Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #4198 in Watches
• Brand: Casio
• Model: GW500AJP-1AV
• Dimensions: .0 pounds
• Band material: Resin
• Bezel material: stainless-steel
• Case material: stainless-steel
• Clasp type: Buckle
• Dial color: black
• Dial window material: Mineral
• Movement type: Quartz
• Water-resistant to 660 feet

Features

• Quartz movement
• Water-resistant to 660 feet (200 M)

Amazon.com Product Description
Make a powerful statement with the Casio GW500AJP-1AV G-Shock men's atomic solar watch, which receives time calibration radio signals which keep the displayed time accurate. It's also solar-powered--charging in either sunlight or indoor light--so you'll never have to deal with changing the battery. This shock resistant watch features an Auto LED light with afterglow, world time for 30 cities, a 1/100 second stopwatch, daily alarm, hourly time signal, full auto-calendar, 12/24 hour format, and a battery power indicator. The watch has water resistance to 200 meters (660 feet).

Development of the Timepiece Business
With the launch of its first watch in November 1974, Casio entered the wristwatch market at a time when the watch industry had just discovered digital technology. As a company with cutting-edge electronic technology developed for pocket calculators, Casio entered this field confident that it could develop timepieces that would lead the market.

In developing its own wristwatches Casio began with the basic question, "What is a wristwatch?" Rather than simply making a digital version of the conventional mechanical watch, we thought that the ideal wristwatch should be something that shows all facets of time in a consistent way. Based on this, Casio was able to create a watch that displayed the precise time including the second, minute, hour, day, and month — not to mention a.m. or p.m., and the day of the week. It was the first watch in the world with a digital automatic calendar function that eliminated the need to reset the calendar due the variation in month length. Rather than using a conventional watch face and hands, a digital liquid crystal display was adopted to better show all the information. This culminated in the 1974 launch of the CASIOTRON, the world’s first digital watch with automatic calendar. The CASIOTRON won acclaim as a groundbreaking product that represented a complete departure from the conventional wristwatch.

Casio transformed the concept of the watch — from a mere timepiece to an information device for the wrist — and undertook product planning based on this innovative idea. We developed not only time functions such as global time zone watches, but also other radical new functions using Casio’s own digital technology, including calculator and dictionary functions, as well as a phonebook feature based on memory technology, and even a thermometer function using a built-in sensor. The memory-function watches became our DATA BANK product series, while the sensor watches developed into two unique Casio product lines of today: the Pathfinder series displaying altitude, atmospheric pressure, and compass readings.

In 1983, Casio launched the shock-resistant G-SHOCK watch. This product shattered the notion that a watch is a fragile piece of jewelry that needs to be handled with care, and was the result of Casio engineers taking on the challenge of creating the world’s toughest watch. Using a triple-protection design for the parts, module, and case, the G-SHOCK offered a radical new type of watch that was unaffected by strong impacts or shaking. Its practicality was immediately recognized, and its unique look, which embodied its functionality, became wildly popular, resulting in explosive sales in the early 1990s. The G-SHOCK soon adopted various new sensors, solar-powered radio-controlled technology (described below), and new materials for even better durability. By always employing the latest technology, and continuing to transcend conventional thinking about the watch, the G-SHOCK brand has become Casio’s flagship timepiece product.

Today, Casio is focusing its efforts on solar-powered radio-controlled watches: the built-in solar battery eliminates the nuisance of replacing batteries, and the radio-controlled function means users never have to reset the time. In particular, the radio-controlled function represents a revolution in time-keeping technology similar to the impact created when mechanical watches gave way to quartz technology. Through the further development of high radio-wave sensitivity, miniaturization, and improved energy efficiency, Casio continues to produce a whole range of radio-controlled models.

Customer Reviews

A few observations for a prospective purchaser
Having owned the GW500AJP-1AV for a week, here are my thoughts on some of the points raised by the reviewers of this and other G-Shock models:

1. In my opinion, concerns about the thickness of the watch have been overstated. Certainly, if slimness is an *important* criterion for you, this isn't your watch. But you'll have no trouble fitting it under your shirt cuff. [Though the manual cautions that doing so will hamper the solar function.] Even my ridiculously slender wrists support it - physically and (I hope) esthetically - without difficulty.

2. The G-Shock models are advertised as rugged. I'm not about to use mine as a hockey puck to put that to the test. But it certainly *feels* sturdy. [The thickness helps here.] And from what I've read about them elsewhere, they do shrug off a considerable amount of punishment.

3. Everyone's experience with receiving the timekeeping signal from Fort Collins will vary depending on the particulars of their location and the attention they pay to the manual. I live only 350 miles from the transmitter but with modestly sized mountains in between - which can be a dealbreaker. Although it took a longer period of motionlessness for the watch to lock in than the manual had told me to allow, it has received a strong signal ever since. [And keep in mind that the watch is accurate to 15 seconds a month even without synchronization.]

