Great features but poor quality

After years of being a fan of the Timex Ironman, I decided to try a Casio watch last year based on the great things I had heard about the G-Shock line of watches from friends and associates. When I went shopping to buy my new watch I noted that Casio had come out with an Atomic G-Shock watch that was also solar. This is a truly excellent idea. The watch would never need to be set and never need a new battery. How cool is that? Add those features to the already "tough" G-Shock line and you have one heck of a product.

If you like gadgets and technology, this watch has a ton of features that should excite you. It is solar powered. It is atomic, so it never needs to be set and always has the right time. It can tell the time in any city in the world, it has multiple alarms with snooze. It has a stop watch feature and really neat night mode feature that lights up the face automatically when you turn your wrist. It is water resistant to 200 meters and shock resistant too (so it should take beating). I'm sure i've left off quite a few features. The list is impressive. On top of that, it is attractive too.

So what's the problem? The problem is in the quality of the watch. If you use the stop watch, and alarm, and night mode features, the battery drains quickly and you must set it out in the sun to charge up frequently. The battery charge indicator didn't work either. The watch would go from reading "fully charged" to "empty" in the drop of a hat. And after 18 months, the solar cell no longer holds a charge. I charge it all the way up and hours later the battery is drained again.