Damn. Big fan of their hybrid smart watches (e-ink screen, ~10 day battery and looked like a watch).
Anyone know of any good similar products?
this post was submitted on 27 Jan 2024
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Withings. Small oled display, looks like an analog watch until you use it. Ton of sensors to monitor your health, or none if you don't want that. And a huge battery. Like huge enough to lose the charger between charges 😆
I'll second this, stupid good battery life but a fairly simple watch. Doesn't do apps but it does health tracking and notifications and it's pretty good at looking like a watch instead of a toy.
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Even more, I get pretty consistently 3 weeks per charge with my fossil hybrid
Garmin is know for excellent battery life. I don't think they use e-ink though.
A much bigger drawback (to me at least) they lack Google Pay support and keep pushing Garmin Pay which is not widely supported.
?
Is there really any functional difference which backend is providing that virtual card number? I have never seen a terminal anywhere that A) supported contactless in the first place, but B) did not work with the Garmin Pay feature of my Fenix 6. Even out in the sticks. Not-a-one.
The difference is in the bank support. All contactless terminals support all NFC payment providers. But banks don't. Each bank chooses with which services to integrate, and this part is not standardized so it requires some investment on the bank side.
Another vote for Garmin instinct (2 solar in my case). Not E-ink but oldschool style black/white LCD. Full charge with nightly pulsox is just above 2 weeks, would be 3 if i turned off nightly pulsox. With solar, if you are active outside and have a sunny climate, you probably do not need to charge basically at all.
There is also the instinct crossover for the hybrid look. But first series instincts are supposedly hit or miss on the software. And trust me, the whole analogue watch thing is nice for looks, but really you will not look at it if you have a digital clock on the watch face.
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That’s a shame. I really liked my Fossil before I switched to the Apple Watch. It did a fantastic job of looking like a normal watch while still being a decent smartwatch.
The square face of the Apple Watch really irks me.
The Apple part of the Apple Watch really irks me.
I know I'm in the minority, but I switched from a square Android watch (LG G Watch from the neolithic era) to a round watch, and I miss the square. A round screen is awkward for anything but a simple watch face, IMO. I use my new watch much less than my old watch, partly because of this, and I don't think I'll ever buy another one.
Visually as a watch design I agree with you. Having used quite a few round face smart watches before getting an Apple Watch I can absolutely see why Apple went with a square face. It just makes way more sense for displaying data. A square space displays more information in a an easier to read format.
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I'd love a smartwatch that, along with telling time, is just a screen that shows me my notifications and a button to pause my music.
Garmin hybrid watch might be something you'd like.
There are dozens like those...
Such as? Not doubting, I just want to know
Withings
Withings, Garmin and Casio have them in very different styles, plus a lot of Chinese ones which names I don't remember.
Literally months of battery time, up to unlimited for the solar ones.
As someone with a Garmin Instinct Solar, the unlimited battery is really dependent on your habits. You really need to be exposed to the sun for long periods on a daily basis for it to noticeably charge via solar. Still though the idea of a watch that you never need to charge is really neat.
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Important thing with those is... avoid Garmin at all costs. They are nasty company who will drop support for your device 6 months after purchase forcing you to buy a new device and similar nasty moves.
what? my fenix 5x is going strong years later despite being a couple gens behind
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Literally this. Maybe let me see a preview of notifications, but that's not a make-or-break issue for me.
Will there ever be a day where I can just buy a smart watch strap to attach to my mechanic watch to get biometrics and what not?
Soon. Oura rings exist so they could be an alternative.
Invis make straps without sensors but with NFC payments.
There's clearly a market for rings as fitness trackers so people can avoid a watch altogether
Wanting a watch strap is a bit more niche but it'll come around as a product I'm sure.
A smart strap honestly sounds like a gap in the market. Seen quite a few people wearing a normal watch and trackers.
Don't you need a paid subscription just to get full access to your biometric data from the Oura ring?
Yes you do.
They have to get usable at some point, but I got tired of the (shitty off-brand) smart watch I had after a couple minutes. I replaced it with a fully analog Seiko watch and a fitness tracker ring.
Way easier to manage and still meets the needs addressed by the smart watch.
I really enjoyed my Samsung watch. I was able to give it a face that looked like a nice watch. It was round. I could get notifications without taking my phone out of my suit jacket. I still have it and it works with my work iPhone and personal android. I hardly have any use for it now that I work from home though.
