Alarms and timers are found in digital watches, analog quartz watches and even automatic mechanical watches. Though mobile phone alarms are louder and easier to program, there's still a place for a small alarm that can be worn 24 x 7 and doesn't need to be recharged every day.
Timers and alarms are useful for busy people who need a reminder to do something in 5 or 30 minutes, or at 3pm tomorrow. Automatic reminders can be lifesavers for people with medical conditions: diabetics, people on medication or who are suffering from incontinence.
Popular brands include Timex, Casio, Pulsar, Bulova, Swiss Army, Luminox, Invicta and Hamilton Watch.
Types of Alarm Watches
General purpose digital multi-function alarm watches are easy to set. Hybrid digital-analog quartz alarm watches combine the attractiveness of an analog watch with the ease-of-use of a digital watch.
Some analog quartz watches, such as the Timex "Easy Set," have a rotating bezel to quickly set the alarm time. However they are limited to 12-hour alarms (the alarm cannot differentiate between am and pm). Alarms are rarely found in automatic mechanical watches, except with luxury watches costing over $1,000 such as the Blancpain Leman GMT Alarm Watch.
"Medical" watches are designed for people who need to take medication at specific times. They typically have more daily alarms than conventional watches, with up to 12 or 20 alarms. Some allow a short customizable text message to be displayed with each alarm, such as the name of the medicine to be taken.
Pediatric or kids alarm watches are watches with a smaller strap to fit young wrists. If the strap is too long, one solution is to remove the strap and wear the watch as a pendant.
Combination "alarm chronograph" watches are popular with men and women, where the chronograph is a stop watch.
Alarm Watch Features
Watch alarms differ mainly in the setting of the alarm day:
- The simplest watches only have daily alarms.
- More advanced watches allow the day of week to be specified, at the cost of increased complexity in the setting procedure.
- Less common are alarms that allow the day of month to be set.
- Some alarms can be set for weekdays or weekends; useful for office workers who want to wake up later, on weekends.
It should not be possible to switch off the alarm just by pressing one button. Otherwise an accidental bump could switch it off, with unpleasant consequences.
A snooze feature is useful, especially for timing medications. If in the middle of a task, the snooze feature ensures that the medication is not forgotten and can be taken a few minutes later.
Countdown Timer Watches
Countdown timers are often available only on digital, or digital-analog watches. They are used like kitchen timers: ad-hoc timing of anything that crops up during the day. This means cooking, laundry, appointments, timeouts for kids, naps, exercising, anything at all.
Maximum timer durations range from 30 minutes to 24 hours. Anything longer is better set with a standard alarm. Some simpler (and cheaper) watch models feature a dedicated timer-set button. Pressing the button repeatedly causes the timer to be set to 1, 3, 5, 10, 15, 20, and 30 minutes. This simplicity makes for a highly functional watch.
An auto-repeat feature causes the timer countdown to automatically repeat after it times-out. This can be used as a simple interval timer for exercising (a real interval timer allows a few different timers to be triggered one after another). It can also be used for timing medication. Dedicated medical alarm watches allow manual or automatic pausing of the auto-repeat, to cater for sleep times. Automatic pausing means that a auto-repeat start and stop time is set.
Silent Alarm or Vibration Watches
Silent alarms vibrate instead of beep, but might still give off a quiet buzz. They are useful for:
- Loud environments.
- Waking up without disturbing the spouse.
- Discreet reminders in the office.
- Timing Powerpoint presentations.
- Hunting, to avoid alerting prey.
Vibrating watches are available from established brands such as Casio and Swatch; or specialist medical-oriented brands like VibraLITE, e-pill CADEX or MeDose, Malem and WatchMinder.
Many models can be switched between vibration, beeping, or vibration and beeping. Vibration durations are usually short, from a few seconds to 20 seconds. The vibration mechanism and larger battery to power it, means that the watches are big, including kids and women's watches. If size is a concern, WobL claims to be "the smallest vibrating and alarm watch in the World."
The Best Alarm Timer Wristwatch
The various watch models are surprisingly different in how the alarms are set and function. Ease-of-use is especially important for children and elder-care patients. This is more a matter of good, simple design than expensive electronics. A cheap and simple digital watch can be the best watch for many situations.
Alarms can also be found in scuba diving watches, military watches and other types of watches.
Yuen Kit Mun - Kit Mun is a self-confessed information junkie, reading an average of a book a week over the past two decades. His growing Internet ...
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