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ronch
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Late FNT: The Case for Smartwatches / Wearables

Sun Jun 14, 2015 9:51 am

Seems to me we haven't had a Friday Night Topic for a while now, so how about we discuss smart watches and wearables? Yeah I know this is late and it's MONDAY tomorrow (we just loooove Mondays, don't we?) but oh, what the heck! Anyway, here's my take to get the ball rolling:

The traditional wrist watch form factor is a natural fit for analog watches with hands and dials. Later on, things went digital, and it was still a good fit because it's a relatively simple gadget.

Smartphones, however, have become popular and are practically computers that we can put in our pockets. People have grown to expect certain things from them. Cram it in a wearable, however, and so many features that seemed naturally suited to smartphones fade away. How do you dial numbers on it to call someone? (And even if you could call someone with them, how would you use it? Do you need a pair of earbuds? Do you put it next to your ear? M.A.S.K. style communication?) How do you respond to an SMS? How do you watch a movie? Can I use it as a calculator?

You see, practically everyone has a smartphone these days and they're pretty happy with it fitting in their pocket and they can do everything except predict tomorrow's lottery numbers (but then again maybe they could). Do they need one more extra gadget to plug into the wall that doesn't really do anything compelling enough to make someone who already has a smartphone really NEED it? Techies may feel curious enough to buy one, but not everyone's a techy, and not every techy would be willing to pay good money for one. Sure, wearables may have some things like pulse monitors and all that, but few people care, and those who are watching their heart beats probably wouldn't trust a wearable either.

Bottomline, IMHO, people just don't have enough compelling reasons to NEED wearables. Heck, they wouldn't even be able to play Angry Birds on them. Thing is, I think the traditional wrist watch form factor IS NOT A GOOD FIT for portable computing for several reasons (battery capacity and display size being the biggest deal breakers). And so, it's mostly just a curiosity. Plus, traditional watches have this sort of effect on people, kinda like cars; they're not just tools that tell time, they're status symbols, symbols of your personal tastes, fashion accesories, mechanical masterpieces. Smart watches? Um, aren't those just like smartphones except they wrap around your wrist and can do far fewer things and you have to charge them every two or three days? Cool? Maybe. Geeky? For sure. And they aren't cheap enough for most folks either, so that's one more bullet point.

So bottomline, IMHO, I think wearables are an answer to a question no one even asked, especially with smartphones in their pockets.

Discuss.
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Re: Late FNT: The Case for Smartwatches / Wearables

Sun Jun 14, 2015 4:56 pm

Smartphones have gotten ridiculously, laughably large. Some of these are bordering on too large for pockets, at least in business attire. I can understand those who may want to get their alerts without having to dig a tablet out of their purse or bag.

The future of the smartphone is a new form factor, these wearables are the intermediate tech we have to deal with until that evolution takes place. Until a watch can serve the phone function all by itself (see dick tracey) or there is a wrist mounted option (see leela from futurama or any of dozens of sci fi shows or modern FPS games) or unless google glass becomes seamless we will have to deal with overpriced, gaudy devices that have a questionable use case.
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Re: Late FNT: The Case for Smartwatches / Wearables

Sun Jun 14, 2015 7:53 pm

To start off, after two years I have just upgraded from a Pebble to a Pebble Time, so that's my experience in this area.

As I figure it, a smartwatch is for people who can't get their phone out of their pocket or purse. As stupid as that sounds, that's me a lot of the time - I have an active toddler and I spend large portions of my day where I either need to be holding or carrying him. If I'm not doing either of those, I have the conundrum that he treats my phone (really, any phone) as visual crack - if it's out of my pocket, he wants to play with it.

The Pebble allows me to screen incoming calls and texts to see whether it's important enough to stop what I'm already doing, fish out my phone and respond. It doesn't sound like a lot, but it makes everything in my day run so much smoother. Once you get used to it, it becomes much more normal. Actually using my smartphone for receiving communication happens a lot less, and I get distracted less as a result.

The Pebble also gets ~6 days battery life (both original and new) between charges, and charges in about one hour. That's enough of a lifespan, and a short enough recharging period, that it's almost never off my wrist - like a normal watch. Really, anything else is unacceptable to me for anything that's going to call itself a watch.
 
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Re: Late FNT: The Case for Smartwatches / Wearables

Thu Aug 23, 2018 9:27 pm

Dredging up this old thread due to all of the advances in wearables lately, and my crazy run with trying to find the "perfect" motivator to get me off my butt once in a while.

So a couple of years ago, I bought a MisFit, which was a very simple tracker in a metal clamshell enclosure on a rubber strap. No display, and terrible connectivity. The advantage was I could track swimming activities without killing it, no other reasonably cheap tracker could go swimming at the time. It was an OK device, but the connectivity issues drove me nuts, and frankly, it didn't tell time very well without a display. It was also annoying to change the battery when it finally died, I could never figure out how to pry that sucker apart without scratching it. It also didn't do squat for biking, and had no clue on hiking and elevation.

I went watch-less for a couple of years... then I bought my first Garmin about a year ago, a Vivo Active HR. I was immediately hooked as a tech nerd like myself loves to play with little gadgets. Garmin has a great partnership with Strava, and also it's own really well developed web site and "Connect" application. You can explore your metrics in there for hours, set up tracks to use for navigation, and pit yourself against other users. Now since I have been on the Garmin product line for a year, I find this one of the most compelling features.

