By Scott Kramer

 

If Casio’s PRO TREK Smart outdoor watch (WSD-F20) was simply a dumb watch, I would want to wear it everyday. It’s lightweight, comfortable and has a huge face. As a smartwatch, it both enhances and compromises that experience. Let me explain.

 

First the bad news. Its magnetic charger clasps rather clumsily to the charging port on the side of the watch. It’s a USB unit, so you can either plug the USB end of the cord into the side of your computer or into the included power brick and into a wall plug. Problem is, the magnetic side that connects to the watch isn’t a powerful one. So unless the watch is resting untouched on a desk or somewhere flat, it’s not going to stay connected. Even the slightest vibration will disconnect it. And when you consider that this is labeled an outdoor watch designed for hiking, camping, etc., I wonder where an active person who doesn’t sit at a desk all day is going to charge the unit. Especially knowing that the battery charge lasts two days, tops.

Now the good news. This is a pretty useful watch. It’s powered by Android Wear 2.0, offers GPS, full color maps, offline map usage, water resistance up to 50 meters deep, and is tested to military standard specs — ensuring it can withstand rugged activities and adventures. Out of the box, it displays a compass, barometer, altimeter, sunrise/sunset display, tide graph, latitude and longitude readout — anything you would realistically need out in the wilderness. It even has a microphone that lets you perform Google searches, ask for directions, or record voice memos on the map so you can remind yourself what you saw at a particular location.

You can also download maps and display them when the smartphone is out of range or offline — as it may well be up in the mountains. That’s a nice feature that makes it more like a standalone watch. Its screen is also touch-sensitive, so you can pinch and zoom. Unfortunately for me, my fingers are too big and kept hitting the raised bevel surrounding the screen. So that feature was rather ineffective for me.

 

Setting it up and pairing it with an Android smartphone is typical. If you’ve ever done it before, you’ve already mastered the feat. Casio also has its own “Moment Setter+” app that lets you further customize features.

My favorite feature was email: I could read it easily on the bright watch display. And to reply, I just voice-dictated into it and my response was sent in an instant. And my phone’s Bluetooth was not on for this function — only Wifi. Loved it, for its ease to use.

I did initially misinterpret one incident, before realizing it was a nice feature: After not wearing the watch for a day, I picked it up and it was only showing the time and date. For a while, I couldn’t figure out how to bring up the menu or get it communicating with my phone. Then I realized I was in low-power mode, as the battery had depleted to almost nothing. My bad. Once I charged it, the watch of course started functioning again right away. But if you use it just in timepiece mode with GPS disabled, the battery life extends to about a month.

And I could easily do that, believe me. The soft urethane band was extremely comfortable around my wrist. Best of all, it has 11 notch settings, so it truly will fit anyone. The watch lists for $500.

 

 

Scott Kramer is veteran, Southern California-based writer primarily versed in golf and personal technology. Studying Computer Sciences in college, and then working as a programmer/software engineer for about a decade, triggered my passion for today’s high-end, high-tech gadgets. I can’t help myself whenever I see any kind of cool new personal technology. I feel compelled to further check it out and see what it’s all about. And even if I have no use for it personally, I’m always thinking who it might best suit. There are exciting new innovations emerging daily that are shaping the future and simplifying life. And I hope to be your eyes to that world, through the words of this column.

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