t really change much as you change modes), you have to make some decisions on how you’re going to wear and use it. For instance, if you want to keep an eye on the time in two different time zones, you can’t see the date without changing modes. If you want to see the date and the day of the week, you can’t see seconds. You get the point. I don’t think it’s a huge downfall, however, since you can just change the view mode to suit your current circumstance.
• The electro-luminescent backlight only illuminates the four LCDs, not the face. That means unless the display mode is such that the 3 o’clock LCD is displaying the time digitally, even though the watch is illuminated, you still won’t know what time it is (the analog hands glow, but not enough to make sense of at 4:00 a.m. in the morning). I usually keep the 3 o’clock LCD in date mode, so this is a problem for me. If I want to see the time in the middle of the night, I actually have to change the display mode which is not easy when you’re not fully coherent.
• Up means down, and down means up. This is more of a complaint about Casios in general, but for some reason, the two buttons on the right side of the watch feel to me like they are reversed. They are used for cycling and scrolling, like when you need to increment or decrement values while setting alarms and such. Now here’s a little test. Would you expect the top button to increase a value, or decrease it? I say it should increase it, but on all the Casios I own, it decreases the value. Strange. I have a Tissot sitting right here next to me with a big plus symbol on the top button, and a big minus symbol on the lower. I guess the Swedes and the Japanese think differently. (This is a minor point, by the way — just something you have to get used to when donning a Casio.)

This line of G-Shocks brings four great features together into a single watch: solar power, atomic timekeeping, analog display, and a countdown timer — all in a big, bold, and very cool looking case. If you like G-Shocks, this is a must-have. If you like small, discrete, delicate watches, you will want to overlook this one and keep shopping.

Additional Resources

• GW-1100 user manual (PDF)
• Similar models (on Casio’s site)
  • GW1000DJ-9
  • GW1200A-1AV
  • GW1200BA-1AV

By Christian Cantrell