junko:hi,
I'm sorry if this has been discussed already--I tried to look through the threads but didn't see it.
I read a lot of good things about Suunto Vyper on here, but then I went to Rodale's and they criticize it for various things: buttons are too hard to push with gloves on, screen is difficult to read, its not clear which buttons do what, and the manual is bad. I've never used a dive computer before so I have no idea what to think. Have the Vyper owners experienced the problems above? thanks
I tend to ignore Rodales for just about everything regarding equipment
Im a vyper owner, i dive in cold water and always wear 5mm neoprene gloves.
I dont find the buttons hard to push with gloves on - yes theyre small but they stick out a fair bit and are positioned far enough apart you dont have a problem pressing 2 buttons at once.
Underwater in dive mode the amount of presses is really limited to 2 - toggling the time/temp display on one button and rarer, using the bookmark feature on another. I have no problem doing either of these.
As for screen hard to read, i find this hard to believe. Its got a very big screen with big figures (far bigger than these new wrist watch style computers) and has a nice blue backlight (with selectable on-time) for dark environments.
In over 90% of my dives i never need to hit ANY button whilst underwater. Its rare i need to bookmark, even rarer i need to know the exact time.
On the comment about manual hard to understand - make your own mind up - Suunto site has it for download as a PDF.
I didnt find it difficult to use - i hired one abroad once and had a 5 min tutorial and was told the main bits, i bought one afterwards and took no more than 30 mins to work out. Once you work out the method of up/down and select using the buttons its easy.
I THINK Suunto has a vyper simulator on the site too so you can even try that for yourself.
In short, have a look yourself and dont place faith on Rodales
Final added bonus, the dive logger software is free and for less than $5usd you can build the computer interface yourself.