SUUNTO Core Classic Outdoor Watch for Men

The Watch is fantastic! The watch is as advertised. I am grateful it was stopped and decided so quickly. It does everything I was looking for. It fits perfectly against my wrist, the multiple features work perfectly. The price was well within reason. Read more

I waited for quite a while to buy this Suunto Core as I wanted to see if the Apple Watch was something that would interest me. It wasn't. This replaces a Casio Pathfinder that I wore for about five years. After two months of ownership, I am now writing a review as I think I know enough now to relate an educated experience. First off, the looks: This is a really, really gorgeous watch. It makes the Casio look like very clunky in comparison. It's lightweight (more than I expected) and is extremely comfortable to wear. I did switch out the band for the optional Suunto black rubber/aluminum one and think the look and comfort improved even more. The original band had a "brittle" feel and it was either too big or too small for me with the adjusting holes available. The optional band's satin black aluminum lugs and matt black rubber sheen really works with the highly polished lens, the matt black case and the satin black bezel. I added photos to show the difference in appearance. Also, if you opt for the other band, the screws that fasten the crossbars are teensy and have been reported as easily lost. I used Loctite when installing mine. I thought the contrast was a bit low as shipped so bumped it up a few notches. That has a tendency to reveal some of the LED zones as they show up a bit lighter than the surrounding black mask, but it's a tradeoff in the ability to see the time. The battery life has started out badly as I received the watch on 4/29 and had to replace the battery on 5/18. Hopefully that was due to being powered up in inventory for a while before I got it. I'm going to keep track of changes to see what the trend is like. Changing the battery is easy and is best accomplished with a coin (I used a US nickel since it's the thickest). It uses one inexpensive and readily available CR2032 3V coin cell. Edit: I finally had to change the battery 16 months after installing the new one on 5/18/15 so no real complaints with battery life. The operating system is very easy to use (much more so than the Casio's). I really like the "guide ticks" that show up around the dial to indicate which buttons are active in each mode. I keep the watch locked in barometer mode for day to day wear. This has a tendency to trigger the storm alarm constantly so I turned that off. It was getting irritating. The stopwatch is the biggest disappointment as it is way too small and shows up as a sub-display of the time rather than having its own screen. If you are hoping for the big stopwatch like on Denzel Washington's Suunto in "The Equalizer" you will be disappointed. From what I have read, those displays were digitally added to his watch for the movie and Suunto did not do a special firmware for him as reported in several places. I would really love to see Suunto offer a firmware with a large stopwatch mode. I have not had much occasion to use the compass, but it's easy to activate and will be useful on hikes. The temperature function is useless unless you remove the watch and let it stabilize on ambient temperature instead of your arm temperature. Mine usually reads 82 degrees F. So to sum up, I'm extremely pleased with the All-Black Core. If you track the prices, they will dip to around $200 from time to time so if you are patient you can save enough to buy the extra band. Read more

I’ve been wanting to move away from smart watches for awhile, simply because I’ve been bored with the same square look. So, I decided to purchase a Suunto to appeal to my sporty side! The watch looks great and is easy to set up. There are a few things that aren’t intuitive about the setup but you can just about find anything explained online. I mention this because one of the online reviews about this watch mentioned the contrast wasn’t adequate and there’s a way to adjust the contrast . Once again, the watch is beautiful, feels good and feels as if it will hold up well. The price at the time of sale was an absolute value! Read more

