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One of the big reasons I'm wanting a smartwatch is to help reduce me missing notifications or thinking I've gotten one when I haven't. I frequently have my phone on silent and don't notice the buzz, or think that it's buzzed when it hasn't, and having the vibration directly on my wrist rather than being dampened by my pocket (and the otterbox on my phone) would be very helpful. Anything else is just gravy to me.
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May 12, 2015 18:42
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Takoluka posted:But why would you want always full brightness and not "Don't be bright when I'm not looking at it"? Vague ideas of wanting to keep up the appearance of it being a "normal" watch rather than some nerdy toy.
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May 14, 2015 21:01
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In case anybody missed it, Woot is selling refurbed LG G Watches (just the original, not the R) today for $80. Not a bad deal for what really amounts to a pretty decent watch. I picked one up earlier this week from a buddy that had upgraded and am really happy with it.
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May 29, 2015 21:23
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Three Olives posted:I'm still really happy with my G Watch but $80 seems really, really high for a refurb this late in the game, there have been lower prices on new G watches weeks and weeks ago. For $80 for a refurb I'm going to wait for either the second gen or pick up a G Watch R next time it goes on a decent sale. 80 is a bit much this late, yes, but not awful for an entry level Wear device. I just snagged one for 50 from a coworker, personally. Wanted something to use to dip my toes in the water and see if it'd be worthwhile for me to buy one of the shiny new ones that's inevitably coming over the next couple months.
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May 30, 2015 04:02
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Three Olives posted:Replace the band and nobody will say anything about it. My ex who works for a very high end fashion company who will be the first to make fun of whatever I am wearing said it looks fine or more, inoffensively bland. It's not a piece of jewelry but it is no more stylistically offensive then a Fitbit and we have all pretty much come to accept those. Already done. Got a nice black leather one on there now. Thinking about replacing with steel (haven't decided between mesh or traditional links, worried my armhair will get caught in the mesh too easily) so I can have something that breathes better.
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May 30, 2015 17:39
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Nitrousoxide posted:At least for LG's watches. The G watch, G watch R and the urbane have the exact same internals. Same processor, same battery, even the same radios. Only the housing and screen are different between models. You can even flash the urbane's radios drivers onto the G watch R to enable the wifi mode (although you'd be violating FCC rules because that device hasn't been certified). So really they're all still first gen with a fresh coat of paint. Of note, the original G Watch doesn't physically have a wifi antenna, but other than that this is accurate.
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Jun 4, 2015 13:36
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codo27 posted:Somewhat crosspost from the pebble thread, but my Steel developed a slight yellow tint at the bottom of the screen, well actually it was pretty much like that out of box. They sent me a replacement, and I was thinking of selling both and putting the money towards the new Time Steel. Aside from that issue I do like the watch and feel it does all I want, I'm mainly interested in the microphone in the new iteration. But should I be considering something different all together? Is there anything out there that offers enough to warrant the drop in battery life? Any less than a couple days, I don't think I'd be interested. My LG G Watch (like... the first Android Wear watch, that and the Moto 360, basically) can pull more than 48 hours of battery, but that's a stretch and really depends on number of notifications I get. And that's without ambient mode turned on. YMMV, but I don't think you're going to find much in the Android Wear category that can go much further than that. I bet it could have done 60 hours in the end, but I didn't want it to die while I was at work, so I tossed it on the charger while I was showering and getting ready that day. That said, touchscreen functionality and voice commands are pretty drat nice, IMO. I think they're worth the lack of battery life. It's not like it's charging for 8 hours to be useful. 60 minutes of charging is nearly a full battery for me.
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Jun 8, 2015 04:07
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Dr. Video Games 0050 posted:I hate not being able to tap on the screen to bring up voice commands. Hate. Instead I have to go through a contact page..... What the hell for? Are you meaning a list of possible commands? Because you can flick your wrist to turn on the screen and say "OK Google" on mine, and then immediately issue a command. I don't understand why you'd want to involve a second hand for that. That kinda defeats the point of voice commands, in my eyes.