3. When I first unpacked the watch, the battery level was at Medium - which you would expect after it having been in a box for who knows how long. After 3 hours of direct exposure to bright sunlight [which you should do in the early morning to keep the watch from roasting], the battery level has remained High ever since.

4. The four control buttons are slightly recessed - for decreased vulnerability, I imagine. This means you will need to operate them with a directly perpendicular press by the edge of your fingernail, rather than an angled mashing under the meat of your fingertip. I can see why this irritates some people. [It did require a small mental adjustment on my part.] However, I think it was a legitimate design decision.

5. The leftmost of the three circular "gauges" at the top of the display is meant to mimic the sweep of a minute hand on an analog watch. Speaking as someone whose attachment to that visual "pie-slice" style of time reading has been my main reason for sticking with analog watches until now, I think it's a terrific idea. In practice, though, the gauge is too small to be useful for that purpose. [For my eyes, anyway.] However, I don't mind particularly - since I think the three gauges look cool simply as decoration.

6. Someone else commented that the black resin wrist band is not replaceable. I'm not sure if that's true. However, replacing it would be no casual affair. So if you won't be content with this kind of band, you should look for a different watch. I prefer leather bands myself. But this one is in keeping with the toughness of the rest of the watch and certainly comfortable enough to wear.

On the whole, I'm very happy with this purchase. If you enjoy having an accurately set timepiece - and who doesn't? - it's difficult to overstate the satisfaction of radio-synchronization. A good mechanical watch is accurate to 5 seconds a day. A good quartz watch is accurate to less than 1 second a day. As long as it's in signal range, this watch will be accurate to less than 1 second for the next 60 million years [http://tf.nist.gov/cesium/fountain.htm] - or at least until the US government stops broadcasting, at which point you'll probably have other things to worry about. When someone asks you for the time, you will be able to give them *The* time.

Great but thick
I first bought a Casio G-Shock type watch back in about '82, a DW-1000, actually a precursor to the G-Shock. Still works great to this day, though I've replaced the battery twice and replaced the resin band with a metal one. This watch has served me well over the years from hiking to scuba diving. So I decided it was time to upgrade to the latest technology - a solar powered G-Shock with "atomic" timekeeping.

This new watch performs great so far. It synchronizes to the Fort Collins signal every night without problems. I live roughly 700 miles from the transmitter. In the good old days I used to dial in the time signal on a shortwave radio to synchronize my watches. It's great to have a watch I can forget about setting.

I was a little concerned before I bought this watch that Casio was relying on the time sync and the watch might not be accurate without it. This is important to me because I frequently travel internationally. Not a problem. My watch had last been synced about 6 weeks prior to my receiving it, and was off about 12 seconds. That's 2 seconds a week or less than 2 minutes a year.

The other feature I especially like is the easy world time - a couple button presses and I can show time at whatever time zone I am in. Other functions like the stopwatch are easy to use without constantly referring to the manual.

There are 3 round dials at top. The left acts like an analog minute hand. The center shows the battery charge, and the right shows if any secondary functions are active, like the alarms or stopwatch. The text on the right dial is almost impossible to read regardless of how young your eyes are.

I think this watch looks great, but it is thick - almost 5/8 inch thick. So if you like svelte watches this isn't for you. The resin band is integral to the watch, so replacing it with a standard band is not an option. This is probably the only weak point.

The manual is small and thick, but can be downloaded in PDF form from the Casio web site.

Indestructible??
I have a friend who recommended G-Shock watches as being indestructible, and his apparently were. So I got a model exactly like this one except with a metal band. It had all the cool features of solar recharging, synchronizing with the U.S. atomic clock, water resistance down to 200 m, stop watch, alarm, everything except the temperature gauge. It worked real well for about one and a half years of normal wear and tear. I did not put it under more stress than a regular watch would have been put under. But it started to come apart at the seams. The lower part of the watch where the band connects started to separate from the band.

I thought this should not be a problem. After all, a watch whose indestructibility Casio had such confidence in would surely be covered under a warranty. In fact, I would think they would want to know that one of their watches had not lived up to their high standards. But when I contacted Casio, they informed me that their indestructible watch only had a one year standard warranty, just like all their regular products. I would have to pay for them to repair their indestructible watch. I was out of luck! But the watch still worked, and so I kept wearing it.

Just today (about two years after the purchase), I took a swim with my waterproof watch, and it is now dead with water plainly showing itself on the inside of its screen.

Let the buyer beware, this watch is not at all indestructible. The name is tempting, but remember that it does break and only has a year warranty.