Wear OS: I'm not rich, just stupid

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Inspect Your Gadgets > Wear OS: I'm not rich, just stupid

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

Why are people assuming there won't be huge strides in the tech of these devices when competition is just starting to heat up?

# ¿ May 12, 2015 21:55

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# ¿ May 6, 2024 18:55

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

True, but there's probably about 10 times the R&D going into this segment than there was a year or two ago. I would hope to see some unexpected pleasant surprises somewhere along the line, a game changer like the iPhone and iPad did for smartphones and tablets.

# ¿ May 12, 2015 22:27

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

5TonsOfFlax posted:

I saw another story on the Fossil Founder (that's it's name, and also a verb that means "fail or break down, typically as a result of a particular problem or setback."). It has a Moto 360 style flat tire. That's not a dealbreaker for me, but it is a negative.

That sounds more like the definition of flounder if anything.

# ¿ Oct 22, 2015 01:54

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

I've been looking at the Urbane and the Gear S2 lately, are there any other Wear devices in that price range I should be considering? I really like the looks of the Huawei, but dislike that it's double the price of the other two, but it might be worth considering if it's that much better.

# ¿ Mar 22, 2016 02:07

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

BottleKnight posted:

The moto 360 probably.

Also the Gear S2 doesn't run Wear, it runs Tizen, so while it is a beautiful watch with a very nice bezel mechanism, it is a device very much hamstringed by its OS.

Oh I know, that's squarely in the cons category for the S2. Neither OS seems to have any groundbreaking features though. Seeing as how all I'm looking for is a pretty watch that shows notifications and they're both the same price I might as well consider it.

With Android Wear I'm wary that it seems over reliant on voice, but not as worried as I am by the fact that the S2 will most certainly be abandoned this fall.

# ¿ Mar 22, 2016 02:39

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

LastInLine posted:

I'll tell you now that I very very seldom use voice on my Moto 360/2 and it hasn't hamstrung my use of it at all. I find that everything I want to do is accessible via swipes and gestures.

Another thing I'd throw in is that I really didn't expect to think it would be worth the $400 I paid for it but you know, I don't regret it at all. I thought the flat tire would bother me but now in use I know that the lack of an ambient light sensor would piss me off a lot more. And I stand by the reason I picked the 360 over the Huawei which was that the screen is raised over the bezel and not recessed within it which just makes it look so much nicer than every other watch.

At this point I'd probably wait for a Snapdragon Wear device unless I needed one by the weekend but I have no complaints about my 360/2 at all.

I really like the look of the steel 360/2 but $400 is squarely in the realm where I might feel buyer's remorse if this year's offerings render existing watches obsolete. $200 for the Urbane though, seems too good to pass up.

# ¿ Mar 22, 2016 06:16

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

Turns out in order to get the Gear S2 or Urbane LTE for $200 you have to sign up for cell service on them, making them actually more expensive than more attractive options like the Huawei or 360 2.

# ¿ Apr 9, 2016 16:32

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

I don't feel that Wear is dead, I do feel that it is going through its HTC Thunderbolt/Droid Bionic phase. I want to play around with a Wear device but I can't shake the feeling that this year or the next is gonna produce devices that make the current selection look like absolute poo poo.

# ¿ May 8, 2016 05:57

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

The Bananana posted:

Anybody?

Should probably ask in the general wearables thread, and also provide some more detail considering there's about 5 versions of the Gear S2 out there.

# ¿ Aug 2, 2016 08:40

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

AA is for Quitters posted:

Samung gear? My bank doesn't support Android pay/Samsung pay yet so I have yet to try it, but I've heard good things.

The Samsung Gear is not an Android Wear device though.

