The Ultimate Casio Pro Trek (Almost)

I’ve been waiting for this watch. I’m a big fan of the Casio Pro Trek line, especially since they went solar, and even more so now that they’ve gone atomic. That’s right: an atomic solar Casio Pro Trek. That makes for quite a list of features:

• Atomic timekeeping. That means this watch is automatically calibrated through radio waves transmitted by an atomic clock.
• Solar powered. Solar cells around the face keep the watch’s battery charged, and a sophisticated power-saving function will keep the watch going for up to 20 months with no light. (It seems every time I write an article about a solar Casio, that number gets higher.)
• Thermometer. The temperature range is from -10° to 60° Celsius.
• Compass. Direction is indicated by a second LCD that hovers above the main one. Very cool effect. The Casio Pro Trek supports magnetic declination correction for true north as opposed to just magnetic north. (See my review of the Tissot T-Touch for more information on mag
  netic declination.)
• Barometer. Atmospheric pressure can be measured in the range of 260 to 1100 hPa (hectoPascals). Barometric trends over the last 30 hours can be displayed as a graph.
• Altimeter. The altimeters on Casio Pro Treks are barometric altimeters which means they work, but you have to know how to use them. See my review of the Tissot T-Touch for more information.
• World time. Keep track of a second time zone (30 cities supported).
• Stopwatch with a resolution of 1/100th of a second.
• Auto-repeating countdown timer. After time and date, the most useful function a digital watch can have.
• 5 daily alarms, and an hourly time signal.
• Battery power indicator.
• Signal strength indicator (for the atomic function).
• Electroluminescent backlight.
• Available with a resin case and strap, or in all titanium.

Like I said, the ultimate Casio Pro Trek. Almost. This particular line of Professional Casio Pro Treks are only available in Japan, and I’ve been told by my Japanese connection that they will not receive the US time signal transmitted from our atomic clock in Fort Collins, Colorado, which means the atomic feature is useless. Huge bummer. As soon as I find one that will work in the US (it’s only a matter of time), rather than just writing a wishful article, I’ll post a detailed review. In the meantime, here are some additional resources:

• Review of the Casio Pathfinder PAW1200.
• Review of the Casio Pathfinder PAW1300-3V.
• Translated product information from Watch Tanaka.
• Review of the Tissot T-Touch compass/thermometer/barometer touch-crystal watch.