For once a nice looking smartwatch: Moto 360

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mi7chy

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http://moto360.motorola.com/

http://motorola-blog.blogspot.com/2014/03/moto-360-its-time.html
 
That band is horrific, but I like the direction of the rest of the watch. I would certainly consider getting a smartwatch if they looked like normal watches instead of stupid power nerd crap.
 
looks good - still have no idea why i'd want a smartwatch
 
At least it passes the first test. I tend to agree that smartwatch is kind of redundant if you're already carrying a smartphone but I might take a look if it offers useful features and convenience such as passing through useful info so you don't have to pull the phone out of the pocket such as displaying who's calling, answer/initiate calls, calendar event reminders, hand gestures to get weather/stock info, more hand gestures for quick response to messaging when driving (double vertical hand motion for 'yes' or double horizontal for 'no'), etc.

1. Looks nice enough to go on the wrist
2. Offer useful features and convenience
3. Built-in GPS that can run stand-alone untethered from phone for fitness like my Garmin 310XT
4. Battery life (I'd like to see the wrist strap as an extension of the battery to provide longer life)
5. Price
 
I like where Google is headed but the question is can the OEM's and Google get there fast enough to make it worthwhile?

This is the first time a smartwatch has a appealed to me (Pebble and Gear are laughable at best). I love the mock-ups of the interface and the integration with Google Now. Like others have said not having to constantly pull my phone out of my pocket would be a blessing.

I like the fact that Fossil is on board. I currently have a Fossil watch that I love and pair that with a great user experience and usefulness and I'm in.

Bottom line: Android Wear, please please please don't suck.
 
rhouck said:
That band is horrific, but I like the direction of the rest of the watch. I would certainly consider getting a smartwatch if they looked like normal watches instead of stupid power nerd crap.
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There are different options for bands.
 
CHANG3D said:
There are different options for bands.
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Yeah, I saw that. All of them look pretty terrible :p , but my assumption is that you can use any aftermarket band with them, so a nice band could really clean up the look. The band is certainly a minor issue if the rest of the watch looks good :)
 
Moto 360 will be available in a variety of styles globally in Summer 2014
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With Motorola pushing customizations like with the Moto X I doubt what they've shown with the Moto 360 is complete nor final. And, by then there will be other options like Apple's fisher price iWatches.
 
mi7chy said:
With Motorola pushing customizations like with the Moto X I doubt what they've shown with the Moto 360 is complete nor final. And, by then there will be other options like Apple's fisher price iWatches.
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Wow, trolling so hard he's insulting a product that hasn't even been announced. Let's wait until Apple and Motorola have shipping products before we reach conclusions, shall we?
 
Aurelius said:
Wow, trolling so hard he's insulting a product that hasn't even been announced. Let's wait until Apple and Motorola have shipping products before we reach conclusions, shall we?
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More accurately preferences. Nothing wrong with liking the fisher price look and UI:

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txsizzler said:
I like this one better:
http://www.neptunepine.com/
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Not much different than strapping a 3.5" phone to your wrist. Doesn't look like a traditional watch and definitely not elegant.
 
mi7chy said:
More accurately preferences. Nothing wrong with liking the fisher price look and UI:

compare_iphone5c.jpg
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Yes there is something wrong with it. The iphone 5c isnt selling as well as Apple hoped and where it comes to UI design iOS 7 is pretty terrible.
 
LOL at the premature apple hate already!

If anyone should be scolded for bad designs one after the other, it should be Samsung. Good job on marketing, folks.
 
I switched from a galaxy nexus to a 5s and honestly wish I'd stick w Android. Sure some stuf "just works", but it also feels dumbed down and slow.

Regarding smartwatches, the only use case I see for them is maybe if you owned only the watch and a tablet?
 
A nice non gawdy watch that can act/look like a normal dress watch would be perfect when wearing a suit. My note 3 is too noticeable in my dress pants, so I keep it in my suit coat pocket. That means I have to fish around to get it and have to go to my coat if I set it down.