# ¿ Feb 5, 2018 23:19

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

Rastor posted:

I move we replace the OP with this Ron Amadeo article

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/03/android-wear-isnt-dead-yet-gets-rebranded-as-wear-os-by-google/

Google took a page out of the Windows Phone playbook and tried to convince OEMs to push a product with an OS they couldn't modify or integrate into their own ecosystems, giving them no reason to stay in the battle when the brand was not an instant runaway success. It's a shame really, had they kept the same hands off approach they took with Android, Samsung would've most likely put their full marketing might behind "Samsung Experience" Android Wear watches. This could've created an established user base, giving incentive to other OEMs to create competing devices for a slice of the market. That in turn would've motivated Qualcomm to design new wearable chips and even created the kind of environment where Google could swoop in with a Pixel Watch, touting Google exclusive features.

Instead of learning from Microsoft's painful lesson they repeated history. Now we've got Tizen as the Apple Watch alternative and Qualcomm with zero reason to produce a wearable chip that would only move a few thousand units. Perhaps with this new seemingly platform agnostic branding approach things will turn around.

They listened to the handful of users who crave "pure" Android and "updates straight from Google" despite the fact that they're a minuscule fraction of the market, much more so when it comes to wearables.

# ¿ Mar 16, 2018 08:15

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

LastInLine posted:

I don't think that's it at all. I think they released a mediocre product in response to The Next Big Thing and slapped together the base minimum necessary because neither Samsung (who entered the product space first due to Apple's cunning misdirection) nor Apple (who forgot they made up the idea of the smartwatch just to trick Samsung) was going to license their platform.

They figured, correctly, that it was better to make the commodity tier platform for anyone who wants to ”Make a smartwatch, I don't care what it does just make sure our name is on it" and that worked. The part that didn't work was anyone wanting smartwatches.

Edit:

Thinking about it further, I feel like you're way off base with the idea that allowing tinkering to OEM wishes would be a good idea. All the OEM wants to have to do is provide watchfaces with their name on it, design the housing, and determine the feature count and they can do all of that. Do you really think OEMs would've jumped on board en masse had they also been able to change the font, coloring, and order of the settings menu? That's laughable on its face.

Even paid Apple shills like Gruber and Arment are floating the idea that the Apple Watch should do away with third party apps beyond watchfaces and just focus on notifications, HealthKit sensors, and Apple Pay. In other words, they want to walk it back to where Android Wear was when it launched (minus NFC payments, of course).

The fact is the segment is moribund because it was never going to be as big as analysts hyped it to be. Again, there's ample evidence that rumors Apple was going to make a wearable was Jobs just trying to make Samsung sink tons of money into a stupid idea and then Tim got FOMO and did it after Samsung launched theirs. It could certainly be the case that what's out there is good enough and everyone who wants one of these things can get one if they want it. I don't think a super fast, hyper efficient chipset being made available would set the world on fire, nor do I think there's some killer app that just hasn't come out yet. The market for wearables is what it is and it will never be much.

Well I haven't seen the ample evidence of those having been Steve Jobs' plans and honestly it would make absolutely no sense for that to be true.

Do you really think Google made the right call by positioning themselves in the insignificant tier lumped in with every other no name wearable OS? Do you really think if Samsung had been given the option to slap their Gear UI on top of Android Wear and sell a Galaxy Gear S they wouldn't have jumped at the chance?

The truth is the smartwatch market is finally growing at a good pace but it's already starting to mirror the smartphone market with Apple taking the lion's share, Samsung bringing up second place, and everyone else being utterly irrelevant. While other OEMs have less interest in modifying Wear OS to suit their needs they also have no interest in fighting Apple on Google's behalf. Samsung on the other hand, would've been more than happy to represent Wear against Apple, had they been given the chance to push their ecosystem alongside. With a big enough established user base of Wear users other companies would see an incentive to push their own Wear hardware, which would be differentiated from Samsung's by the "purity levels" of their OS (like Sony and Motorola do with their phones). As it stands it is now a platform nobody buys and a market nobody wants to get into, leaving us with another Apple/Samsung duopoly in the making.