Seiko are great watches. I have a couple of G-Shock watches and a Garmin heart rate monitor watch. The Garmin is kinda like a smart watch but more practical. It's got all the sports stuff you'd ever need but GPS too. It makes for an excellent daily-driver watch.
I find HRM watches to be very handy. I can tell from checking my heart rate whether I need to slow down my running speed. I can tell if I start running for something how long I'll last by checking my heart rate. If it's in the "anabolic zone" I'll crap out in a few minutes. If it's in the "aerobic zone" I'll crap out when my body gives up.
It's also been handy for monitoring my general fitness. Resting heart rate, steps, floors travelled, etc. I recommend the Garmin Fenix if you ever wanna try out a 'Smart watch' again: https://www.garmin.com/en-GB/p/641479
I think "full blown" smart watches like the Apple Watch and Samsung Gear are largely a waste of money. I always considered getting one, but always read the largely "meh" or negative reviews from them. When I got my Galaxy S23 Ultra Verizon said I could get the Gear 5 for "free" I just had to pay $5/month for LTE service. The thing lasts about 15 hours on a single charge, it's damn near impossible to type anything on, I've never used it to make or receive a phone call, the fitness tracking is nice, but unless you're a hardcore athlete/gym rat you don't really need it, and the sleep tracking is nice, but once again not really that useful. After about a year of using it, I'm largely over it.
I really rely on my watch for notifications in particular since it’s MUCH less intrusive to check my wrist than pull my phone out. The other big benefit for me is maps. I get a tap on the wrist when my turn is coming up, which works particularly well when walking like I’m doing a lot of in NYC this week.
That said, my watch is something like 5 years old now and I see zero reason to upgrade. I’ll wear it till it dies and then buy whatever the cheap version is.
The notifications are nice, but half the time I have my phone out anyway. I lived in NYC for 5 years (and only got the watch about 4 months before I moved away) and the directions were useful like you said, but using my phone was just as good.
yeah I got a watch 4 for free with my s22 ultra, I gave it a good shot and used it for a few months but went back to my garmin. I simply don't need a lot of the "smart" features aside from notifications and fitness tracking, which garmin does better, and then there's the battery.... different worlds there
Yeah, I had a few FitBits before this and they were great, the battery lasted like 4-5 days. The software on this has gotten better, I think it may last a full day now, but still, that's pretty bad. Also, I get tons of spam texts on my watch which is just flat out annoying.
Smart watches looks interesting to me at first, but knowing how it only lasts 3-5 years and additionally companies loves to purposely make stuff obselete quickly, I'd rather just buy normal watch.... Or just look at my phone's clock.
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Garmin vivomove.
Analog face, and a wee display that tells you whether you want to look at your phone when it buzzes. Counts steps and stuff if you're into that. Week of battery (still 5-7 days after like 5-6 years of owning mine). Perfect daily wear.
+1 for Garmin!! I've got 2 Fenix watches and they're so important to me I'd be lost without them.
The vivomove is my daily, but for many outdoor activities I'd be literally lost without the GPS forerunner!
Also they seem to be one of the lesser evils for those who care about personal data collection and brokerage.
I got the Lily, seems like one of the cheaper ones but ditto to pretty much everything you said here!
Agreed, I regret buying my Galaxy Watch 4. The sleep and exercise tracking is nice to have but otherwise it is just an inconvenient watch because you have to remember to charge it daily.
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Sucks but they couldnot keep up. I'm rocking a Garmin and am very happy with it
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I just want Pebble back 😭😭😭
Same here!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The company announced this afternoon that it would leave the smartwatch business and redirect resources to its less-smart goods instead.
The company has been one of the most prolific makers of Wear OS smartwatches over the years, and its absence will leave a large gap in the market.
“Fossil Group is redirecting resources to support our core strength and the core segments of our business that continue to provide strong growth opportunities for us: designing and distributing exciting traditional watches, jewelry, and leather goods under our own as well as licensed brand names.”
This shouldn’t come as a huge shock if you’ve been paying attention to Fossil the past few months.
The company regularly put out smartwatches through Wear OS’s toughest years and was often a permanent fixture at CES.
What’s more, Fossil was expected to announce news of a new Gen 7 featuring the Qualcomm Snapdragon W5 Plus platform in 2023 — however, it was nothing but crickets the entire year.
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I like the style. I might just skip smart watches just because of this.
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