TRACK YORUSELF: (l-r) the Suunto Ambit3 Sport, Ambit3 Peak Black and Ambit3 Peak Sapphire all come with built in GPS and a heart rate monitor accessory.
Finnish company Suunto has a new line of digital sports watches out, called the Ambit3.
There are currently three models in the range, namely the Ambit3 Peak Sapphire, the Ambit3 Peak Black and the Ambit3 Sport.
All three watches have gained some smartwatch features, and if you have an iOS smartphone and the Movescount app installed, you’ll see calls, messages and other push notifications appear on the watches as they come in to the smartphone.
All three Ambit3 watches also come bundled with a Suunto Smart Sensor, a Bluetooth heart rate monitor that is strapped to the chest to monitor the user’s heart rate during activity.
The Ambit3 Peak Sapphire and Ambit3 Peak Black are essentially the same watch, except that — as the name suggests — the Peak Sapphire features a sapphire crystal lens instead of the mineral crystal one found in the Ambit3 Peak Black.
The Ambit3 Peak series has built in GPS and is meant for advanced outdoor and multisport functions and has route navigation, digital compass, temperature, altitude, sunrise and sunset times, speed and pace monitoring and up to 50 hours of battery life with GPS on.
The Ambit3 Sport on the other hand, also has GPS route navigation, digital compass and the ability to record multiple sports in one log, but is missing temperature and weather information.
The Ambit3 Sport also has a shorter total battery life, rated at 25 hours with GPS on.
Without GPS on, the Ambit3 Peak can last up to one month on a single charge, while the Ambit3 Sport can last up to two weeks.
The Movescount companion app for iOS devices allows the user to customise sport modes and change settings in the Ambit3 watches as well as recording heart rate from the Suunto Smart Sensor and synching of your activity in real time to the movescount.com site.
The Movescount app is free in the App Store and while there isn’t an Android app available yet, Suunto is working on it and a Movescount app for Android is expected in the first half of 2015.
The Ambit3 Peak Sapphire has a recommended retail price (RRP) of RM2,799, while the Ambit3 Peak Black will go for RM2,599 and the Ambit3 Sport will have an RRP of RM1,799.
Suunto is also expected to launch the Ambit3 Sport Sapphire in January — again, the same in terms of features as the Ambit3 Sport, but with a sapphire crystal lens for superior scratch resistance.
For more information check out the Universal Fitness & Leisure Sdn Bhd site here.
