Hiking / Fitness watch

[shurik]

What smart watch would you recommend to get these days, where there are so many choices?
Mainly used for hikes, to needs a GPS. Would also use it to track fitness, so things like the typical steps/running/cycling counters, a heartrate monitor, water proof for swimming. Must connect to a smartphone.

Aside from the generic brands, good ones that stand out are Garmin (eg vívoactive® HR) and Suunto (eg AMBIT3 RUN) and Tom Tom Adventurer.
A lot of the prettier ones are also quite fragile, glass gets scratched or damaged, which isn't great when you are crawling through the bush.

I've found one thread on this topic, but it's old and not much in it.

Thank you!

[MrWalker]

I have a Suunto Ambit 2 and am very happy with it. I didn't need the extra features of the Ambit 3 and I don't worry about heart rate.

It has good battery life for day walks at 1 record/second, but you can slow that up for multi-day walks.
I mainly use it, with the lap function, to get distance, time and climb/descent for subsections of a walk. During a walk i can easily switch options to check total distance, time, average speed; plus section distance, time and speed; time of day, altitude. It reads about 5% less distance than my real GPS and I suspect it takes shortcuts on windy tracks, because on straight roads they both agree. I'm not using anywhere near all the functions it has and my only compliant is that it's a bit big, so I use it only on hikes or training, not everyday use.

[ErichFromm]

Also check suunto traverse. A bit more focused on hiking. A bit of a toned down version of ambit...

[Geevesy]

Can also vouch for the Ambit - i've got an Ambit 3 Peak. I mainly use it for walking and running, and like MrWalker says it is a nice feature to slow the recording rate down to get more battery life. I had it on a 6 day walk earlier in the year and it barely used 50% of the battery.

I also like the fact you can download various apps - I have one in my walking profile which tells me how much daylight I have left for example which is good for shorter days.

[shurik]

Thanks for your replies. One thing that keeps popping up about Suunto is the crappy app. I use Android, would like to have the stats from the watch to be on my phone and sync well, especially great if it works with Google Fit. How do you guys find the app? And also, how is the durability of the Ambit or other Suunto watches, do the scratch/damage easy?

Suunto website has so many options, it's crazy, confusing and they all seem to be more or less the same (but different)

[slparker]

can these watches give you a easting/northing co-ordinate for plotting on a physical map? that's my main interest in one.

BTW the suunto ambit is on sale at the moment for $214:

http://www.wiggle.com.au/suunto-ambit-3 ... 7&curr=AUD

[Tyreless]

I have a suunto ambit 3 sport (the one that slparker linked to). Yes, it gives you eastings and northings - it's my main navigational aid with map and compass. Mine's a bit scratched up (I'm not very careful with it) but I really love it.

[slparker]

Nice to know, Tyreless - I am thinking of getting the ambit at that price. What is battery life like for the purposes that you uses it?

i would be using it for checking my grid reference a few times a day. i generally use a map and compass for navigation, with the GPS a s a position check.

[Tyreless]

Battery life varies depending on how you use it. I track my day walks at medium accuracy (GPS reading every 10 seconds) and it lasts ~12 hours. If I'm on a multi-day walk I track at low accuracy (GPS reading every 60 seconds) and it lasts ~4 days. If you aren't using it to track your walk but just to get grid readings every now and then I imagine it would last a few weeks.

Note that the battery life in Geevesy's Peak model is twice as good as the battery life in my Sport model.

[headwerkn]

I've had a Garmin Fenix 3 (non-HR version) for nearly a year now and really like it. I've used it mainly for triathlon and multisport training/racing, so far but chose it over (somewhat) less expensive options for its mapping/navigation options for hiking as well. Obviously, it doesn't have 'proper' graphical maps a la the Epix and handheld GPS units but it is a relatively trivial matter to create and transfer over a course and relevant waypoints to give you something to follow.

About the only thing you need to do when using it for hiking is to ensure your activity mode (Hiking, most likely) is using GPS in UltraTrac mode to extend the battery life... mine died about 6km from the end of our 12 hr run/hike into Frenchmans Cap on New Year's Day!

Cheers, Ben.