Wear OS isn't going to progress on the back of a new hyper efficient chip, like the Gear and the Apple Watch, it can only progress with continual development and improvement. Samsung is exactly the kind of company that would've continued pumping Wear devices and marketing them until they got it right. The Galaxy Gear S1 could've been a flop but by the third or fourth you'd see Wear as a serious contender to Apple Watch supremacy.

# ¿ Mar 23, 2018 21:54

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

LastInLine posted:

The whole point of Wear at the beginning was to present Google Now front and center to the user to drive engagement of the Google platform. There really isn't any new data for Google to be gleaned from someone having a Wear device so why let Samsung rebrand and reskin something only intended to provide value to the ecosystem and to promote Google services?

Because Google still wins with more people using Wear as opposed to having it die off in obscurity.

quote:

Google only cares about getting data and serving ads and doing what you propose wouldn't promote either regardless of whether it would've been better for wearables in general. Taking the commodity approach, however, has put Android Wear on the wrists of lots of iOS users who otherwise may not have been using Google services to view every notification their device receives. Which is, you know, their goal.

Again, the approach I'm proposing would've put Wear on the wrists of many more users, iOS and otherwise. Would have been a net win for Google and would've served their goals much better than the current irrelevance of the platform.

# ¿ Mar 24, 2018 03:09

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

LastInLine posted:

According to Google "1 in 3" Wear OS users are doing so with iPhones. I don't know either.

Good point.

It certainly would've put Samsung on a lot of peoples' wrists and I, like Google, would argue that's bad not only for Google but for humanity as a whole.

Seems to have worked out just fine for them in the smartphone market. I don't see how it would be worse to have Samsung give them market share vs having no market share.

# ¿ Mar 24, 2018 19:25

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

Thermopyle posted:

The smartphone Android market is "fine" but it is not "ideal".

I don't see how the market could get much better for Google considering they are currently dominating it.

LastInLine posted:

I took what Desk Lamp was saying to be that if Samsung used Wear then Wear's marketshare would be Gear's plus Wear's marketshare, not that then those two combined would be larger than they are today.

Yeah that's pretty much what I meant.

quote:

At the point that Samsung started taking over Android I think Google would've taken anyone selling phones, whatever it took, just to make sure they had secure footing in the space. By the time Wear came around the last thing they needed was yet another OEM ball and chain constantly threatening to fork.

By the time Wear came around Samsung had already been in the space for a year already. I don't see why Samsung, even if Google told them to poo poo all over their OS again, would abandon something they already had and was fine to give in to Google, a company that they were all but openly threatening to ditch. They launched Gear in 2013 which was right after the Motorola acquisition and right when Samsung had really started to do extremely well following the S3. Samsung was trying to break away from Google entirely at that point.

Google could've called their watch OS "Samsung #1 Best Watch OS Ever" and had terms requiring that every watch app had to have at least four Samsung-branded duplicate apps doing the same exact thing and Samsung would've told them to eat a pile of dicks because that's just how things were in 2014.

Remember though, that although Samsung had been in the market selling watches, they were Android powered smartwatches. They did not switch to Tizen watches until Android Wear launched and it became clear that Google would not give them a seat at the table. It's also important to note that despite all the tension and forking threats surrounding the Google-Samsung relationship of that time, in the end they made up. Google and Samsung entered a cross licensing deal that has been mutually beneficial and I see no reason to believe it wouldn't have been the same for Wear as well. We're all speculating what could've been or even what the goal of Wear is but one thing is certain: it is not languishing in the "others" category of the market share pie chart. That was the last stop for Windows Phone, BlackBerry, and Palm OS before they were killed off.

Desk Lamp fucked around with this message at 01:49 on Mar 25, 2018

# ¿ Mar 25, 2018 01:46

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

LastInLine posted:

I mean, yeah, it's not looking great for Wear (though the rapid changes coming lately are pretty good, I fear they're too late) but Google's dropped a lot of turds along the way and left OEMs holding a lot of bags. How many aborted television OSs are they up to? If the Fossil group gives up then I guess it's all over for it and I think everyone who cares (not many of us) would agree it's been mismanaged.

