Apple iWatch 2.0
Discussion
Lorne said:
I can see this thread isn't going well for me, but as someone with a scattering of 301s and 191s I feel obliged to note that Bose can make surprisingly good speakers.
Back to the iWatch, although noted that's not its real name. Looks are subjective, so I withdraw the 'looks silly' comment. Since you put it on a magic disk that charges it by voodoo I also withdraw the 'have to plug it in' comment. And unfortunately as it knows when you're looking at it and then springs to life to tell you how many emails you haven't bothered opening, your heart palpitation rate, or possibly even the time, I'm going to have to withdraw the 'two hands to operate' comment. I would say I bet it's not cheap, but that's quite subjective on a watch forum.
So all I'm left with is to say it is, in my humble opinion, as desirable as a beard.
Haha, good reply! Back to the iWatch, although noted that's not its real name. Looks are subjective, so I withdraw the 'looks silly' comment. Since you put it on a magic disk that charges it by voodoo I also withdraw the 'have to plug it in' comment. And unfortunately as it knows when you're looking at it and then springs to life to tell you how many emails you haven't bothered opening, your heart palpitation rate, or possibly even the time, I'm going to have to withdraw the 'two hands to operate' comment. I would say I bet it's not cheap, but that's quite subjective on a watch forum.
So all I'm left with is to say it is, in my humble opinion, as desirable as a beard.
I'm in the fantastic position of owning an Apple Watch and sporting a neatly trimmed beard.......
NDA said:
DUMBO100 said:
I have been thinking about an Apple Watch 2 for a while now mainly to help me stick to a diet and excercise routine. I am 38 so possibly middle aged but think that the benefits will outweigh the fact that I might look silly. The sports model is best suited to my requirements, I will use Sat nav function too but will be sad not to wear my Rolex Date Just every day
You could wear a fitbit thing on the other wrist to your Rolex...That said, I know there is an Apple Watch 2 under the Christmas tree for me. I resisted the first model (you had to take a phone with you when running, not waterproof, no music, etc.). Now they have addresssed those I thought I'd get involved.
Not sure I will like it but at £320 (bought in the US), it seemed a relatively inexpensive experiment. If I don't like it, one of my kids will have it in a heartbeat.
Rosscow said:
I've got a 42mm black sport model with black band, and I'll probably buy a black milanese loop band for it at some point for when we go out for dinner, etc.
OP - if you want something to attack the Apple Watch on, it is the cost of the straps from Apple. Proper daylight robbery. Even the bloke in the Apple Store in the US told me to buy them off Amazon.
The latest version has many advances over the previous one, it is not a case that the functions mysteriously packed up on the last one to force you to upgrade. E.G. built in gps.
So 400 odd pounds for a gps device to replace separate sports watch. Tells the time.. Good battery life. Zillions of apps .
All for the price of a cheap watch.
I have some half decent watches (Onega / Longines) but you have just reminded me that I need an apple watch, I guess too late now for Santa!
So 400 odd pounds for a gps device to replace separate sports watch. Tells the time.. Good battery life. Zillions of apps .
All for the price of a cheap watch.
I have some half decent watches (Onega / Longines) but you have just reminded me that I need an apple watch, I guess too late now for Santa!
Purchased an Apple Watch yesterday, steel, 42mm and have ordered some straps to make it a bit smarter - leather etc.
Went for steel as thought it could be passed off as a smart watch as well as a fitness watch. The aluminium looked a bit... cheap.
No comment on functionality yet as I haven't got a clue how the bloody thing works. It was the addition of GPS tracking and waterproofing in the 2.0 that made me buy it.
I bought it mainly as a fitness watch - I can track my swimming, running and cycling on Strava while listening to music on wireless waterproof headphones. I HATE running with an iPhone and detest wires just as much. The thought of swimming while listening to wire free music fills me with joy.
Apps and that? Have to see how I get on but doubt i'll use it to it's full potential outside sports tracking. Maybe get the football scores to pop up. Who knows.
Went for steel as thought it could be passed off as a smart watch as well as a fitness watch. The aluminium looked a bit... cheap.
No comment on functionality yet as I haven't got a clue how the bloody thing works. It was the addition of GPS tracking and waterproofing in the 2.0 that made me buy it.
I bought it mainly as a fitness watch - I can track my swimming, running and cycling on Strava while listening to music on wireless waterproof headphones. I HATE running with an iPhone and detest wires just as much. The thought of swimming while listening to wire free music fills me with joy.
Apps and that? Have to see how I get on but doubt i'll use it to it's full potential outside sports tracking. Maybe get the football scores to pop up. Who knows.
I bought a 2.0 and it lasted all of two weeks before giving up the ghost on Christmas Eve. I had worn it swimming a few times in the short period I had it but for some reason after my last swim with it, the watch literally fizzled out in front of my eyes, losing 30% of its charge in seconds, just as I was getting out of the water and drying off. Nothing could revive it and I got a full refund.
