So, the other day, I glanced at my trusty G-Shock, you know, the one I’ve had for ages, and the time was completely off. It’s a solid watch, takes a beating, but when the time’s wrong, it’s just annoying. I think I might have messed it up when I was trying to set an alarm or something, who knows. Those tiny instruction manuals are always lost when you actually need ’em, right? Anyway, I had to get it sorted, and I figured I’d share how I usually wrestle with it, ’cause it’s not always super obvious.
Figuring Out The Buttons
First thing I always do is take a good look at the buttons. Most of these G-Shocks have four main buttons, sometimes five. You’re looking for one that usually says ADJUST or SET. On mine, it’s the top-left one. That’s usually the magic button to get things started.
Getting into Setting Mode
Okay, so once I’ve found that ADJUST button, the trick is to press it and hold it down. Don’t just give it a quick tap. You gotta keep your finger on it for a few seconds. I usually count to three or four. You’ll know you’re in when you hear a little beep, or, more likely, something on the display starts blinking. For me, it’s usually the city code or the timezone that starts flashing first. That’s your green light – you’re in the settings now.
Cycling Through What to Change
Now, once something is flashing, you need to tell the watch what you want to change. Is it the hour? The minutes? The date? For this, I use the MODE button. This one is typically on the bottom-left. Each time I press MODE, the flashing part on the display changes. It’ll cycle through stuff like DST (Daylight Saving Time), then the hour, then minutes, then the year, month, day, and sometimes the 12/24 hour format. I just keep pressing MODE until the thing I want to fix is blinking.
Making the Actual Changes
Alright, so let’s say the hour is flashing and it’s wrong. Now I need to use the other buttons, usually the ones on the right side of the watch. On many G-Shocks, these might be labeled FORWARD and REVERSE, or sometimes they’re the START/STOP button and the LIGHT button if you’re in a different mode. One button will make the flashing number go up, and the other will make it go down. So, I just press the up or down button until the hour is correct. Then I’d press MODE again to move to the minutes, and use those same right-side buttons to adjust the minutes. Same process for the day, month, and year.
Saving and Getting Out
Once I’ve gone through everything and all the settings are how I want them – correct hour, minutes, date, and all that jazz – it’s time to save it and get back to the normal time display. To do this, I just press the ADJUST button (the top-left one again) one more time. Just a quick press this time, no need to hold it down. The watch will usually beep, the flashing will stop, and the hands (if it’s an analog-digital one) will whirr to the new time, or the digital display will just show the corrected time. Done!
Sometimes I forget about the DST setting, so if the time is off by exactly one hour, that’s usually the culprit. Or I might accidentally switch it to 24-hour mode when I prefer 12-hour. It’s just a matter of cycling through with MODE until that specific setting is flashing and then changing it. It seems a bit of a pain the first time, but once you’ve done it a couple of times, it’s pretty straightforward. Every G-Shock model can be a tiny bit different, but this general method has worked for most of the ones I’ve owned. Hope this helps someone else save a bit of frustration!
