Samsung Unveils Galaxy Gear Smartwatch

MojoKid writes "The smartwatch race heated up today, as Samsung showed its Galaxy Gear smartwatch at the Samsung Unpacked event in Berlin. Samsung's take on such a device has been eagerly anticipated. Samsung announced the Galaxy Gear as a companion to the new Galaxy Note 3 (or any Galaxy device). The Gear lets users make and receive calls hands-free with the built-in speaker, and it notifies you of any incoming texts, emails, and alerts and gives you a preview of whatever is coming through. A Smart Relay feature will display the full content on your Galaxy device. The Galaxy Gear sports an 800MHz processor and 1.63-inch display (320x320) AMOLED display with 512MB of RAM, 4GB of internal storage, a speaker, and two microphones with noise cancellation. There's a 1.9MP camera with a BSI sensor and autofocus, and it connects via Bluetooth 4.0 + BLE. Sensors include an accelerometer and a gyroscope. Samsung plans to launch the smartwatch in October for $300."

Comments

Expensive

[supertrooper]

Smart or not 300$ is expensive. Considering that Google is selling Nexus 4 phone for 200$ I'm not gonna buy this thing. Yeah, the battery life is like 10hrs or so. Bluetooth drains the battery fairly quickly so you'll end up charging this thing fairly often. No thanks.

Re:Expensive

[Nerdfest]

I (finally) got my Pebble watch the other day. t's not perfect, but it's pretty damn good, and has a week long battery life. It can also be read outside, which adds a lot of value. Between the notifications, weather, and ability to run things on the phone using Task, etc, it's pretty damn good for ~150$.

Re:Expensive

[zenith1111]

I won't be ditching my Casio for that thing, but I reckon the battery life will be low because of the screen. Besides, the battery is not that large to begin with, if the user doesn't make calls the Bluetooth v4 connection won't drain the battery very much, see the "Bluetooth Smart" part: https://developer.bluetooth.org/TechnologyOverview/Pages/v4.aspx

Citizen has been selling Bluetooth 4 enabled watches for some time, their watches use the bluetooth connection the get the current time from the internet a couple of times a day and run from a tiny solar cell: http://www.citizenwatch.com/en-ir/2012/10/12/citizen-eco-drive-unveils-proximity/

Re:Expensive

[michelcolman]

A watch that works for 10 hours?! So you take it off the charger when you get up in the morning at 6am, and it stops working at 4 pm? Or you have to take it off during lunch break so it can recharge?

So basically, you can look at your watch to check your messages, but you end up having to dig your phone out of your pocket to see what time it is because the watch battery went dead? Something tells me they didn't think this through.

Re:Expensive

[Monoman]

Exactly. This thing need Power over Bluetooth so it can charge wirelessly while connected for data. ;-)

Re:Expensive

[Emetophobe]

200 is the subsidized price, its really closer to 600 without a contract.....

Uh no. Google was selling an unlocked Nexus 4 8GB for $200 on their store. They're sold out now, and rumour has it that they aren't restocking them either.

Re:Expensive

[c_jonescc]

$900 for a Swiss Quartz watch is not cheap. It's a very good price for a mechanical, though even a good mechanical from a less luxury brand is closer to $600 often.

Re: Expensive

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's see ...
- cost too much for what it does.
- early release just to get to market.
- no apps available at launch.
- needs to use your phone in order to communicate with the rest of the world.

Are we talking about a Samsung Galaxy Gear or a Blackberry Playbook?

Re:Expensive

[Omestes]

And if its like most clocks, its useless for me, since it automatically sets DST. Pretty much every auto-setting clock I've owned has gone in the trash, since they don't work in Arizona.

Re:Expensive

[serviscope_minor]

Citizen has been selling Bluetooth 4

For those that don't know, Bluetooth 4 has the low energy profile which is the sort of thing which will happily run off a coin cell for a year or two.

For some reason Android has terrible support for it despite Linux having supported it since it came out, and having a specified driver model. There's no excuse really.

Re:Expensive

[msobkow]

You'd think they have learned from Blackberry's experience with their tablet to realize just how uninterested people are in "companion" devices.

Re:Expensive

[iamhassi]

Calculator watch battery lasted several months. This lasts several hours. Calling the Galaxy Gear a calculator watch is a insult to the calculator watch.

Kitchen Sink with a Wristband

[Sponge Bath]

Samsung should have contemplated this longer before shoving it out the door. Deliver useful things a smartphone can't and nothing more then you'll have better battery life and something stylish instead of that bulky thing.

Fire Sale

[spire3661]

Cant wait until this thing tanks and I can pick one up for cheap. This thing was made as a hedge in case anyone else came out with a watch, at least Samsung would be poised to compete. I believe wearable computers are in our future, just not in this very obvious form. Give me something that looks like a real watch, with DAYS of battery, and useful functions that dont require a larger device to run it all the time.

Re:not good enough

[MrHanky]

Like they said, it's a fashion accessory. Did you see the presenter at the event, with those hideous white glasses? Fashion. So they made a giant, cumbersome watch with insultingly poor battery life and some crazy advanced technology that they couldn't find any practical use for. Fashion. You wouldn't understand. Neither do I.

ugly

[JustNiz]

Its quite ugly not to mention far too bulky.
I'm not sure what benefit having this could provide anyway.
Can anyone provide a credible use-case?

Re:Snake Pliskin Style!

[michelcolman]

Actually, you'll be alerting local crooks you have a smartphone AND a $300 smartwatch. And best of all, they can see it all the time because the thing is on your wrist, visible to everyone, instead of in your pocket most of the time.

It's making the Omate look more and more appealing

[gnatman64]

I almost got a pebble, but I wanted an android based watch, and then I saw the Omate, but decided to wait and see what a big company like Samsung could do. I was actually really excited to get the Samsung watch, but now having seen it, at that price, I'd rather just get the Omate for $100 cheaper by backing their kickstarter. I know, kickstarters hardly ever live up to their promises, but the demo videos of the Omate look like exactly what I'm looking for.

Disappointing...

[mspohr]

I've been waiting for this because I wanted a phone that was easy to carry (like a watch, duh). I have been following the Omate TrueSmart on Kickstarter:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/omate/omate-truesmart-water-resistant-standalone-smartwa
Now that Samsung has released more information, I'm very disappointed. It's not a stand alone phone, it requires the latest Samsung phone to be paired all of the time. It's crippled Android. (Not very attractive, either, compared to the Omate). The Omate is waterproof and is a fully functioning phone with better specs... and it's only $200.
I guess Samsung was just looking to create a fancy "accessory" for their phone without much functionality.

Re:Casio

[exomondo]

Nowhere near as cool as the 15 Swatches I wore on both arms every day!

before you were mugged?

No, after he mugged 15 people wearing swatches.

samsung: 10 hour battery and time not visible

[goombah99]

What sort of watch only runs for 10 hours and when you glance at it doesn't show the time till you activate it?