By David Ponce

The above watch is a concept over at Tokyoflash, and like some previous such concepts, it might one day make it to market. This one however seems to one-up all of the Japanese company’s designs in terms of unreadability. See, to tell the time, you actually have to solve a Sudoku puzzle: each missing digit is the time. So by the time you’ve solved it, it won’t even be the time it was when you started trying. We’re not sure at this point how they plan to deal with this, or even how long it can take to solve a Sudoku puzzle because numbers scare us. But you can head over to their design blog and give you input as it might actually affect whether and how the watch is developed.

[ Sudoku Watch Design Blog ] VIA [ Chip Chick ]

By David Ponce

Back in September on 2010, our favorite watchmaker put a concept up on their design blog. Fast forward 16 months and here it is in the market. It’s called the Optical Illusion watch and is inspired of course by any of these illusions that you see in print or online from time to time. You can train your eyes to see the time in puzzle mode (I tried, it works, but it’s hard) or you can press one of the four hotzones on the touchscreen display to reveal what the time is. There’s also a mode that cycles between puzzle and time mode every 20 seconds. This is meant to attract attention and get conversations started; this has sort of always been the point of a Tokyoflash watch. This one, like the others, doesn’t disappoint.

It’s $179 and for the next 33 hours, shipping is free.

[ Product Page ]

By David Ponce

You can add the Click Keypad watch to the list of time-telling devices whose entire point is to make the business of telling time more (not less) difficult. There’s a certain charm in the process, at least in the mind of certain geeks that are attracted by it. We fall squarely in that group and that’s why we like this watch. Not only does it tell time awkwardly, it also looks like it should be a calculator, but it isn’t. Time is displayed by a sequential blinking of the corresponding LEDs, which are activated after pressing any 0-9 number. The date is similarly triggered and read by pressing “#”.

The Click Keypad comes in 5 colors and costs $90. They ship worldwide.

Video and link after the jump.

[ Click Keypad ] VIA [ BoingBoing ]

By David Ponce

We’re aware that watches as a time-telling device are pretty much finished. But they carry on as one of the few acceptable bits of male adornments left. We happen to have a soft spot for a few manufactures like Tokyoflash and Nooka. Well, you can add Ziiiro (with three “i”s) to that list. Their latest offering, the Celeste, tells the time elegantly by featuring rotating bands of colored, semi-transparent material. When different layers superpose, the colors change: gray and blue on the Mono models, and green and blue on the Colored models. You’ll get a better idea by watching the video below. They come in matte-finished stainless steel casings in chrome, gunmetal or black with matching bands. Available for pre-order now for €149 ($205), they’ll start shipping November 18.

ZIIIRO Celeste ( gunmetal / mono ) from ZIIIRO on Vimeo.

[ Product Page ] VIA [ Engadget ]

By David Ponce

We’ve been big fans of Nooka for some time and have written about their products on several occasions. And while the watch as a timekeeping device may be a dying breed, we firmly believe it’s one of the few ornaments men can wear without wandering into metrosexual/douche territory. We happen to like the look of Nooka’s latest design, the ZIZM.

The ZIZM’s unique faceted crystal lens produces a refracted view of time on the ZenH display. This faceted surface creates a pattern that continues throughout the entire design of the timepiece including Nooka’s first silicone strap. The Zizm is sized by cutting the silicone strap to create the perfect fit for each wearer.

It’s $375 and the company is taking pre-orders now. It comes in black and blue and starts shipping October 24th. Hit the jump for two more pictures.

[ Product Page ] VIA [ Geeky Gadgets ]

By David Ponce

Not only does it look better than that kidney, it tells the time. But who are we kidding, you won’t have to sell a kidney to buy this. Please. You’re buying it because you already own a Lamborghini and have to buy a timepiece that matches, don’t you? Well, here you have Adriano Valente’s AV-L001, a watch with a matching price tag of $35,000. For roughly one-tenth the price of the car, you get a casing made of Karbonyte (allegedly a Titanium Carbon alloy, but we can’t find anything on this online…), a backplate made of either aluminum or titanium, a sapphire crystal cover and titanium screws. The mechanism “is based on the mechanical Engine 001 movement, specially made for the company.” The wrist bands can be made from carbon infused rubber or Alcantara laced rubber.

This will be a limited edition set, with numbered models.

