Garmin quatix un-boxing an first impressions

Got my new Garmin quatix yesterday – and here is a few pictures for those of you who wants to know what is in the box.

Garmin quatix – First impressions

The watch is really good quality. The USB interface is nice – the strap is very nice – but the big let down is the screen. It is simply too small. The primary text items looks fine and the right size – but “small” text is just far far far too small to be readable.  In a sail race situation that might be a big handicap – but more on that once it gets “sail tested”. The screen seems to have 4 “grayscale” levels – and that is not much. So the built in “graphical” maps are … well – more of a gimmick than anything usable unless you are REALLY lost (like 500 km lost). The watch is also VERY thick – like at least twice the thickness of my Polar RCX5 sports watch.

The sensors work pretty well out of the box and compass, altimeter and GPS works really well. Temperature sensor not so much – since it takes after the temperature of your body and not the ambient temperature. But leaving it on the table – after a while it does show the right temperature.

The GPS receiver is very very good – gets the signal fast and seems to keep a good signal even in some buildings. But of course not in my concrete apartment block.

The quatix also provides you with Tide tables. That is a great feature – but also a PITA if you are a travelling sailor – since the watch only has the tide tables for EITHER the USA or for “rest of the world”. So a US bought quatix wont show European/Asian/Australian tides and vice versa. There are 22MB free space on the watch – so Garmin – please include ALL world wide tide tables on all watches.

It is to early to say much about battery life. The GPS receiver is a manually “Turn Off/Turn On sensor” where the other environmental sensors turns on when you press any button on the watch- and then goes back to sleep after a little while. But after leaving GPS off for about 10 hours – the watch showed a charge level of 94%

The watch can pair with a range of ANT+ accessories like external temperature sensor and heart rate straps. Garmin owns the company behind the ANT standard so it should be very compatible. The GNT10 is Garmins “boat interface” – a gateway from boats NMEA 2000 networks to the wireless ANT+ standard the watch uses. I do not yet have a GNT10 to test with – or any other ANT+ sensors – so maybe more on that later.

I tried data sharing with my Garmin Bluechart Mobile on iPhone 4s and iPad 3 – but the instructions with the watch does not work with the current generation Bluechart mobile. I think a new version is required.  But dear Garmin – don’t ship instructions with a devices – where the “other” part of the platform is not ready. That is embarrassing!

The quatix is also supposed to work with Garmin Homeport Windows/Mac software – but I tried getting it – but Garmins servers kept saying “Down for maintenance” – so no luck there yet.

That was it for now – more to come. Feel free to post comments with questions.