*15 month(ish) later update. Surprisingly there isn't much new to say that I didn't already mention in my initial review, so I just wrote additional commentary in the relevant sections instead of writing a full-fledged update. I did have to do a battery change at 14 months and it's currently running on its new battery, more details on that in the appropriate section.* I will continue to keep this review updated as I spend more time using the watch. I'm a long time outdoor instructor and a working and sport dog handler. My cheap analog/digital watch of the last 9 years finally gave out on me and I decided it was time to upgrade to something better. I liked the idea ABC functions in the watch form factor. Historically I relied on larger handheld units but it's nice to have the capability of ditching them for shorter excursions and everyday use. So far, I really like the Core. In my opinion the unit ticks off all the necessary functions for a good work watch. The utility of date and seconds mode are obvious, the stopwatch and countdown clock are wonderful functions for use in the field and training, and dual time is an excellent feature when traveling. It's not the most unique feature but I really appreciated the easy access to the sunrise and sunset times. It's really great to be able to click a few buttons so I can make plans for sun down accordingly. *Still love the sunrise and sunset display. It's great for K9 detection and tracking* I haven't had a ton of time to play with the atmospheric barometer and altimeter but my quick tests have found it to be consistent with the results that my Foretrex spits out. I look forward to putting it alongside some other units and testing out the 'automatic' profile when I'm done with trials. For users like myself who are accustomed to atmospheric barometers that auto recalculate with a GPS, be sure to remember to set your reference altitude. The current heatwave means I haven't been able to try the storm alarm yet but I can't wait to test it out because it could prove to be extremely handy in the field. I was glad to find that the unit includes a thermometer. It should be noted that the thermometer spends its time pressed up against your wrist so when wearing the watch the readings will be wrong. To Suunto's credit they do mention this in the user manual found on their website. But it's readings appear to be pretty accurate when removed from your wrist for a few minutes. And even then in this current mid-90s degree it's readings on wrist have been pretty close. *Barometer still works really well as long as you update it. Storm alarm has gone off a few times but hasn't done so before an actual storm. I don't think this is an issue with the alarm just the ambient pressure of my location. Thermometer is great to have. This year I had a contract at a location that had obscenely high temperatures, and a dozen and a half years working in the outdoors it's the closest I've ever gotten to a heat-related injury. The on board thermometer help me track my status and recovery.* One of my teaching specialties is land navigation and I'm a bit of a compass nerd. So I was very curious to see how the compass mode would perform. It is my opinion that a electric compass in this form factor will never replace a good analog compass. The utility of a unit like this isn't in its accuracy or precision but in its convenience. To that end, this unit is very convenient to use with a few hiccups. Initially I had a lot of issues with the compass being wildly inaccurate. And I had no success with recalibration. I found a YouTube comment on the official Suunto tutorial about compass recalculating that suggested a reset. That suggestion worked wonders and the compass worked extremely well after calibration... for a few hours. I put the watch down by my phone and computer while doing some work and then left it there when I took a nap. When I woke up and tested it again it was out of whack and I needed to do another factory reset. In retrospect this is blaringly obvious but the magnetic interference for my computer equipment was responsible. Keep that in mind if you're having issues with the compass. Like any compass, this unit needs to be kept level if you want accurate readings. At least for me, it can be difficult to judge what's level when the unit is on my wrist. With practice and more use I'm sure this will become less of an issue for me but it does introduce a degree of mistrust in the readings when not checking a known direction. It's a shame that Suunto didn't include the bubble level that was found on the old Vectors. Like any good compass, the unit has adjustable declination. In 0.5 degree increments, larger than I would like but adequate for a unit like this. *Have still not been able to calibrate the compass. In the last 15 months I have spent hours trying. So whenever I need to recalibrate I just reset the watch.* You'll see a lot of complaints in the Amazon reviews about the dim display. Personally I have not had that issue. It is very readable in bright light. In low light I find it just as readable as a regular analog. It does have a backlight which is just bright enough to illuminate in low and no light. I do miss the utility of having glow in the dark watch hands but that's just one of the trade-offs of going digital. Is my understanding that you can adjust the contrast after a factory reset but I haven't felt the need. And this is from someone who doesn't have particularly good eyesight. *Absolutely no problems with the display in a wide range of lighting conditions* I don't like the included silicone watch band. It's comfortable, easily adjustable, and breathable in hot weather but it means that watch can't lie flat when the watch is removed and I found it made compass calibration more annoying than it needed to be. I can't speak for the durability of the band yet but even outside of the world of Amazon reviews these new silicone bands are notorious within my professional communities for breaking unexpectedly and at the worst possible times. I would have greatly preferred the NATO style bands that ship with the new Alpha Stealth version of the Core. I will probably replace the band at some point in the future with a aftermarket band. *Still don't like the included band but it's held up and haven't had any issues with it. Haven't found an aftermarket alternative that I like.* Can't speak for battery life yet but I like that it uses the same coin batteries as my RMR. What concerns me is the somewhat inconsistent information about battery replacement. With Suunto simultaneously providing instructions and kits for battery replacement but also suggesting that trying to replace the battery on your own voids the warranty. And when investigating further it gets even more unclear about who actually is authorized to do the replacement. I may end up calling my local REI and asking if that's a service that they actually provide (the Suunto website claims they do) just to have options open. *Battery gave out on a contract about 14 months after receiving the watch. Because of the timing I just replaced the watch battery myself and didn't deal with any of the warranty maintenance stuff. I had a surprising amount of trouble opening the case, the coins I had on hand were either too thick or thin to adequately turn the coin slot. Ended up using a shotgun hull. Make sure you look up replacement instructions so you know what to do with the silicone o rings.* I also can't speculate on long-term durability yet. As a precaution I did purchase one of those extended warranties/insurance policies from Amazon for the first time. Much like the silicone watch bands, Suunto is infamous for it's for poor or inconsistent warranty support in my communities. Hopefully I won't have to find out or see how well the third party one works. *Still looks pretty good after 15 months of nearly daily use* Read more