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Jul 13, 2015 02:08
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Ixian posted:They might as well throw a speaker in the thing too or at least a more complete BT radio for hands free, then it would basically be a tiny, crappier phone you wore on your wrist. Which, lets be honest, people would buy anyway. This is exactly what I want in an Android Wear device. I wouldn't use the speaker for listening to music, but the idea of being able to use it as a speakerphone when driving sounds perfect to me. I can already answer calls from my watch, let me do the actual conversing from there as well, and have it automatically go into speaker through the watch any time you answer a call from there. A speaker would also open the door for audible alarms on the watch, which some people actually would be into.
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Aug 26, 2015 12:55
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echo465 posted:I've got the LG G ($50 from AT&T a while back), I think $50 to get a feel for Android Wear is a great starting point. This was exactly my thought, when I bought mine used from a coworker. It's not the best looking watch out there, but it gives you an idea of if you'd actually get any reasonable use out of it. It doesn't have any of the fancy sensors or the built in wifi that the other watches have, but it's still a great way to get your feet wet and see if you want to invest more.
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Sep 11, 2015 12:36
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Logikv9 posted:As long as it runs Android Wear as its OS, all watches work with any Android phone more or less identically.* * So long as the phone runs Android 4.3 or higher. And I believe there are some features gated behind 5, and MAYBE 5.1 also.
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Sep 14, 2015 03:45
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If you sweat a good amount and that area's moist, that could easily do it.
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Sep 27, 2015 23:44
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Chu020 posted:Jumped on the Sony Smartwatch 3 deal. What watchfaces are good for the square screen format outside of LCARS? I'm a big fan of http://facerepo.com/app/faces/details/jarvis-light-14b897694a3 Flashy, but functional.
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Nov 17, 2015 13:50
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I've been getting notifications just fine, personally. But on the flip side, since the latest AW upgrade (and moving my phone to Marshmallow), my battery life on my watch has gone from moderately good to holy poo poo amazing. I was getting, on average, about 28 hours out of my original G Watch. Since those two changes, it's more like 60-65 hours. NEVER less than 48. I'm pleased as punch.
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Dec 13, 2015 23:12
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I use mine for music controls in my car all the time, because it's a lot easier to keep my eyes on the road with quick glances at my watch while that hand is on the steering wheel. Notifications have been huge for me too. Being able to reply to stuff without grabbing my phone is great. I've also got an app called Wear Speaker that pops up a button on my watch to switch the phone to speaker, so I can have it sitting in an open compartment in my car, answer an incoming call from my watch, and switch it to speaker, without ever touching the phone. Extremely helpful, in my opinion.
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Dec 23, 2015 14:00
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For what it's worth, my G Watch is a little fiddly, and the pins are clean and look great. In my experience, when I put it on there, sometimes the vibration knocks it off the pins, and then it'll connect again and vibrate, and repeat indefinitely. If I take it off and align it carefully the next time, it works just fine.
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Jan 16, 2016 01:43
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Sure, but there's a notable difference between a well crafted traditional watch and a smartwatch. One's pretty blatantly a fashion accessory, the other's a multifunction tool. If you don't have a use for the functions it offers and want something that looks nice, tells time, and will last for a very long time, get the traditional watch. If you want to take advantage of the extra functionality a smartwatch offers, get one of those. Pretty simple, realistically. At the end of the day, smartwatches are theoretically disposable consumer-grade electronics, not heirlooms or status symbols.
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May 8, 2016 16:02
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bull3964 posted:30% better battery life at the SoC level isn't really going to lead to that much more dramatic battery life with current display tech though. One of those SoCs combined with an OLED screen would be a far cry from the LG G Watch that I've been wearing for quite a while. I certainly wouldn't argue with that.
