Coros Vertix 2

Anyone have a Coros Vertix 2 and can comment on its accuracy while in real life multi-pitch situations? Supposedly they've done some work to reduce the reflection problem that makes most GPS sport watches pretty useless for tracking distance and elevation gain climbing on walls in canyons and such.

https://www.techradar.com/news/your-coros-sports-watch-is-about-to-get-a-huge-update

Bump. Curious on this. There doesn't seem to be much feedback from actual climbers on this watch. CEO apparently is active on MP.

That'll look real nice sitting next to my PAS and cordalette on my harness.  Whats the MBS on it? Maybe I can eliminate a biner.

Kevin Mokracek wrote:

That'll look real nice sitting next to my PAS and cordalette on my harness.  Whats the MBS on it? Maybe I can eliminate a biner.

If it's not your thing, you may move along. Some of us find it useful to track mileage, elevation gain, and location in the mountains. 

Kevin Mokracek wrote:

That'll look real nice sitting next to my PAS and cordalette on my harness.  Whats the MBS on it? Maybe I can eliminate a biner.

Well, it might be useful for you when you're doing another of your first ascents of a new route on an 8000 meter peak line (the ones that make the news), a speed record on a multi-day alpine enchainment, or a desperately hard ice or rock climb. 

Or - you could just move along.

Dang, you all are pretty touchy when it comes to giant carabiner watches.  

This is great, until now I've had no way to know how hard my multipitch climb is!

Kevin Mokracek wrote:

Dang, you all are pretty touchy when it comes to giant carabiner watches.  

Nice try.

The watch I have now is useless while climbing because it bounces the GPS signal from the top to the bottom of the wall repeatedly and thinks I've covered way more vert than I have - on the order of hundreds or thousands of feet of extra elevation gain while climbing a few pitches. This is a known problem with how pretty much every GPS watch works. While flattering to my ego, it's super annoying to have this consistent issue with your stats when you're training for an objective.

If Coros has indeed fixed it with their new dual GPS system in the Vertix 2, it would be uniquely useful. The promo videos and some reviewers say that yes, this is the real deal. I'm asking whether anyone on MP can verify.

L Kap wrote:

The watch I have now is useless while climbing because it bounces the GPS signal from the top to the bottom of the wall repeatedly and thinks I've covered way more vert than I have - on the order of hundreds or thousands of feet of extra elevation gain while climbing a few pitches. This is a known problem with how pretty much every GPS watch works.

If your main concern is measuring vertical gain and loss when climbing, have you thought about using a watch with a barometric altimeter instead of GPS altimeter? I think the Vertix 2 has a barometric altimeter, but so do many other watches. Barometric altimeters aren't very precise – they tend to drift out of calibration as your elevation changes – but they're not terrible either. In my experience they usually record gains or losses within about 5-10% of the true figure as determined using a topo map, and of course they don't depend on GPS signals.

Regarding GPS accuracy, here's a review that was quite skeptical: https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2021/08/coros-vertix-2-in-depth-review.html.. (Quote: "From a GPS standpoint, at best I'd say 'meh'"). I'd be skeptical too. Fundamentally, if you're half-way up a big vertical rock face then by definition you won't have a good view of the sky, and if you don't have a good view of the sky then it's difficult to get a good GPS fix. Maybe some clever signal processing can make a difference in marginal situations, but I don't see how signal processing can help if you're unable to pick up GPS signals in the first place.