Jewellery & Watch News
Since their founding in 1989, Garmin have had an unwavering dedication to navigation. From the early beginnings of their history, they focused largely of GPS systems for cars and handheld navigation systems for hikers and adventurers. Then in 2003, they expanded their product line even further to include wristwear and it wasn’t long before Garmin multisport watches began to lead the industry in innovation and durability. Twelve years later and the technology giants combined these two worlds into one smartwatch release, the Garmin EPIX, which became their first hands-free Garmin navigator.
The original Garmin EPIX became an instant hit for explorers with its high resolution full-colour touchscreen display preloaded with mapping for all of Europe. It was the dream wearable for anyone often walking, hiking or running in unknown territory thanks to a breadcrumb trail to see where you have been so you could always find your way back, a back to waypoint feature and a built-in compass. For several years, the Garmin EPIX was the brand’s leading navigation tool until it eventually lost traction and disappeared from their collections altogether. That was until now, as just this morning Garmin have officially announced the revival of the EPIX with the release of the Garmin EPIX 2.
As we expected, the Garmin EPIX comes fully prepared with a huge host of navigation and hiking tools. There’s Multi-GNSS support with GPS, GLONASS and Galileo, ABC sensors, an acclimation widget which shows your current elevation, acclimated elevation and correlated Pulse Ox2, heart rate3 and respiration rate, so you can see how you’re holding up to the current elevation and the iconic ClimbPro feature. You can also expect multi-continent TopoActive maps where you can view terrain contours, elevations, summits, parks, coastlines, rivers, lakes and other geographical features.
Although still entirely developed as a wrist-based navigation system, the new Garmin EPIX 2 watch collection also hosts plenty of sports and fitness apps including preloaded activity profiles for trail running, swimming, running, biking, hiking, rowing, skiing, golfing, surfing, indoor climbing and more. There’s also animated workouts, HIIT workouts, Garmin Coach, Visual Race Predictor, PacePro technology which helps keep you on pace with grade-adjusted guidance as you run a course, VO2 max, performance metrics, daily workout suggestions and real time stamina which allows you to track and manage your exertion.
One of the Garmin EPIX 2’s biggest updates can be found at the touchscreen which is now a high-resolution AMOLED display protected by sapphire crystal glass on three of the four available models. The display has a 454x454 pixels resolution which measures in at 33.02mm in size taking up the majority of the 47mm case diameter. Despite the high-performance AMOLED display, the Garmin EPIX doesn’t disappoint on battery life either offering up to 16 days in smartwatch mode.
There are currently four Garmin EPIX 2 watches to choose from, three engineered from titanium with fibre reinforced polymer housing and one in stainless steel. The first titanium model is finished in a Black DLC coating with sporty red accents on the crown and a sporty black rubber strap. The second model is left bare in polished titanium with subtle lime green accents and a white rubber band. The third Garmin EPIX Titaniuym watch in the line-up is arguably the dressier out of the trio bringing together a black DLC titanium case and a brown calfskin leather strap. For the steel model, there are orange accents, Corning® Gorilla® Glass DX and a grey rubber band.
If you’d like to learn more about the Garmin EPIX 2 and shop the collection for yourself, head over to the W Hamond website here. Alternatively, get in touch with the team by calling 01947 603330 or send us a message at info@whamond.com.