I later gradually realized that this Vivo Active HR device wasn't really all it was cracked up to be. It was cool, but battery life wasn't as good as it should be, and I couldn't customize this and that, and it wasn't all that comfortable. It was also no longer in production. I don't remember exactly why I returned it, but I bought a Vivo Active 3 afterwards for way more money than I planned on.

The Vivo Active 3 is an excelent little tracker, great GPS, swimmable, reasonable battery life (multiple days), except one fatal flaw: The wrist strap is a standard quick release cheap wrist-watch pin setup. I took one dive at 25 feet, and now it is in the bottom of Blue Mountain Lake in the ADK. So in an effort to find a replacement device that didn't pop off so easily, I started looking around for tough devices, and came right back to Garmin. For one I didn't want to start all over on my tracking metrics, for another, their devices are just nice looking IMHO. Not a square over-sized chicklet on a strap.

Before I get into the reason I think I am a horrible person after the events of the past three weeks, let me list out the results of some informal research into other brands:

From what I understand, Fitbit is similar to Garmin for app support and fitness-centric, but has a MUCH larger community. That was very appealing. However, until recently I couldn't swim with them, and the ruggedness of them just isn't there. For example, I would never leave one on while playing hockey. This was confirmed by L.L Bean stopping carrying them due to the number of broken returns. My VA3 survived many a hockey game.

I looked as the Samsungs, and they are nice, a beautiful display even these tired old eyes can read, but the lag in display light up, and the marginal battery life turned me off. Also, their watches tend to be geared towards smart watch features rather than athletics. Again, they didn't seem all that rugged, and Samsung is not interested in rugged as much as selling something that lasts just long enough... The Fit 2 is nice though. Fits well, looks good, I'm sure works well, but has no real metal case to protect it.

The Apple watch, beautiful! But why bother with sleep tracking if you have to charge the damned thing every night? Expensive, and I don't have an Apple phone. Oh, and no swimming. Sports is a distant secondary function to Smart Watch.
The new MisFit? Too little, too late. Bad battery and charger dock. No GPS.
All the Chinese knock-offs have zero support, and their apps just suck. My son has one, and it is OK for casual use.

So now the reason I am a bad person:
L.L. Bean lost some money on me because you cannot test these things out for a day or two without doing a standard return. At least these were all display models except for the S3, so it wasn't all that bad...

So I went into The Bean and replaced my drowned Vivo Active 3 with a Fenix 5s. They were roughly the same size and weight so I thought that it is essentially a VA3 with a rugged design... but unti I got home and put it on, the watch bands for it were too short! I was on the last rung. Longer watch band? I couldn't find one with a measurement listed. Garmin bands for this were all too short for me and $50 a pop. Then I realized this was marketed to women. Duh. Returned it.

Then I got the Fenix 5, but the one I got was a display model since it was the only one left. It turned out it was likely the first model of the first run... sitting on the display for as long as the Fenix 5 was out. Totally flat battery. Having spent a little more than chump change on this thing,I was concerned of buggy hardware and a damaged battery. After using it a week though, the only real problem was pretty bad GPS reception in the woods. Only 5% of battery drain a day though, with an average 1hr GPS use per day. Pretty stinking good, but that nagging GPS performance got to me. If I was going to spend that kind of money, the GPS better work well!

I went back to the Bean to query to see if I could exchange the Fenix 5 for a fresh in the box rather than the display model. I would have to purchase another Fenix 5 and return the old one when it arrived. But while I was asking, she informed me the larger and much more expensive Fenix 5x was on liquidation sale, and I could get it for $48 less than I spent on the Fenix 5! So without thinking much, I went for it. I briefly tried it on, but neglected to simply wear it around the store a bit first.

The Fenix 5x is for a lack of a better term, huge. It is heavy. It is awesome. Then came the regret. It hurts simply to wear it. The thing is so heavy that the larger strap had to be tightened just to keep it on my wrist properly. This was not that comfortable. The GPS behaved the same way as the Fenix 5 in the woods, and biking with it on bumpy trails hurts as it bashes into my wrists. But it is awesome!

I loved it, except... battery life was bad (another display model), and I couldn't wear the beast at night. In my head, I could swear my hand was turning purple as the watch band slowly choked my circulation off. I had to return it. I knew I would almost never use the mapping features anyhow. Cool as they are. If you want the most awesome smartwatch there is, this is it! But you better have He-Man wrists.

So now I have a Fenix 5 back on order, one of the very last still in L.L. Bean stock as they have moved on to the Fenix 5 Plus series, which is a startling $700 and up. Nope. I am desperately hoping it is not yet another display model, but it is being shipped from Vermont. I am watch-less for a few days, and I feel naked.

So moral of this story?
There is no perfect Smart Watch. Try to wear them about for a little if possible if you are shopping. Maybe wait a few more years for a standard Smart Watch to have a 2 week battery life (I consider this minimal, so when you are on vacation you don't have to remember your charger), and daylight readable always on displays standard. After all, the point of these fitness oriented smart watches is to encourage you to get out a little more, push yourself a little harder, and perhaps check the time once or twice.

Go to REI, that is the place to try them out.

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