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May 10, 2016 01:33
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I use Watchmaker and Facer, and they're basically two sides of the same coin. Though, last I knew, Watchmaker could do a little bit of fanciness that Facer couldn't, like smooth-ish rendering at 50FPS for animated watch faces.
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May 10, 2016 01:45
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KillHour posted:Isn't the G-Watch OLED? The original? Regular LCD. The G Watch R had an OLED. But, really, that combo I mentioned above would be great. I don't use ambient mode right now, because my watch is really responsive, but I tend to get a lot of notifications, so my screen's on a lot. I can generally get 72 hours or more out of a full charge, on the old inefficient processors and an LCD instead of OLED. That's enough reason for me to want to upgrade right there, because I could feasibly get the same amount of life with ambient mode on, or a ton longer without it.
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May 10, 2016 13:14
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Depends on what watchface you use, and how much time your screen spends on. Mine has a ton of black space, and more in ambient mode, so it'd make a notable difference.
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May 10, 2016 13:27
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Tunga posted:This reply really seems to miss the point of my post. Does it really make a notable difference? Is there some actual real-world evidence for this? https://senk9.wordpress.com/2015/05/24/thoughts-amoled-power-consumption-tested-and-explored/ It's no peer-reviewed study, but it's something. Regular LCDs only have the brightness of the full screen backlight to adjust to get varying power draw.
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May 11, 2016 00:30
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Putting in another positive vote for the HWatch. Got one for my wife a couple months ago and it's been rock solid. Battery life's great (she uses always-on, and can generally get two days out of it), and the only time it's acted strangely it just needed a hard reboot from the power button. Android Wear as a platform is honestly pretty mature and functional. I'm still using an original LG G Watch, and haven't really felt the need to move up. It'd be NICE to have a speaker, wifi, and maybe LTE, but not mandatory at all. This thing is 2.5 years old, getting consistent, daily use, and I STILL get at least 48 hours out of the battery. I've gotten 72 in a real stretch, but I generally charge it sooner than I need to anyway. The worst bug I've encountered is one where some app goes into a presumably infinite loop and spikes the CPU to 100%, causing the watch to get hot and burn battery quickly, which can only be solved by a reboot, and I honestly don't consider that a big deal because that could happen on literally any computing platform in the world.
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Dec 12, 2016 13:52
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LastInLine posted:I use IFTTT for minor home automation stuff with Google Home. I say specific phrases and certain lights come on or turn off. There's about a 3-5 second lag between acknowledgment and action which is about right given that it has to go out to the internet to get the applet then back to execute it on the Hue bulbs. It's certainly not great for something you'd want an immediate action on. If you want to get really fancy schmancy, you could make IFTTT do something like post to a private Twitter account, with a service you're running yourself on (insert computer-type device here) monitoring that account, and then have it execute chained actions programmatically. Hell of a lot more complicated than IFTTT though.
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Dec 14, 2016 14:29
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No LTE in the US release of the classic is kinda a bummer, and I really dislike the numbers and ticks on the frame, but other than that it's a really nice looking watch that would satisfy my criteria of round with no flat tire, with traditional lugs, and replaceable bands. Might be what I finally replace my G Watch with.
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Feb 27, 2017 14:27
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Do I just have a freak of a watch, or is my use case dramatically different from everyone else? I generally burn 30% every 24 hours on my original G Watch, that's actively been in use since maybe a month after it launched. I keep my brightness at 4, and don't use always on, so maybe that's it? I reply to notifications via voice using it a couple times a day, maybe do a few actual voice commands as well, and other than that just dismiss notifications.
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Mar 20, 2017 14:03
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One of the few reasons I keep my chunky as hell LG G Watch (the original square one) is that the battery life is insanely good and it will NEVER get Wear 2.0, so I don't have to suffer the new interface or notifications.
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Oct 6, 2017 13:36
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The trick to preventing burn in is not using the always on screen. Can't burn a screen that's off.