I bought it in duty free before a three week trip, on the basis I wanted a relatively cheap holiday watch and a new gadget to play with during a week with the in-laws as part of said trip. My thoughts were:
- surprisingly long battery life
- excellent functionality, particularly for gym goers. The timers work extremely well if you are into interval training/precise rest periods, the music app is excellent (picked up all my playlists and worked well with siri) and it seemed pretty resistant to knocks.
- I enjoyed the activity monitor, even if it might not be the most accurate one around.
- the heart rate monitor seemed ok but on occasion, gave quite mixed readings. That said, I was not trying particularly hard to get it to work properly and for me, it was more of a gimmick.
- excellent synchronicity with the iPhone (iPhone 6 in my case) and useful for picking up text messages, not missing phone calls and for playing music via Siri commands
- I wore mine in hot, humid conditions for two weeks and it never started to smell, despite being on the woven nylon band!
Whilst I had it, I thought it was all the watch I would ever need and wondered whether I would be as keen on wearing my traditional watches again (IWC, higher end Omegas, Zenith etc) when I got back home. To my surprise, I have not missed it at all other than when I'm at the gym and have really enjoyed the feel and heft of wearing a 'proper' watch again. I might pick another one up (with Apple Care this time) at the airport again but for something so useful, I am somewhat surprised it didn't get under my skin as much as I thought it would.
I bought it in duty free before a three week trip, on the basis I wanted a relatively cheap holiday watch and a new gadget to play with during a week with the in-laws as part of said trip. My thoughts were:
- surprisingly long battery life
- excellent functionality, particularly for gym goers. The timers work extremely well if you are into interval training/precise rest periods, the music app is excellent (picked up all my playlists and worked well with siri) and it seemed pretty resistant to knocks.
- I enjoyed the activity monitor, even if it might not be the most accurate one around.
- the heart rate monitor seemed ok but on occasion, gave quite mixed readings. That said, I was not trying particularly hard to get it to work properly and for me, it was more of a gimmick.
- excellent synchronicity with the iPhone (iPhone 6 in my case) and useful for picking up text messages, not missing phone calls and for playing music via Siri commands
- I wore mine in hot, humid conditions for two weeks and it never started to smell, despite being on the woven nylon band!
Whilst I had it, I thought it was all the watch I would ever need and wondered whether I would be as keen on wearing my traditional watches again (IWC, higher end Omegas, Zenith etc) when I got back home. To my surprise, I have not missed it at all other than when I'm at the gym and have really enjoyed the feel and heft of wearing a 'proper' watch again. I might pick another one up (with Apple Care this time) at the airport again but for something so useful, I am somewhat surprised it didn't get under my skin as much as I thought it would.
I bought one in December but didn't get my hands on it till Christmas (my wife took it off me and wrapped it...).
I've worn it pretty much constantly.
I am pretty much in Mosdef's camp: a nice gadget, useful for the gym, no killer app without which I would be bereft.
The heart rate is flakey unless you are doing something plain vanilla like running (when it is pretty accurate). I do quite a bit of gym and ergo work - it really can't cope with that. My HR strap will be showing 170-180 and the wrist monitor will show 80. However, my Garmin Vivosmart is probably worse in those sessions. I have noticed that I can pair my Polar H7 chest strap to the Apple Watch - but that means I can't then link it to the ergo.
I've worn it pretty much constantly.
I am pretty much in Mosdef's camp: a nice gadget, useful for the gym, no killer app without which I would be bereft.
The heart rate is flakey unless you are doing something plain vanilla like running (when it is pretty accurate). I do quite a bit of gym and ergo work - it really can't cope with that. My HR strap will be showing 170-180 and the wrist monitor will show 80. However, my Garmin Vivosmart is probably worse in those sessions. I have noticed that I can pair my Polar H7 chest strap to the Apple Watch - but that means I can't then link it to the ergo.
Feedback after a couple of days is the watch is a lot more limited than I thought it would be, but now I have gotten over the disappointment of my heightened expectations I am starting to like it.
Annoyances -
Whatsapp - displays one message but if you receive more than one messages just pops up saying you have notifications. You then need to use your phone to read messages.
Strava - Have not yet updated their app to include swimming. Tracks running and cycling, but not swimming. Annoying when the watch is waterproof.
Apple Activity (Apples Strava) - you cant enter manual workouts. So when you go on a rowing machine it will track time of activity, calories burned and heartrate but you can't manually add distance rowed. Now, that is pathetic.
So I enter turbo training in to strava, rowing in to strava and it exports data to apple activity to include distances but then add swimming in to apple activity which tracks distance by GPS but apple do not export to strava. Grr.
Spotify - can not use spotify with the watch properly. If you want to listen to music from your watch while running (without phone) you need to use apple music which is rubbish in comparison to spotify.
