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Lenovo Reveals Wearable Smartband To Track Exercise Stats

Posted by samzenpus on from the it's-all-in-the-wrist dept.

An anonymous reader writes Lenovo is the latest tech company to enter the fitness tracker market with its Smartband SW-B100 device. "It can record calories burnt, steps taken and a user's heartrate, in addition to syncing with a smartphone through an app to provide more complete health data. Users can also customize notifications and reminders on the smartband, and even use it to unlock a Windows PC without typing in the password, according to the product page."

28 of 51 comments (clear)

  1. No surprise by MPBoulton · · Score: 2

    A Chinese company making a product that can bypass security in Windows? Who would have thought...

  2. Re:Burnt? by TWX · · Score: 1

    Ah. I guess what I should have asked then, is what an article about an exercise product is doing on Slashdot...

    --
    Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
  3. mostly novelty item by itzly · · Score: 2

    Unless you're a professional, these fitness devices only have a brief novelty value. Calories burned is cute, but if you want to lose weight, you just need to eat less. Instead of counting steps, you can just measure the distance travelled, or time spent exercising. And instead of looking at your heart rate, you can just judge how you feel. After a while, you know what kind of exercise level you can sustain for the next 30 or 60 minutes. And if you misjudge, and you go to fast, just slow down for the second half. Don't worry too much about staying in the exact "heart rate zone".

    1. Re:mostly novelty item by itzly · · Score: 1

      Even when "eat less" is oversimplified, tracking your exercise calories is equally useless.

    2. Re:mostly novelty item by Ericular · · Score: 4, Interesting

      My FitBit motivated me to be more active, and therefore didn't just have a brief novelty value for me. Instead of sitting around on my break at work, I'd take a brisk walk around the building. I'd park in the back of the lot. I'd take the stairs instead of the elevator, even if it was 6 flights up. All of these things I would never have done if I wasn't receiving immediate feedback from the FitBit, and seeing that I was burning more calories by making these small changes. Even an extra 100 calories burned per day adds up to a significant weight loss 365 days later.

      I've also found that I'm more likely to meet my calorie intake target for the day when I'm graphing calories in/out day-to-day in a spreadsheet. So I'd argue that these fitness devices can have a real value.

    3. Re:mostly novelty item by itzly · · Score: 1
      And how long have you been doing this ? Probably not too long, because after walking up the same 6 flights of stairs for a few times, you already know how many calories it takes, and how many steps it is without looking at the FitBit.

      Even an extra 100 calories burned per day adds up to a significant weight loss 365 days later.

      Unless you eat 100 extra calories because you think you can afford it. And 100 kcals is only a quarter of a donut.

    4. Re:mostly novelty item by Totenglocke · · Score: 1

      It's completely true. Anyone will lose weight by eating fewer calories, this is a scientific fact that only idiots try to deny. While the number of calories each person needs to stay at a given weight vary based on height, gender, current weight, genetic factors, etc, it is a simple truth that by eating fewer calories, you will lose weight. You will lose weight faster if you combine eating fewer calories with increased exercise, but that doesn't change the fact that you will still lose weight without changing your activity at all and just consume fewer calories.

      --
      "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
    5. Re:mostly novelty item by Lazere · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yep, totally not ignoring the last sentence of his post at all. But you're right, after a few time going up the same stairs, you know how many calories it takes. Here's the thing though, fitness is all about habit. If the FitBit is helping him to build new healthy habits through information, I'd call that a win. Wouldn't you? Perhaps he won't need it down the road, but that doesn't mean it's not useful now.

    6. Re:mostly novelty item by timeOday · · Score: 1
      Does any of these wristbands have continuous heart rate monitoring without a chest strap? And does it actually work?

      I am a runner and have a love/hate relation with my Garmin GPS watch, because it's useful, but was expensive and is bug-ridden. And in contrast to the GP, I've come to believe that heart rate is KEY. Distance in itself doesn't tell you so much if there is significant variation in slope, elevation, surface type, and temperature. What really matters is effort times time, and heart rate measures effort. But I rarely wear the chest strap for my Garmin because it's a nuisance and a bit uncomfortable. But without a chest strap, can these things do continuous heart rate measurement at all?

    7. Re:mostly novelty item by wiredlogic · · Score: 1

      There's an entire industry geared toward selling useless fitness gear to the gullible. There's money to be made here no matter that they'll all be abandoned in three years.

      --
      I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
    8. Re:mostly novelty item by Ericular · · Score: 2

      The point is that the FitBit does all of the calculation for me, and then I see affirmation in cold, hard numbers that my habits make a difference. I don't want to manually calculate every activity I do and then tally them at the end of the day. That's the whole point of the FitBit in the first place. I want to see that I burned 2,642 calories yesterday, and 2,884 calories today, determine what was different, and continue habits that make a difference.

      And yes, if my goal for a 500 calorie deficit, I could eat 2,500 calories on day I burned 3,000, and 2,300 on a day I burn 2,800. What's your point there?

      I've logged my calories in (MyFitnessPal) and out (FitBit) for several months now. The line for my expected weight (based on calorie estimates) and actual weight are very similar. Much more than I expected they would be.