And although it may be distracting I could see some use for it when Im on my motorcycle.
 
This is probably the only android version that can match or exceed Apple's future offering. It's sexy and hopefully "assembled" in the good old USA!
 
Looks pretty damn nice, but I'm sure it's going to cost more than the Pebble Steel and have considerably less battery life than it too. So I think I'm still going to get the Pebble steel here pretty soon even though the UI, display, and functionality seem much better than the Pebble.
 
elzeus said:
It's sexy and hopefully "assembled" in the good old USA!
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Very likely it will considering Moto X is assembled in USA.

It'll be hot if MSRP is like the Galaxy Gear at $299 but have a feeling it'll probably be $399 minimum. But unlike the Gear I'll probably have no hesitation buying it considering one of my all time favorite devices is the Motorola Startac plus the brand recognition is associated with professional/military communication.
 
Since this looks like a Nest on the wrists, I wonder if Nest would be using Android Wear OS for the next iteration.
 
mi7chy said:
Very likely it will considering Moto X is assembled in USA.

It'll be hot if MSRP is like the Galaxy Gear at $299 but have a feeling it'll probably be $399 minimum. But unlike the Gear I'll probably have no hesitation buying it considering one of my all time favorite devices is the Motorola Startac plus the brand recognition is associated with professional/military communication.
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I don't know if it'll be as expensive as the Gear 2. Compared to the Gear 2, the Moto 360 doesn't have a camera and Android Wearable looks like it's designed to rely a lot on the paired phone, so less local storage should be necessary. I expect it to have some sort of motion or fitness tracking sensor built in though. If Moto is smart, they'll use a similar pricing strategy as with the X and the G - they'll be turning a only small profit on each watch to move more units. Fingers crossed for $200 - 250.
 
Domini said:
It may be water resistant but don't expect waterproof. Heck even the Sony smartwatch isn't waterproof
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If you look at the 360° photo of the watch, you can see that it should be a nearly completely sealed watch with the exception of a little hole on the left, most likely for the microphone, and has some kind of special backplate, most likely for wireless charging and a few more sensors. I believe that it should waterproofed to a certain degree kind of like the Qualcomm Toq.

BTW, if it uses a Mirasol screen, it shouldn't take too much battery power either. The screen being circular should also take less battery due to pushing out less pixels than another screen of similar but rectangular dimensions (draw a circle inside a square).
 
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Very timely Motorola hangout session discussing the design decisions. They even touched upon one question I had regarding the display orientation auto-adjusting so you don't have to adjust your arm position to read like with a traditional static face watch. Size wise it looks acceptable even on the lady's wrist and the only suggestion is to taper off where the wrist band meets the watch for aesthetics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpY8O5Zer78&feature=share

Quick look at UI
http://youtu.be/4c6gPK0NdTI

- water resistant
- no camera
- different wrist band options
- hints at wireless charging
- UI is responsive from the looks of it
- Probably AMOLED display for low power consumption
 
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CHANG3D said:
If you look at the 360° photo of the watch, you can see that it should be a nearly completely sealed watch with the exception of a little hole on the left, most likely for the microphone, and has some kind of special backplate, most likely for wireless charging and a few more sensors. I believe that it should waterproofed to a certain degree kind of like the Qualcomm Toq.

BTW, if it uses a Mirasol screen, it should take too much battery power either. The screen being circular should also take less battery due to pushing out less pixels than another screen of similar but rectangular dimensions (draw a circle inside a square).
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Jim Wicks from Moto said that it's water-resistant, not waterproof. In other words, don't panic if you're caught out in the rain... just don't jump in the pool.

And from what little we saw of the real thing during the Hangout, it doesn't look like Mirasol. My guess is that it's AMOLED, since you'd want that watch face to either be always on or have a degree of persistence.
 
ninjacore said:
I switched from a galaxy nexus to a 5s and honestly wish I'd stick w Android. Sure some stuf "just works", but it also feels dumbed down and slow.