I think I am going to use it mainly as a sport watch, to track activity, listen to music and check messages on the run - so although the points above are trivial, it really creates a downer on the watch for me.
BUT.....
I have stopped sulking, subscribed to apple music, learned that strava will be updating their app early 2017 and accepted that I don't need to read whatsapps on the go.
Would I buy the watch if I didn't use it as a fitness tool? No. Save the £590 and buy a casio as you'll use the same number of features. But, as a fitness tool I think few products rival it for an average swimmer/runner/cyclist and then to have a few lifestyle apps on top of that help.
Annoyances -
Whatsapp - displays one message but if you receive more than one messages just pops up saying you have notifications. You then need to use your phone to read messages.
Strava - Have not yet updated their app to include swimming. Tracks running and cycling, but not swimming. Annoying when the watch is waterproof.
Apple Activity (Apples Strava) - you cant enter manual workouts. So when you go on a rowing machine it will track time of activity, calories burned and heartrate but you can't manually add distance rowed. Now, that is pathetic.
So I enter turbo training in to strava, rowing in to strava and it exports data to apple activity to include distances but then add swimming in to apple activity which tracks distance by GPS but apple do not export to strava. Grr.
Spotify - can not use spotify with the watch properly. If you want to listen to music from your watch while running (without phone) you need to use apple music which is rubbish in comparison to spotify.
I think I am going to use it mainly as a sport watch, to track activity, listen to music and check messages on the run - so although the points above are trivial, it really creates a downer on the watch for me.
BUT.....
I have stopped sulking, subscribed to apple music, learned that strava will be updating their app early 2017 and accepted that I don't need to read whatsapps on the go.
Would I buy the watch if I didn't use it as a fitness tool? No. Save the £590 and buy a casio as you'll use the same number of features. But, as a fitness tool I think few products rival it for an average swimmer/runner/cyclist and then to have a few lifestyle apps on top of that help.
Edited by FrankAbagnale on Wednesday 18th January 12:37
Sounds like it's quite a limited device unless the wearer is using Apple proprietary apps. I use WhatsApp to some extent but not enough to notice any limitations. The Strava issue seems like an oversight however, particularly given how many people use it.
I was on Spotify Premium for years but went over to Apple Music when it came out and haven't looked back since. I think it's quite a marmite product but I find it more intuitive than spotify and the way it integrates itself with my previous music collection in iTunes has been great. One of the big advantages to me was that no car I have been in has worked well with offline content on spotify but all music downloaded through Apple music gets displayed and played perfectly on the car system.
I was on Spotify Premium for years but went over to Apple Music when it came out and haven't looked back since. I think it's quite a marmite product but I find it more intuitive than spotify and the way it integrates itself with my previous music collection in iTunes has been great. One of the big advantages to me was that no car I have been in has worked well with offline content on spotify but all music downloaded through Apple music gets displayed and played perfectly on the car system.
audidoody said:
If its such a fantastic bit of kit how come it only works properly when its connected to a nearby iPhone?
Depends on what you class as working properly, it will tell the time, and contact-less payments without an iPhone anywhere near it.It will even receive imessages with just a wifi signal and allow you to reply to them.
Zoon said:
audidoody said:
If its such a fantastic bit of kit how come it only works properly when its connected to a nearby iPhone?
Depends on what you class as working properly, it will tell the time, and contact-less payments without an iPhone anywhere near it.It will even receive imessages with just a wifi signal and allow you to reply to them.
feef said:
I believe the first iteration of WatchOS did require the phone to be present to do most things, but that's not been the case for some time now. I suspect it's that early limitation that he has in mind,
Not much has changed really. Most features were usable without a phone from release.The only one I can think of which was added was the ability to connect to known wifi networks without a phone.
FrankAbagnale said:
GPS is a major benefit in the second watch.
Cycles, swims and runs only need the watch to track and upload to strava. No phone.
The watch and some wireless headphones on runs with no phone, wires and armband is the dream.
Does the latest version not also have the heart-rate monitor built in using LEDs on the back of the case? Or is that in the next release?Cycles, swims and runs only need the watch to track and upload to strava. No phone.
The watch and some wireless headphones on runs with no phone, wires and armband is the dream.
feef said:
FrankAbagnale said:
GPS is a major benefit in the second watch.
Cycles, swims and runs only need the watch to track and upload to strava. No phone.
The watch and some wireless headphones on runs with no phone, wires and armband is the dream.
Does the latest version not also have the heart-rate monitor built in using LEDs on the back of the case? Or is that in the next release?Cycles, swims and runs only need the watch to track and upload to strava. No phone.
The watch and some wireless headphones on runs with no phone, wires and armband is the dream.
n.b - a bit harsh above, it is pretty accurate but certainly not spot on. If you were a semi serious athlete it would not be useful. For me, it's a good enough indication.
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