[ Product Page (Warning: crappy Flash page with auto-music) ] VIA [ BornRich ]

Professional athletes often rely on very specialized gear. But the latest addition to Garmin’s Forerunner line of GPS capable watches is designed for athletes from all disciplines. Including cyclists, runners and even swimmers. The 910XT continues to shrink wristworn GPS technologies with a form factor that can even be worn when getting in or out of a tight wetsuit. The press release claims the watch is water resistant to 50 meters, though I’m hoping they mean ‘waterproof’ otherwise I’d be leery of ever submerging it. But I’m suspecting the latter since it’s designed for both open water and pool swimming, keeping track of metrics like swim distance, stroke identification, stroke count and pool lengths. It’s also capable of calculating a swimmer’s ‘swolf’ score which, according to Garmin, is “the sum of the time for one length plus the number of strokes for that length.” And like golf, the lower the score the better.

For those who prefer exercising on dry land (for the record I count myself in neither camp) the Forerunner 910XT includes all of the necessary stat tracking for runners and cyclers like distance, pace and speed, elevation and even heart rate when used in conjunction with a monitor. A quick-release bike mount even keeps the watch front and center while riding, and a new ‘Virtual Racer’ feature lets athletes compete against their best times. Battery life is rated around 20 hours, but I’m assuming with the GPS functionality disabled you can get away with wearing it as a regular watch for a few days between charges. And of course all of the data the watch collects can be offloaded to your PC for analysis, or uploaded to the Garmin Connect online community if you’re particularly competitive. Pricing and availability are still TBA.

[ PR - The Ultimate Multisport Training Experience: Garmin Forerunner 910XT ] VIA [ SlashGear ]

In a weird way I feel like this post is putting me in a ‘don’t shoot the messenger’ position. Because Flud’s new BPM watches are simply not as awesome as they look. You might think they’ve created a miniature retro drum machine you can strap to your wrist and use to create fresh bleep bloop beats wherever you are. But I’m sad to say that’s not the case.

What you’re looking at here is your run-of-the-mill ’80s era calculator watch that’s designed to only look like a miniature drum machine. The 4×4 grid of drumpad buttons do work, but only for entering numbers and mathematical functions. Everything else is just moulded rubber. Presumably created to get this writer’s hopes up, then cruelly dashed! Their limited functionality also doesn’t justify their $80 price tag as far as I’m concerned. And I find little solace in the fact they’re available in 5 different color schemes.

[ Flud BPM Watches ] VIA [ Fancy ]

Swatch is a brand that has primarily put form before function over the years. Their simple watches are known for having some of the most colorful patterns and unique designs you can find on a timepiece. But as far as technology goes? There’s a reason you don’t see them popping up on OhGizmo! too frequently. A few years ago they dabbled in Microsoft’s SPOT technology, and now they’re jumping on another bandwagon that will probably be around a lot longer than MS’s smartwatch platform.

The new, and uninspiringly named, Swatch Touch eschews any and all buttons for a touchscreen LCD display providing access to 6 different functions via swiping and tapping. The basic digital watch options are all there like date and time displays, multiple timezone support, chronograph, timer and alarms. And the ridiculous font used on the LCD display seems to mirror their rounded plastic case and silicone strap. Available October 1st for ~$157 (£100) and because they’re from Swatch, you’ll be able to get them in 6 colors including camo, pink, purple, black, white and turquoise.

[ T3 - Swatch Touch officially unveiled as touchscreen timepiece ] VIA [ Ubergizmo ]

As far as concept watches go, TAG Heuer’s new Mikrotimer doesn’t look like something from the distant future. Or even some crazy LED-enhanced lightstravaganza from the likes of TokyoFlash. It might even look a little boring to some of you, until you see it in action. The Mikrotimer is a chronograph designed to measure down to 1/1000th of a second. To do this, the watch’s caliber—or its internal movements—run at 500 rotations per second, or 500Hz. That equates to 3.6 million beats per hour, and as you can see in the video embedded below, when operating as a stopwatch the sweep hand is moving so fast you can barely see it in motion.

At this point the Mikrotimer isn’t quite ready to leave TAG’s R&D department just yet. But as Hodinkee points out, it’s important for any company to foster this kind of development and innovation in their field, to push their industry ahead. Also, for anyone who’s still a fan of analog watch technology, seeing it in action is pretty amazing.

[ Hodinkee - Exclusive Hands-On ] VIA [ TechCrunch ]