Regarding smartwatches, the only use case I see for them is maybe if you owned only the watch and a tablet?
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Not sure if you are trolling or trying to be serious.....
 
Looks very nice. Hope they sell it without bands but I am generally interested in it.
 
QwertyJuan said:
If someone doesn't think an iPhone is the best phone ever, they are lying? Why must that be?
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I thought he was referring to the watch/tablet combo comment. That makes no sense to me, lol. If your watch is getting all of its data from a tablet, how is the tablet getting its data for the watch (you can't rely on WiFi being everywhere)? Smart watches are designed to be direct companions to smart phones, not tablets.
 
T4rd said:
I thought he was referring to the watch/tablet combo comment. That makes no sense to me, lol. If your watch is getting all of its data from a tablet, how is the tablet getting its data for the watch (you can't rely on WiFi being everywhere)? Smart watches are designed to be direct companions to smart phones, not tablets.
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Not to mention tablets don't get very many phone calls or texts.
 
That's the first smartwatch that doesn't scream nerd from a mile away. Not sure I have any use for one though.
 
Blown 89 said:
That's the first smartwatch that doesn't scream nerd from a mile away. Not sure I have any use for one though.
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The situation we're in now mirrors that from when the iPhone was still very new, I think. At the time, smartphones were seen as primarily for business, and I heard a lot of people ask why home users would ever want them. In both cases, it's a question of technical ability and simply getting to try the technology for yourself.

When the iPhone was new, smartphone interfaces were bad, and made few concessions to anything that wasn't calling or messaging. Heck, the only BlackBerry that was at all media-friendly before 2007 was the Pearl (from late 2006). Why would you want to buy one as a home user when it doesn't do much of what you want, and haven't seen what it can do? Then people got iPhones, which were focused on home users, and both had a better time and understood why they might have wanted any smartphone in the first place.

Same deal with smartwatches. I like my Pebble, but it really just passes along notifications and runs a few very basic apps... I wouldn't suggest that someone drop $150 on one unless they're already in the market for a watch. I actually found the Galaxy Gear less useful because it wouldn't even handle many notifications. Android Wear looks like the first major platform that takes full advantage of always having something on your wrist.
 
Smart watches are and can be useful the question is are they $300 useful? How many people would pay $300 for a blue tooth ear piece?

For me I am just waiting till they come down in price. Also wouldn't kill these guys to keep the band connection standard so people can buy any band they want.
 
My concerns come down to how open the thing is going to be, and its functionality set. Is this going to be a Android Wear device? It appears to be part of the "meant to be a companion to an Android device" kit, as opposed to "its a tiny Android device itself" like some smartwatches. I'm not opposed to the "companion" devices, but I am worried about the openness of the thing.

Right now, we don't even know the amount of openess and the full specification of Android Wear. I don't want to buy something that relies on a proprietary toolkit that only has access to a handful of features, especially if it costs quite a bit. I am a bit worried that Android Wear will be focused on a bunch of "core Google stuff" as they keep talking about Google Now etc... and that those of us concerned about our privacy and use custom ROMs etc... may not be able to get all the features working with alternative services. Still, we'l see how it turns out. I'm interested in a smartwatch/band, but I want something that is not only high quality, but I want openness and privacy as well.
 
Do you guys realize how big this thing actually is? It looks sexy in promotional shots, but that's because it's not actually sitting on a wrist.

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This is absolutely gross.
 
Megalith said:
Do you guys realize how big this thing actually is? It looks sexy in promotional shots, but that's because it's not actually sitting on a wrist.

Moto_360_Map.jpg


This is absolutely gross.
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Looks fine to me in that shot.
I guess if you have a petite wrist then this is not the watch for you.
 
I think the small wristband width relative to watch size gives it the appearance that it's big but it's actually small compared to other smartwatches but if you have tiny wrists any one of them is going to look ridiculous. On the positive side there's a few months left until release to do wrist building exercises.

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Plus, big watches are in style. Here's a 52cm U-Boat that's popular with men.

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