Without knowing almost anything about atomic/radio-controlled watches, 2-1/2 years ago I bought one, a Casio, their particular designation being wave ceptor. Just within this last week the battery became weak and the band broke, oddly enough. I went on amazon last night and bought the exact same Casio WVA-104H again (a new band and battery would equal the cost of the new watch, $32, which, thankfully, will also come with an unscratched crystal).
Even 2-1/2 years ago, these watches had already been on the market quite some time. Why haven’t they made all other watches obsolete by now?
Despite the user-manual’s recommendation to set the watch at a west-facing window sill overnight to facilitate reception of its time signal from Fort Collins, CO, after a few months I became neglectful and simply started wearing the watch all the time, as is my custom. The watch never failed to get its overnight time signal, even with my arm under bed covers. I live in Pennsylvania, nowhere near Colorado.
The user-manual cautions “keep the watch still” during the 2-3 minutes it is receiving its time signal. Most mornings I am up and moving around at 5am, the hour it receives the last of it’s four overnight time signals, with the watch on my wrist. But, it always gets its 5 am time signal. (There is a button to display, in the watch’s digital field, when it successfully ‘got’ its last time signal.)
In 2-1/2 years I never adjusted the time for any reason, including the evening of its purchase. The time was not correct when I unpacked it, and though there is a method for manual time adjustment, before I could go through its steps the watch received its first time signal. The analog hands, eerily, advanced to the precise correct second. It does the same every Daylight Savings Time/Standard Time change.
I have never adjusted the time in any way, yet on any occasion I have checked its timekeeping with a known correct source, such as a corrected computer clock or a radio or TV hourly or half-hourly signal, the watch is always dead-on. If I have the watch’s hourly beep/chirp switched on, that beep sounds concurrently with whatever known-correct indicator I utilize.
In looking at the Web, I seem to notice: there is Casio, and maybe two or three other brands offering atomic watches. Given their great leap forward in accuracy, low cost, and trouble-free nature, can anyone offer any insight on why they have not entirely taken over the market, but seem to remain a ‘niche’ product. Is there something I am missing?