Casio Men's PAW1500T-7V Pathfinder Multi-Band Solar Atomic Ultimate Watch

What I liked about the Casio PAW1500T - 7V Summary

- Titanium bracelet – its light weight, tough and salt water corrosion resistant – great for off shore fishermen like me

- Motion sensor that automatically lights up the dial when you turn your wrist

- Solar power that lasts a LONG time once it’s fully charged

- Easy to read face – many watches with this many options tend to end up with a cluttered hard to read dial – not this 1500.

- Automatic power save mode – you really need this on a watch with all these features that use power

What I didn’t like about this Pathfinder:

Plastic shell and stainless steel back – as one the top of the Casio Pathfinder series I expected the titanium to be used throughout the watch, not just on the band.

Casio Men's PAW1500T - 7V Pathfinder - Bottom Line:

If you are on looking for a fully features Pathfinder with a pretty complete list of goodies by combining many of the features from the Casio Pathfinder and Casio Sea Pathfinder features, a great stylish look ( it’s not dainty)  and a titanium band then the Casio PAW1500T is for you. As one of the top of the line (= most expensive) watches made by Casio in the Pathfinder line is had all the add ons like solar power and atomic time keeping that you expect in an upper end watch. Of course The PAW1500 has the basic ABC goodies - Casio's cool  "triple sensor" technology that gives you date  on altitude, barometric pressure, and a thermometer. After all , if you are an adventurer then you need a watch that does more than just tell the time, no matter how well it does that.  The Casio PAW 1500 has other nice options like tide charts, moon phase, world time, alarm, chronograph, timer and of course a compass.  

I found the most competitive pricing on the Casio PAW1500-1CR at Amazon and where they also usually include free shipping. I priced every watch I have reviewed and Amazon seems to always have the best price or is very close to the best price, especially when you factor in all the costs. You can also find additional reviews at Amazon if you want other perspectives so it’s worthwhile to visit and take a look, but I think this is one if the best patches in the market for the price. The PAW1500 like every watch from Casio in the outdoor series in the Casio Atomic Solar Pathfinder and Casio G-Shock series provide great reliability, all types of options, and good value for the money you spend. If you are looking for a sports/adventure type watch, for my money, the Casio Pathfinder Watch series are a great choice.

Casio PAW1500-7V – My Favorite Features:

Solar Power - if you are buying a Pathfinder at the top of Casio’s line of watches then one of the features you have to be looking for is solar power- otherwise why spend the extra dollars. So why is the solar power function important?

 Well as watches go, the Casio Pathfinder line of watches are pretty much power hogs. Providing all the functionality like the basic ABC (altimeter, barometer, compass) requires a fair amount of juice- at least in the watch world. That’s why I personally prefer the solar power option if you are going to spend the money on a Pathfinder with lots of bells and whistles – make it solar powered.

The PAW1500 obviously has a solar power feature, including a meter to tell you when its filly charged,  but what you can’t see is how well it works. First off, it takes very little ambient light for the watch to charge, it doesn’t require direct sunlight. Ambient light from the lighting in your home is sufficient to allow the 1500 to charge.

 But here’s a hint, if you are heading out on an adventure trekking through the forest or taking off on a fishing excursion and you can tell by the charge indicator that you are low on the charge scale, make sure you wear your watch on the outside of your shirtsleeve if you are wearing long sleeves. The good news is that once the watch is fully charged you can pretty much forget about it – a fully charged watch will probably run for four to five months.

One of the reasons the watch can function so long on a full charge is that it has an automatic power save mode.  The PAW1500 automatically goes into more that turns your screen off to save power but it only does this when it detects that there has not been sufficient light to charge the solar cell for an extended period of time. As soon as the watch is exposed to light again it will power up the display or you can just press a button for it to come on again.

 Casio Pathfinder Atomic  Watch

The second feature I would spend the money on to buy a watch at the top end of the Casio Pathfinder series is to buy a watch with atomic accuracy. The PAW1500 7V is a multi band watch which simply means it can access atomic time keeping signals from more than one source. The PAW1500 can receive signals from the US (Fort Collins, Colorado) the UK, Germany and Japan. Unfortunately the ability to easily receive these timing signals appears to be a source of frustration for some Pathfinder owners so you may want to check with other owners in your area about this issue. The Casio 1500 7V is designed to receive calibration signals as frequently as six times a day automatically or it you have the option to do a manual synchronization.

Casio PAW1500-7V Light & Comfortable

Of course one of the advantages of the titanium watch band is to greatly decrease the overall weight of the watch. Titanium is about 30-40 percent lighter than stainless steel – your other “metal” option for the watch band , and it’s also much more scratch resistant. Make no mistake, this is not a small watch, and you really couldn’t say that about any of the Pathfinder series.

These Pathfinder line of watches are designed to be rugged, to provide a number of great features in as small a package as possible – but they designed for wearing to a black tie dinner – that is unless you don’t think you can find your way there.

The watch bracelet is also comfortable to wear because it features a nice design element that Casio is beginning to use more frequently for metal bracelets and clasps. The individual interior pieces of the bracelet are beveled and cut. This means that the parts of the bracelet that are going to press against your arm more comfortable than traditional designs. It’s just another small engineering design that puts Casio at the front of the pack – they continually refine each little component.

