The completely new Smart Apnea computer watch by Mares represents a big novelty on the market.
Designed specifically for freedivers and spearos, as it can be easily deducted by the name, this wrist computer has many interesting functions, from the alarm to remind the diver to rehydrate, to the measure of vertical speed and depth alarms. List price is 279 euros.
General comment
Very good materials and functions, in particular a nice indication is the measure of the vertical speed, and practical two button menu, Smart Apnea is a high quality product. Some details can be improved in the visual quality, in particular the connection between the watchstrap and the case, and also week day indication is missing.
Design and materials
Watch case is in glass charged polymer, a very hard and resistant material, utilized in many marine applications (speargun components for example). The quadrant gives a good technological image thanks to the crown with graduated scale for seconds, while the external stainless steel polished ring makes the design of the watch modern, using the same material as the two buttons on the right. The glass of the quadrant is antiscratch .
The watch strap is made of a comfortable soft elastomer. The technique used is two colour molding, grey and black, or black and “Mares” orange. A process, the one with two colours, surely more complex than the one with a single colour, but that permits to have more colours without having to paint them, a solution that would lead to wear off of the colours after some use. At the same time though, such technology can generate minor imperfections in the bornders between the two colours. Moreover, also the point of connection between the watchstrap and the case is visible as the materials of the two components are different. This aspect is minor, but reduces slightly the visual quality of a well designed product.
Functions
As many modern wrist computers, the Mares Smart Apnea can be worn as simple watch, as it offers all the basic functions, stopwatch and countdown included. A pity, in such sense, the absence of the indication of the day of the week beside the date.
There are many interesting functions that make the difference in the Mares Smart Apnea. One important alarm is the indication to rehydrate, meaning the diver after a certain period should drink to compensate the loss of liquids. Another important measure, which can be useful to analyze one’s dive, is the vertical speed, in descent and ascent, and alarms when certain speeds are exceeded. Also depth alarms are useful, adjustable and regulated to on or off, setting up to 6 different depths. Today present in almost all diving computer watches, but fundamental, are the indications of surface recovery times.
Extremely interesting is the possibility to download all the data aquired on PC or Mac, with a dedicated cable and the software that can be downloaded on the Mares Pure Instinct website dowload section. It will be possible to analyze the data of each single dive, with a graph showing descent and ascent phases, with speeds and depths. Also, temperature in each moment of the dive, duration of the dive and surface time will be displayed, together with the date, hour and additional informations that can be added by the user.
The battery, with a life of up to 200 hours in dive mode, can be substituted easely on one’s own (see tutorial), even though Mares suggests to go to an official Mares authorized center.
To see the image of the screenshot of the Mares Smart Apnea software, click here.
Surface mode
Hour
Date
Alarm
Air Temperature
Secondary hour with adjustable time zone
Seconds display
Backlight (available in all modes)
Training mode
Stopwatch
Countdown
1 to 99 repetition cicles
Automatic restart of countdown
Adjustable interval for restart of countdown
Apnea mode
Istant depth
Max depth
Dive time
Water temperature
Descent and ascent speed
6 adjustable and on/off depth alarms
Surface data
Adjustable setting of water density
Max depth of last dive
Number of dives
Surface time
Dive time
Minimum temperature
Hydration alarm
Minimum surface recover time alarm
Maximum descent and ascent speed
Technical data:
Case diameter: 50 mm*
External diameter of the quadrant (including the seconds graduated crown): 38 mm*
Internal diameter of the quadrant (excluding the seconds graduated crown): 31 mm*
Weight: less than 83 gr*
Lithium battery with life of 00 hours of dive
130 hours of dive profile (every 1 second)
Utilization interval from – 10°C to 50°C
30 hours of div data registration with 1 second interval
PC and Mac download interface
* Measures made by AP