Whether them letting OEMs Samsung it up would've made a difference is an interesting line of debate to me because I'd never considered it. While I think you're right in a trivial sense in that had Samsung used Wear then Samsung would keep Wear afloat, I think our disconnect is that I would claim that it would then not be what Wear is and supposed to be and thus no different from where we are now.

I think we're in agreement, but you are slightly misinterpreting my position. I don't mean that Google should've let Samsung become Wear but that they should've allowed them to turn Wear into a viable market. OEMs and demand managers look at the numbers when analyzing the risk in entering any market. Right now Wear's share is abysmal, meaning zero incentive for tech companies to invest. Fossil on the other hand, competes in the overall watch market, they have no interest in growing the Wear brand or market, they just want an OS they can slap on and not have to provide support for in a misguided attempt to keep the Apple Watch from taking business from their main products. I'm sure Fossil would be happiest if the smartwatch market just died off entirely and saved them a headache.

Now if the market share for Wear included Samsung's chunk, tech companies would see every single one of those users as a potential user for their own Wear products, thus driving demand for the tech that powers these products, motivating companies like Qualcomm to develop hardware. I'm envisioning a smartwatch market that mirrors the smartphone market, with Wear being the dominant force split between heavily skinned Samsung products and various other OEM offerings of varying "purity", capped with Google's own Pixel offering. I'm sure Google would love to offer a Pixel Watch, but with no demand to power hardware development their only choices are sitting out or putting out a clunker on years old hardware that could do more damage to their brand's reputation than benefit.

I look at it essentially as a mirror of the smartphone market. Android entered a market that at that point was overwhelmingly dominated by Apple, and it was by working with Samsung that they wrestled the crown away from the iPhone. In today's saturated market it is almost impossible to make someone switch from their iPhone to an Android or vice versa. However it is infinitely easier to entice someone away from their Galaxy to a Pixel or Moto. This secondary internal Android competition is what keeps the smaller OEMs in the running. I think Moto would be much more inclined to support Wear if they were enticed by the possibility of turning Samsung Wear users into Moto Wear users. As it is, launching a product that seems abandoned by the platform maintainer to compete directly with the Apple behemoth AND the second place position belongs to another platform that also competes with you seems futile, more so when your operation is a quarter the size of your competitor's.
Google should've realized that they do much better when they work with Samsung rather than against, for better or worse they are each other's most important partner.

# ¿ Mar 25, 2018 23:55

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

LastInLine posted:

So they went from "Completely nonfunctional checkbox feature" to "Somewhat nonfunctional checkbox feature". Never change, Samsung...

Also this passage was in an article linked to from one on the same site entitled "If the Galaxy Watch really delivers on Samsung's claims, I just might reconsider wearing a smartwatch" which doesn't exactly speak highly of buyers' expectations.

I'm pretty happy with my Gear S3, but I did get it for free and haven't tried to use voice even once. That said I still think the Gear's UI combined with Android Wear and some Apple level polish would be the perfect smartwatch. In my admittedly brief time with Wear OS I wasn't a fan.

All signs point to a revamped Wear later this year though so I'm keeping an open mind.

# ¿ Aug 11, 2018 03:05

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

Considering the way the rest of their lineup has leaked I guess we shouldn't be surprised.

# ¿ Sep 1, 2018 04:19

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

TorakFade posted:

I'm on the lookout for a potential new smartwatch, I currently own a Huawei Watch 2 and I'm pretty happy with it, I just want something that I could wear in more "formal", elegant settings; not necessarily "dress required" settings, but let's say business environments. The Huawei Watch 2 looks like a Casio G-Shock, I love it but it just doesn't go along with even casual-formal wear.

The one thing it has to do is notifications, I need to know who's calling/emailing/texting me at a glance and read the first few words of the message to see if it's important or not. I don't need fitness, GPS, 4G and so on. Many bonus points if the battery lasts more than one full day (which is the minimum requirement, can't be arsed recharging the thing every 4-6 hours).