Casio PAW1500 Digital Display - Auto Illumination

Finally, one of the features I really like on the PAW1500T-7V is a digital presentation that is relatively easy to read under most conditions. Even better is the new auto-illumination feature. I love to fish and frequently go fishing at night or early in the morning, before sunrise. It can be a bit aggravating to hold a fishing rod in one hand and with that same hand press a button on your watch to make the illumination turn on.

 The PAW1500 makes seeing your watch in the dark very easy it’s electroluminescent – which is a fancy way of saying it sues an electric current to create light. All you have to do if you want check the time is turn your wrist to look at your watch and it automatically illuminates and you are able to see the entire watch dial using the light it provides, which is nice. If for some reason you don’t like this option, like you are on a CIA night time stealth operation, Casio made it an option that you can easily turn off and on.

PAW 1500 Tide Chart

As I have mentioned before I am an avid fisherman so one of the reasons I liked this Pathfinder is because it has many of the same functions the Sea Finder series watches provide.  Unfortunately the tide charting isn’t one of the watches strongest features. It will calculate the first high tide to within about 20 minutes – that’s not too bad. I think the actual graphs of the tide aren’t really very accurate and they don’t look very precise. When you compare these graphs to the graphs used for the barometer graphs you will see what I mean.

Casio Pathfinder PAW1500T-7V  A Few Helpful Hints:

Solar Atomic Watch- If you want the watch to be as accurate as possible when you are trying to read the barometric pressure or the temperature or altimeter it helps to keep a bit of separation between the watch and your bear skin. I know – it’s a watch – but it’s also a precision instrument that you are asking perform a variety of different functions and to do so accurately. So if you are wearing a long sleeve shirt – wear it on the outside of your sleeve. Like to go shirtless, how about a small sweat band between your wrist and you watch. If you aren’t going to use the watch for anything but telling time – don’t worry about it.

Casio Pathfinder Watches – there is a reason you Casio watch comes with an owner’s manual – it’s not just to take up room in the box. Yes, you can take it out of the box, strap it on your wrist, and go sailing merry along and it will work just fine. But if you want the most accurate readings when using the compass, barometer, and altimeter you absolutely have to go to the manual and go through the calibration process. When properly calibrated the Casio Pathfinder series watches usually do a pretty good job of providing precise data. But this is not a GPS, you can’t for example use it to put you within ten feet of your favorite fishing spot. You could use the compass to get you very close if you know what you are doing – like in the same block (of you were on land) so don’t expect a GPS level of accuracy. Also the compass display is only presented for a few seconds so it doesn’t work precisely like a manual compass that you can simply look at all the time.

In some reviews I have also read where people are complaining about the accuracy of the altimeter readings saying something like "I live at sea level and the altimeter was reading…." Again, you have to calibrate, and the PAW1500 is designed to provide altimeter readings from -2300 to over 32,000 feet in 20 foot increments. You might be surprised to learn that the accurate calibration of both the altimeter function and the barometric function require an accurate calibration of the temperature function as well. So before you start complaining – read the manual. There, that’s about three times I warned you to read the manual – that should do it.

Ok, heres the "official" information:

Product Specifications
Watch Information
Brand Name: Casio
Model number: PAW1500T-7V
Part Number: PAW1500T-7V
Item Shape: round
Dial window material type: Mineral
Display Type: digital
Clasp: fold-over-clasp-with-safety
Case material: Titanium
Case diameter: 50.5 millimeters
Case Thickness: 14.3 millimeters
Band material: Titanium
Band length: mens
Band width: 24.5 millimeters
Band Color: silver
Dial color: digital
Bezel material: Titanium
Bezel Function: bidirectional
Calendar: day-date-and-month
Special Features: world-time
item-weight: 12 Ounces
Movement: Quartz
Water resistant depth: 660 Feet

Product Features

Multi-Band Atomic Timekeeping (US, UK, Germany, Japan)
Tough Solar Power
200M Water Resistant
Tide Graph (based on a combination of preset and user input data)
Moon Data (moon age based on current date or user input data, moon phase graph)
Digital Compass
Altimeter
Measuring range: -700 to 10,000m (-2,300 to 32,800ft)
Measuring unit: 5m (20ft)
Barometer
Display range: 260 to 1,100 hPa (7.65 to 32.45 inHg)
Display unit: 1 hPa (0.05 inHg)
Thermometer
Display range: -10 to 60 C (14 to 140 F)
Display unit: 0.1 C (0.2 F)
Low Temperature Resistant (-10 C / 14 F)
Full Auto EL Backlight with Afterglow 
World Time
5 Daily Alarms
Countdown (Yacht) Timer
Measuring unit: 1 second
Countdown range: 1 minute to 60 minutes
Countdown Alarm, Progress Beeper
1/100 second stopwatch
Measuring capacity: 23:59'59.99"
Measuring modes: Elapsed time, split time, 1st-2nd place times
Hourly Time Signal
Auto Calendar (pre-programmed until the year 2099)
12/24 Hour Formats
Button operation tone on/off
Accuracy: +/-20 seconds per month (with no signal calibration)
Storage Battery CTL1616
Battery Power Indicator
Power Saving Function
Approx. battery life: 5 months on full charge with Power Saving Function (without further exposure to light)