Suunto Vector

[TeeJay]

Okay, as some of you may have read, I've recently been building an 'outdoors'/survival kit. Much of my inspiration for the kit, (outside of content, which was helpfully advised upon by members of this fair board ) was Stargate Atlantis.

As some of you may recall, much of the 'theme' behind my watch collecting, is movies/TV, and, to that end, I figured I ought to have a similar watch to round out the kit.

Now, a gen Suunto, while not out of my price range (well, if I had any money ) was certainly more than I was prepared to commit to a watch which I knew would get limited wrist-time, so I figured a rep would be the best bet. A quick google search, and I indeed, have tracked down some rep Suuntos which look pretty nice, but are not only from an unknown dealer (like that's ever stopped me before ) but also still of a price, which I could pick up a pre-owned gen on the Bay. Not having any cash at all at the moment, I filed the info away for future reference.

However, while out Christmas shopping today, (A Muslim and a Pagan buying Christmas presents... Some kind of sick cosmic joke there ) my wife and I saw this on a stall in a shopping mall, and she treated me to it

It has absolutely no makers markings on it at all, so is a totally sterile watch. It does not have any of the barometric/GPS/thermometer functions which the Suuntos possess, but, that doesn't bother me for two reasons. One. I would likely never actually use them. Two. Reviews I've read of the Suunto Vector have reported the watch to be, at best, 'unreliable', or, as one dissatisfied reviewer wrote "unsafe", and a product which should be recalled Bearing that in mind, I wasn't particularly bothered about the functions

So, what does this one do?

Well, it tells the time in 12 and 24 modes, has an alarm, a stop-watch, an 'indiglo-style' night light, and most interestingly, Dual power sources. According to the leaflet, when the watch is exposed to light (natural or artificial), it runs on 'solar power', rather than the main lithium battery, which will apparently save about 40% of the battery, thus extending it's lifespan to about 8 years (I'll be interested to see how accurate this is...)

As you can see, it coordinates perfectly with my shoes

And has a strap and buckle damn-near as identical to the gen...

Oh, I nearly forgot to say, it's also water resistant

All that fuss folks make about if their reps might not be water resistant or not, watches which are made of SS and have seals and whatnot to secure the cases, and this little beauty can do that already

How much did this set us back?

The princely sum of

[Toadtorrent]

Funny...good fun!

[TeeJay]

For the amount of use it'll get, I couldn't justify the cost of a more accurate rep (assuming the site would actually send me something, rather than being a scam site ) so when I saw this on the stall, and the price, it was too good an opportunity to pass up I would say that if it gets reasonable wrist time, when funds pick up, I might treat myself to a better rep, but, if I was to do that, it would no longer be the christmas present from my wife... As I've said before, sentimental value is something which features heavily in my collection

[Toadtorrent]

For the amount of use it'll get, I couldn't justify the cost of a more accurate rep (assuming the site would actually send me something, rather than being a scam site ) so when I saw this on the stall, and the price, it was too good an opportunity to pass up I would say that if it gets reasonable wrist time, when funds pick up, I might treat myself to a better rep, but, if I was to do that, it would no longer be the christmas present from my wife... As I've said before, sentimental value is something which features heavily in my collection

Suunto's are very function heavy watches...and something worth getting in the gen variety if you can. They suck batteries like crazy though. You buy them because you need the specific functions for mountaineering, backcountry travel, etc. If you're not using those functions, something like you bought for the look of the big piece is far more practical than spending all the money on functions you won't use.

[TeeJay]

Suunto's are very function heavy watches...and something worth getting in the gen variety if you can. They suck batteries like crazy though. You buy them because you need the specific functions for mountaineering, backcountry travel, etc. If you're not using those functions, something like you bought for the look of the big piece is far more practical than spending all the money on functions you won't use.

That's pretty much what I was thinking. The reviews I read also made mention of them being heavy on the batteries... If I recall, one guy mentioned that his watch just died halfway up a mountain / To be honest, those kind of specific functions, I simply would never use with enough regularity to warrant buying one as a tool for those times, so a rep was only ever going to be as close to a Suunto as I would buy. Seeing this one though, was even better, as it was a close enough look, at an incredibly low price

To be honest, I'm impressed by how similar the basic case and strap assembly is to a gen Suunto (and the sticker on the caseback did say 'made in China' ) so I'm wondering if this was indeed from a 'rep factory', or another example of a 'gen factory' also making sterile surplus. Admitedly, the movement is nowhere near right, but, it's certainly functional, so that's good enough for me Overall, I'd estimate the size as about the same as the 127