Garmin Approach S2 GPS Watch – Purple/White With the golf world still buzzing over the Approach S1, Garmin is excited to announce a redesigned model for the upcoming golf season – the Garmin Approach S2 GPS Watch. The stylish Approach S2 offers a similar easy-to-use watch with a high-sensitivity GPS receiver in a lightweight, comfortable design. The Approach S2 gives golfers all of the amazing benefits of the S1; including precise yardage to the front, back and middle of greens, ability to measure shot distances, and a course odometer. The S2 adds a fashionable design with watch bands fastened by pins for an enhanced fit. Additionally, it includes layup and dogleg distances to improve usability over the entire hole and a digital scorecard that is accessed conveniently by the user throughout the round. And best of all, there is no need for downloads or subscriptions – the Approach S2 comes ready to go out of the box with over 28,000 worldwide courses and free lifetime course updates. Layup Distances Course management is key – especially if you haven’t played a course before. Layup distances shows you the distances you need with yardages to doglegs and other hazards on the course. Precise Yardages Once glance at your wrist from any point on the course is all it takes to get yardages to the front, back, and middle of greens with clear, easy-to-read numbering. Digital Scorecard Approach S2 easily keeps track of your score throughout your round. When you’re done, use the included USB cable to connect S2 to your computer to download, store, and print your scorecards. Then, chart your progress, or brag to your friends. Additional features: Preloaded worldwide courses (over 28,000 courses worldwide) and free lifetime course updates High-sensitivity GPS receiver for stronger signal strength and improved tracking under trees New modern, stylish appearance (decorative bezel to enhance look) Removable bands fastened by watch pins for a comfortable fit New improved four-pin cl
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189 of 196 people found the following review helpful
 Very Solid And Depends Upon What You Want to Trade Off, By
This review is from: Garmin Approach S2 GPS Golf Watch with Worldwide Courses (Black) (Electronics)
If you do a search on my prior reviews, you will see that I have owned and/or tried several different golf GPS devices, and continually am searching for the perfect device. For the most part, nothing has touched my old Callaway MX (the original), until the batteries (even the replacement ones) would not hold a charge. The new MX held promise but didn’t work for me well enough and it was returned after a round, leaving me for the past two seasons or so with the Garmin G. Over time, I came to wonder about the benefits of having distance on my wrist and giving up some of the other features. Make no mistake, there are pluses and minuses with the G2 Approach, and it just depends on what is most important to you, and what you’re willing to live without. First, on to the details. In the Box: In the box comes the G2 watch, and very short quick start guide in like 500 languages and the charger clip. Like everybody else, I threw the box aside and proceeded to figure it out on my own. Charged in a few hours, no problem. The clip charger is not ideal, because it’s kind of bulky (though light), but it’s not that big of a deal. The clip is attached to USB, so you can charge it off your laptop, or from your little Apple USB charger box. Charges pretty quickly. The Fit: I wear a larger heart rate monitor type watch (Suunto), so the Garmin is really no bigger than what I wear every day. The watch band is comfortable, and I didn’t have to synch it too tight. Overall, I don’t even notice it when I play, same thing as every day, so the fit is a plus. The Display: I looked at the G3, because who doesn’t want more pixels right? Well I said no to the extra 0 because I read the movable touch screen didn’t work very well, and I could not see how it would work well, with the limited space on the face. The pixels are fine. I had no problem seeing the distances in the sun or the shade and found the resolution just fine. Ease of Use: This is where some of the tradeoffs come in. On my Garmin G6 handled, I of course could get easy distance to any particular piece of junk to carry or to any bunker as well as to any layup distance. On the G6 is is a simple matter of moving the cursor on the touch screen with my finger and it calculates distances to there and from there to the flag, and it was easy to pull the cursor to the red, white and blue lines to get layup distances to 100, 150 and 200. Also, the G6 gives me the ability to move the flag on the green to the particular hole location–all of which are nice. Now, on the G2, you can get distance to doglegs, and layups to 100, 150, 200, which is a fine amount of data to have (more than I really need) and the closest thing to a “complaint” I have about doing so on the G2 approach is the way you have to work the buttons to do it. Having said that, it’s a minor complaint because the FAR FAR biggest advantage of the G2 is having your distances with you all the time–and I mean ALL THE TIME. There is no wake up function to wake the watch up from a sleep, no digging out the device from your pocket or sitting on the buttons my mistake and having it turn itself off or advance you to other screens without your knowledge. The G2 simply switches holes (advances holes) automatically for you when you get near the tee box and it’s flawless. There’s no digging out the device and having to go back a few holes and if your course starts you on the back side instead of the front, it just knows it. A huge plus. You just look at your wrist no matter where you are, and your distances to the front, center and back of the greens are just there in easy to read format. In my view, the proliferation of GPS and laser devices have kind of over complicated things because rather than getting a distance to the front, center and back, we too often get precise distances to the very spot of the flag (whether from GPS like the G6 or a laser), and we pull a club to that distance without factoring in the bounce and roll. Anyway, the front, center and back view on the G2 is great, and I wouldn’t even want a scrollable or movable flag any more. On to the minor complaint: There are a lot of button presses here. More than there should be. You hold the button to start a round. No worries there. To move from “hole view” to “layup” view, you have to hit a button again, but there is no “back key” and there should have been. Similarly, to score your round–and it only scores a single player’s scores so you lose the score to add up scores for your pals, you have to press AND hold the OK button, scroll a menu of a few items to reach “SCORECARD,” then hit the OK button again, which brings you to the hole you are on, and then you have to hit OK again to confirm you are entering the score on the right hole, press the up or down arrows to enter your score, press OK again, and then press AND hold the OK button until the menu…
88 of 92 people found the following review helpful
 Big improvement on the S1, By
Taran (Chicago, IL) – See all my reviews
This review is from: Garmin Approach S2 GPS Golf Watch with Worldwide Courses (Black) (Electronics)
I have used this watch on 3 rounds now, and it is a very well made product. The strap is much more comfortable than the S1. The dogleg feature did not show up on all holes with a dogleg, but when it did, it was very accurate. The other feature that was great was the distances to layup at different points that you can scroll through. For example, you could see how far you would have to hit to layup to 100yds, 150yds, 200yds, 250yds etc.
As far as battery life, I played 36 holes the first day I had the watch and it easily made it through both rounds without need for any kind of recharge. This is a very well made watch, distances were very accurate and an all around tool to speed up your round. 0
34 of 36 people found the following review helpful
 3 months….not charging anymore. Poor Design, By
Maryalice (Glen Head, NY) – See all my reviews
Verified Purchase(What’s this?)
This review is from: Garmin Approach S2 GPS Golf Watch with Worldwide Courses (Purple) (Electronics)
The S2 was great at first. Now three months later, I am having trouble with it charging. At best, after a night of charging, it holds the charge enough for a 4 hour round. Now I charge it all night and it lasts 15 minutes. I think it has a poor design. The contacts for the charger are located on the underside of the watch that touches your skin. After sweating, the contacts get rusty. I have two friends from my ladies golf league who are having the exact same problem, so I know it is not just my watch. I am contacting Garmin now and asking for a full refund.
I’ll let you know how that goes……. 0 |