Also it should not cost a fortune. What's out there that meets these requirements?

I would recommend the TicWatch Pro and/or the Samsung Gear S Classic for that not quite formal, not quite casual look. Both are around $200.

# ¿ Jan 4, 2019 11:39

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

Sounds like Google Glass paired with a watch. I think the biggest hurdles would be designing the UI and finding a reason to use the thing in the first place.

# ¿ Aug 1, 2021 20:26

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

bull3964 posted:

Samsung announced that since the launch of the GW4, there are now 3 times the number of active WearOS users than before.

That really puts it into perspective why Google threw everything at Samsung to jump start this. In a single generation with a single hardware release, they trippled what Fossil has been chipping away at for multiple years across tons of style brands.

The good thing about that is that now that Samsung is inboard with Wear OS, Google has less reasons to abandon Wear OS (again) if, or likely when, the Pixel Watch flops.

# ¿ May 13, 2022 16:37

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

BonoMan posted:

I am looking for a WearOS watch with LTE. I really don't like lugging my phone with me on workouts.

I basically just want LTE use for podcast/music streaming and emergency calls.

As much as I love to pretend I'll use a lot of exercise apps... I won't. Whatever built in health tracking it has is fine.

I have $70 in Google Store credit and that would make the Pixel Watch LTE about $275 with the current extra $50 it has off right now.

Is that my cheapest/best bet? I have a P7 phone.

Consensus seems to be that the Pixel Watch is the one to get, if there's a reason like price or size that takes the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro out of the equation.

For the record, I've been using the Watch 5 Pro LTE, and aside from missing the rotating bezel of the 4, it has been absolutely fantastic. Unbeatable battery life and works great when separated from the phone as you plan to.

# ¿ Feb 11, 2023 22:01

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# ¿ May 6, 2024 18:55

Desk Lamp: Jun 30, 2014

Kalli posted:

Hi folks, my father is getting old and feeble and recently fell down in the kitchen away from his phone and was stuck there for awhile until my mother got home. She travels a lot, so I want him to have a way to contact me / others in an emergency. I have basically never thought about a smartwatch before, but looking at things, they seem to have fall detection and can make emergency calls, so I'm wondering if anyone's gone this route for an older relative or if I should look at life alert / switch him over to an apple device or what.

Phone wise he's got a Samsung A10e I believe (whatever tmobile was giving away a few years back) so android 9 which looks to be enough, but is there anything I should be on the lookout for? Only one I've looked at was the Samsung so far (not realizing there really were others), any recommendations? Looking for something on the larger side, if wearable in the shower, that might be good, but not sure if I should go with a more breathable strap either. Doubt he'll ever use it for anything besides for hard fall detection and emergency calls. Also for what it's worth, I saw Samsung's site has a government employee discount which I can presumably swing, and will definitely prefer a LTE version in case he ever forgets his phone somewhere.

So other questions:

1) How reliable are these? Saw someone on the last page mention theirs just died randomly
2) How's the battery life? Saw complaints on samsung's site that it's not great (which I mean watch sized battery, i get it), is he looking at a recharge once a day or how far can I push it?
3) Can I configure it to turn off almost everything but the hard fall detection / call stuff? He's grumpy and his mind's starting to fade, so easier is better here.
4) I'm probably going to end up buying whatever and setting it up myself, is it a brutally stupid idea to pair it to my phone first to do the setup?

1) I've had pretty much every Galaxy Watch from the Gear S3 to the 6 and have yet to have one prematurely fail. My Galaxy Watch 3 is still kicking around as the last Tizen watch with no issues.
2) For battery life, you're gonna want the Watch 5 Pro. If you plan to use it with everything disabled as you mention, it should easily go more than a day between charging.
3) You can disable most things easily through the settings. It's pretty straightforward.
4) You have to set it up with his phone so you can link his phone number for calls, whether you get the LTE model or not.

# ¿ Sep 26, 2023 05:11

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