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Oct 10, 2017 13:47
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You also see way more Samsung phones than any other manufacturer. Ubiquity doesn't necessarily imply quality, though. I'd attribute the large number of Gear watches to people thinking that having two devices by the same manufacturer means better inter-op, rather than specifically seeking out the watches because of some feature they provide or do better than the alternatives.
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Oct 11, 2017 18:22
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All this talk, and I'm still sitting here with an original model LG G Watch that still rocks 2-3 days of battery life and does absolutely everything I want, including having not-poo poo notifications because it's stuck on the last release of Wear 1.
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Mar 25, 2018 01:35
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Maybe that can be my impetus to get a new watch. Still plugging away with the original G Watch, running the last Wear 1 release, like 5 years later. Battery life is still fantastic, and the experience is good, but a little buggy as it's gotten more out of sync with mainline Android. Would be nice to have something more modern and that isn't a black, rectangular slab on my wrist, though.
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May 9, 2018 15:58
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Anybody know what time the Qualcomm event is happening and if there is any live coverage? Edit: Well, poo poo. I posted this and immediately afterward saw that Gizmodo has coverage.
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Sep 10, 2018 17:19
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LastInLine posted:The larger models don't get the metal bands. Their website disagrees with you. The black 46mm has a matching metal band. Edit: Disregard, I'm a loving idiot who didn't read that you were replying to the person who DIDN'T want black this time.
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Nov 7, 2018 02:09
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That spreadsheet is a reminder that the smartwatch market is super bizarre. Snapdragon 3100 has been available to manufacturers for months, and while it's only an incremental improvement, the low power mode is a great possible selling point that only two manufacturers are taking advantage of. Of those two, one's making a premium watch, and the other's making two sport models, but those two specific target markets are the exact ones where I would expect LTE support (people who want the best of everything, and people who are likely to go running without a phone and want connectivity), and neither has it. In fact, even more interesting to me, not a single WearOS watch released in 2018 has LTE. Meanwhile, Apple offers multiple SKUs of their watches, with and without LTE support, and from what I've seen a better experience both tethered to a phone and completely untethered. I'm not a big fan of Apple in a lot of ways, but I really feel like this is one of the big areas where Android's fragmentation bites everyone in the rear end. Hopefully Google will figure it out and actually make their own WearOS device this coming year.
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Dec 21, 2018 14:23
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I should point out that my comments about LTE aren't because I think it's a good fit for me, just that I feel the availability is worthwhile for their target demographics that I mentioned. Also, I think the way it becomes financially reasonable is if you already have a family plan for your phone, so it's only $10-20. That might be too much for some people, but it doesn't seem terribly unreasonable to me.
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Dec 21, 2018 15:13
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I was really hoping we'd get something interesting out of CES. Ticwatch Pro is still looking like the top of my list, except I just discovered today that if you don't use the always on screen, the fallback LCD kicks on over the top of it when it's not on, and that's annoying to me. Also, no word from them on getting the latest OS release, so that's a red flag. Just ridiculous that Google hasn't just made a flagship watch to show everybody what's what.
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Jan 10, 2019 03:37
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Anecdotal, but I'm extremely happy with my Ticwatch Pro. Only had it for about 2 weeks now, but it works like a champ, the battery life is reasonable (not as spectacular as my old G Watch, but it's also doing a hell of a lot more things and has a bigger screen to drive), and it looks nice.
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Jan 27, 2019 00:25
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As somebody who relatively recently retired the old square G Watch, just like yours, I jumped to the TicWatch Pro a few weeks ago and found that it was the best option available on the market at the time. It doesn't get as great of battery life as the G Watch, but it performs phenomenally and does everything I want it to. The screen is gorgeous, the heart rate sensor works well, the vibration motor is strong enough without being too strong, the speaker is loud enough... I really have no complaints. I didn't care for the band it comes with, so I ordered a random Milanese loop on Amazon and that's been great too. The only thing I'm lacking at this point is a secondary charger, so I don't have to bring mine on trips, as I do have to charge it every day if I use the always on screen.
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Mar 6, 2019 01:42
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