I really like this Pulsar PQ2003 digital watch.  It's good looking and function rich.  This watch is the most innovative designed watch I have seen since the Casio watches first came out.  The watch is more than just multiple alarms.  You can customize so many things.  I'll give you a run down of the many pluses and a few minuses.

What you should know about...

The weight, the size, and the band: Its a big, robust watch but not too heavy or large.  The band is better than a straight one which I have on another watch and that I have to pull real tight to keep from slipping around. The contoured shape of the Pulsar band allows one to wear the band looser and not have it slide around on one's wrist.

The Hardlex crystal: This is Pulsar's fancy name for a chemically treated mineral crystal.  It's much stronger than plastic crystals but only a third as scratch and pressure resistance as a sapphire crystal.  It's a high quality crystal but not top of the line.  Sapphire is top of the line and costs a lot more.  The thing about Sapphire versus mineral crystals is that when Sapphire breaks it shatters into sharp fragments.  Your standard mineral crystals are softer and less likely to shatter. They will scratch before a Sapphire will though.

The display: It's big and clear and you have options.  You can choose a huge time display with out the year or the seconds displayed.  In this super easy on the eyes display, you can still tell its working because the two dots between the hours and minutes blink.  The other display provides the year and seconds.  Some people might think this is too busy a display but I like it.  The year display could keep you on track the first week of January as well when you are filling out forms and still writing in the previous year.

Two other pluses for the display are that you can choose the color of the light to display the time at night and you can choose the contrast.  The colors are blue and amber (looks orange to me).  I think this is pretty cool.  The contrast control is also very helpful.  I have returned a couple of other brand watches because the watches' displays were too hard to read in low light conditions.  Pulsar has solved this problem.  But first a word about contrast, the contrast is all about the absorption of light. When the contrast is in the positive range you can see it more clearly in low light conditions without using up the juice in your watch battery by having to use the light button too much.  The trade off though, as I see it, is that when you use the light you get shadows and an overexposure of the display that doesn't look ideal.  Low contrast, on the other hand, is just fine for normal office lighting conditions and sunlight but hard to see in low light conditions.  The plus though is that when the watch light is used, the display is not over exposed and looks more pristine.

Setting it up: Some say it's difficult or not intuitive while some say it's not difficult and rather intuitive.  I think it's just different from what most people are use to.  Its not a Casio and has a different way of navigating it.  I found the learning curve to be short. The scrolling of functions does seem counter intuitive though.  For example: you press the bottom right button and you expect the menu item just below the center menu item to show up but this doesn't happen, the one from above shows up.  I found if I envision the menus on a wheel (like the wheel of fortune) and by grabbing a hold of the wheel and pulling down, the menu item on top comes into center view for setting.  Anyway, I put way too much thought into this because it only takes about 2 seconds to figure out.  After you get to a sub menu, the bottom button scrolls down, as you would intuitively expect while the top button set your personal preferences/settings.

The daylight savings time and how it works with world time is the only area that had me stumped.  When you set the time up it also sets up the 39 cities in your world time.  Twenty of these cities observe daylight savings time.  These cities are mostly in North America and Europe and not in Asian.  They have an asterisk by the city names in the world time section of the manual identifying them.  First problem, how do I know my watch is set for DST?  The answer is a small round icon with what appears to be rays around it displays when set to this mode. It's hard to see and there is no mention of this icon in the manual. If you push and hold the top right button it will switch between DST and standard time for your local time.  Another problem is that its not clear telling whether DST is on or off in the world time mode.  All 39 cities show DST.  To set DST you go to the city in world time and press and hold the top left button and now DST will show "DST on."  If it only shows "DST" than its off.  I think its interesting scrolling through the world times in various cities.  Keep in mind, the last one you leave it on is what it will stay on so that with one press of the bottom right button you can see your time and your target city's time.  Hold that button for a couple of seconds and you just switched to that city.  This is a pretty handy way to switch times when getting off a plane.

The schedule mode: This is useful for reminding you about events in your life and you can use preset messages along with other manually inputted messages.  There is one problem with this function though.  You have preset messages assigned to all your numbers.  If you input a number in your message at anytime, the default setting for the preset message will replace whatever message you put in there already.  For example: You enter in the time and date of a flight you will be leaving on.  You enter a preset message for FLT, which would be the number 7.  Now, you want to add the flight number so you can check to see if it's on time.  Let's say its FLT 88.  As soon as you enter 8, the message changes to GYM, which is preset to number 8. I guess if you got to have that flight number in there, you will have to use roman numerals.  I found that not being able to use numbers in the messages to be a big disappointment.

The alarms: You got five daily alarms that sound off for 20 seconds.  The schedule mode are one time alarms with messages.  You can also customize between two alarm sounds, which is nifty.

The stopwatch: Does everything you would expect in a fancy stopwatch.

The countdown timer: I am impressed and a little disappointed with this function.  I like that it's ideal for interval training.  For instance, I can set the timer to go off every 30 seconds while exercising for up to 99 times.  I only need it to do it six times though.  The warming sound beeps for 5 seconds and goes off by its self while counting down the next 30 seconds.  I find this function ideal for certain exercises I perform.  The down side is that the hour and minute display are huge while the display for seconds is very small.  I'd have liked to see a larger display of the seconds.  You got two display options on the time, why not have two display options with the timer?

Battery life: Pulsar says the battery lasts about two years.  I think you can expect maybe a year extension by taking the following steps.  1) Turn the contrast all the way up so you don't have to use the light on the watch as much, 2) Turn the beeps off  (an option in your settings), and your alarms and countdown timer will still sound off.  3) Set the ECO control to shut the watch down after an hour.  In the settings you have an option of shutdown after 1, 2, or 3 hours as well as the option of not using the ECO mode at all.  I think the ECO mode is a clever innovation by Pulsar to extend battery life.

Water Resistance: Although this watch seems too nice to take a swim in, it's perfectly all right to do so.  The back of the watch says, "water resistance 10 bars."  Translation: 10 BAR is equivalent to 10 ATM, 100m, or 330ft. This is suitable for everyday use and swimming and snorkeling but NOT suitable for high board diving or sub-aqua diving

All in all, this Pulsar Watch is a great watch with many useful functions for sports and everyday life.  The customization is terrific and it's a smart watch with only minor flaws.  I highly recommend it.