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Smartwatch Advice
Pony
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So I am looking to get a smartwatch for my wife, primarily as a hitech mitten-string for her phone because she keeps leaving it everywhere.
A big problem for her is she has to have her phone on silent at work, but needs to know if she gets texts or emails immediately because they could be important (she works in a medical clinic).
As a result, she has a tendency to leave her phone on her desk in her field of view so she can see text/email alerts as they come up. But this has created a habit of her leaving her phone everywhere. It's infuriating. I love my wife but I am willing to drop money to fix this.
The additional complexity? She has a Lumia 830 Windows Phone. She is a Windows Phone diehard. Finding a smurch that works with a Windows phone is hard. We're looking at possibly the Band 2?
Also, any advice for a smoorch for myself would be cool. I am not one of the seventeen people still using a Windows Phone, I have a Nexus 6.
Neither of us are big fitness nerds, so all that heart/sleep/jerk off monitoring stuff that many smulches do nowadays doesn't matter. We do care about them having microphones and interacting with Cortana/OK Google respectively, that's a biggie. They are also not going to be phone replacements, in fact the whole idea is to be them flipping their shit if they get too far from the phone.
Any advice?
A big problem for her is she has to have her phone on silent at work, but needs to know if she gets texts or emails immediately because they could be important (she works in a medical clinic).
As a result, she has a tendency to leave her phone on her desk in her field of view so she can see text/email alerts as they come up. But this has created a habit of her leaving her phone everywhere. It's infuriating. I love my wife but I am willing to drop money to fix this.
The additional complexity? She has a Lumia 830 Windows Phone. She is a Windows Phone diehard. Finding a smurch that works with a Windows phone is hard. We're looking at possibly the Band 2?
Also, any advice for a smoorch for myself would be cool. I am not one of the seventeen people still using a Windows Phone, I have a Nexus 6.
Neither of us are big fitness nerds, so all that heart/sleep/jerk off monitoring stuff that many smulches do nowadays doesn't matter. We do care about them having microphones and interacting with Cortana/OK Google respectively, that's a biggie. They are also not going to be phone replacements, in fact the whole idea is to be them flipping their shit if they get too far from the phone.
Any advice?
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She's fussy though, Cortana. When I tell her to send a text from the Band, she'll compose the text as instructed, but there's no way to actually send the text without taking out my phone and pressing send, defeating the entire purpose of dictating it to her via the Band.
Anyone have any experience with Cortana and any thoughts on this?
Simple answer is that despite promises of usability across platforms, it is best to get the smart watch that is made by the same platform company as your phone.
Microsoft bands work on everything but are inredibly limited on all but windows phones.
Google stuff is in the same boat. IOS/Android cross compatibility but the iOS stuff is hobbled due to not being able to dig deep into the foundation wrt triggers for things like sending messages, etc. It becomes a glorified notification device with a snazzy face.
Apple Watch doesn't even try to work on anything else, and it doesn't seem to be hurting Apple any, but yeah...
I would strongly suggest returning your band, having your wife keep hers, and then getting a moto 360 or gear s2.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
I have the Huawei watch with my Nexus 6P and it is alright. Decent alternative to the 360v2 if you get a good price.
the Time can be found for less than $100 US right now, the Time 2 which is coming soonish looks pretty good, and will be cheaper than most Android Wear watches.
honestly, kickstarters, even from well known/reputable companies, never end well. I never kickstart something and expect to get it on time. I usually get them, but never once has it been on time.
Their products are solid and their support is good. I've emailed their support with questions/requests a number of times and always heard back. But in my opinion a product does not exist until it is something you can buy off of a shelf.
I just ordered the Huawei. Seems to be one of the best options out there in terms of price and features (very high marks in reviews as well). Amazon just had one with the leather band for ~240.00 on Prime, which was almost $90 less than the one with the stainless band. But you can order the stainless band for like 20 bucks. All told, I'm all in for $260.
Don't know if you folks saw that Pebble was acquired by Fitbit for their patents. Existing pebbles will probably stop receiving updates or support and the tech will be ported over to fitbit models.
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/12/pebble-confirms-fitbit-sale-hardware-is-dead-software-in-maintenance-mode/
If you kickstarted a Pebble 2 and didn't get it, or a Time 2, Core, or Time Round, you'll not be receiving your watch and they'll refund you.
Considering that stuff should be shipping about now, that means they never requested the manufacturing on it to begin with. They must've been in harder financial straits than thought.
Android Wear the way to go or...?
if iPhone, apple watch.
if android, Adnroid wear
if Microsoft, those band things
Just use a brand-matched device.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
Microsoft discontinued the Band a couple months back as well.
I'd almost look at the Samsung Gear Fit 2. It's supposed to be pretty good, though not traditional watch shaped.
I still really like my Pebble Time, and plan to continue wearing it for the forseeable future. Pebble frankly did some things that no other manufacturer was doing. Their fitness tracking, while simplistic, was brilliant in that it didn't tell you to hit an arbitrary number of steps, it measured your average activity on a day by day basis, and encouraged you to beat that average, and it was granular to days of the week, so it knows that Sundays are my least active day, and my average is lower, and shows me that accordingly. Things like that are actually innovative, and I really hope that's one of the things fitbit picks up and uses.
I use Apple's fitness band when working out because it came with my watch, but seriously every other band I own is 3rd party, and there are some fantastic companies doing neat stuff that apple would charge easily 5-10x more for.
This beautiful stainless steel and ceramic band is 72 bucks.
Apple doesn't even make a ceramic band, and they make a ceramic watch.
Their stainless steel band costs damn near 500 bucks.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
They are not. Pebble hardware support was completely cut off, to the point that device warranty will not be honored.
Fitbit buying Pebble was a bit of a misnomer. Essentially what happened was Pebble sold their IP/software to Fitbit and then folded the company. Fitbit also hired a few of the pebble devs, but most of the staff got canned.