      To your donut reference, I think what you're getting at is that for most people, food intake is much easier to control and adjust than physical activity. I agree 100%. Eating 100 calories less is much easier and more preferable to me than exerting 100 extra calories of energy. I am a runner, and I believe that running alone is not that great of a weight loss plan. When I run 10 miles I may burn well over 1,000 calories, but I'll be damned if I don't find myself ravenously hungry for quite some time afterwards. I could negate my run in a matter of minutes if I wasn't as aware.

      And that's the point - awareness. The FitBit was nice because it held me accountable and gave me data to work with. I wasn't going to pay $100 for something and carry it around all day every day, and then just ignore the data it gave me. I log it every day in Excel. Likewise, the FitBit data alone is pretty useless if I'm oblivious to my intake, so I log intake data every day in Excel. Together, these two numbers keep me focused on my goal and guarantee that I'm progressing toward it.

       

    9. Re:mostly novelty item by itzly · · Score: 1

      Please cite a few of those peer reviewed papers.

    10. Re:mostly novelty item by itzly · · Score: 1

      Sure you are right about effort times time, but you don't need to look at your heart rate to see the effort, if you can feel it. If I start running up a hill, and halfway up I'm out of breath I can tell that I'm going to fast and need to slow down. A heart rate monitor doesn't take into account other factors, like how tired your muscles are from the day before, or what you've eaten, or what else is on your mind. Exercising by effort does take all of that in account. When I went running, I didn't even take a watch. I just had a certain loop that I was running, and I adjusted my speed to whatever level I was comfortable with.

    11. Re:mostly novelty item by anjrober · · Score: 1

      There are a number of running training schedules and approaches that use fairly exact HR thresholds for various runs. The more serious you are with your training, the more likely these gadgets help. for example, one popular use is as a better gauge of recovery between intervals. instead of the old, walk half the distance or walk the same amt of time, using a HR monitor can tell you when recovered more accurately.
      here is a nice article from pete pfitzinger (famous as 2 time US marathon olympian and author of eternally popular Advanced Marathoning - and thus someone with more credentials than itzly ) http://www.runnersworld.com/race-training/heart-matter

      i for one love my garmin. the combination of GPS, timer/watch and HR monitor is great.

      for everyone knocking these devices, i would love to see your event placings. be it running, biking, whatever you do. how did you do in your last race? i'll put my number against yours anyday.

    12. Re:mostly novelty item by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      THis is like when I was 191kg (about 420lbs) and started the final successful plunge to a healthy weight, I would weigh myself two or three times daily.

      Every bit of advice I ever got from people who were a reasonable weight told me this was a fucking stupid idea, and every time I'd tried losing weight before, I took that advice to a tee and either weighed weekly at the most, or left the scales alone entirely.

      For me, being that obese, for almost a year those numbers were the only benefit I saw from my efforts at all. At the beginning when I ate less, I felt worse, I craved more. When I exercised I ached more and old injuries came to the fore and I felt bad all around.

      After months of eating less, feeling unsatisfied, craving, aching constantly, the ONLY thing I had was those numbers on the scale. It wasn't until I was in the 150kg range after a year (I'd reached 330lb or so) that I noticed how clothing changed its fit. When you're a beachball, you need beachball clothing and 400+lb beachball clothing on a shortarse isn't much different to 300lb beachball clothing.

      So for the first year, the only thing that ended up keeping me going was the numbers on the scale. Not long after dropping under 150kg, my exercise efforts moved from being a draining habit to feeling kinda OK. Then the next summer my puffy feet had disappeared, and breathing at night while lying down was easier. Now I'm only about 12kg overweight, which is accounted for in excess skin. I'll deal with that later, but I can feel every benefit from the weight loss.

      But again, numbers on a scale, an arbitrary number that didn't equate directly with health or injury status or blood work or whatever, was all that kept me going for so long at the start. At the beginning I'd see myself drop anywhere from 0.1kg to 3kg in a day, when nothing else had changed.

      For some people, the number of steps taken, or their graphs, or heartrate or whatever is solid evidence that *something* is happening. It can be a fucking awesome tool.

    13. Re:mostly novelty item by Totenglocke · · Score: 1

      Thermodynamics has been proven false by medicine? Please, show these brilliant "articles". People who want to bitch about being fat without having to DO anything to lose weight are always claiming that "SCIENCE SHOWS I CAN"T HELP SITTING ON THE COUCH POUNDING DOWN THE OREOS!", yet it's never true.

      --
      "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
  4. Re:Burnt? by i+kan+reed · · Score: 1, Informative

    Exercise products are an attempt to make exercise intellectually stimulating enough to engage helpless nerds, and others with short attention spans.

  5. Re:Burnt? by alexander_686 · · Score: 1

    Geeks are knowledgably.
    They know that exercise is hard, which is a problem.
    They know that technology can fix any problem.
    Ergo, with the right technology, exercising can be easy.
    Corollary – Knowledge is power, which is why bookshelves groan with diet books.

  6. Re:Burnt? by tomhath · · Score: 1

    American English would usually use "burned" as the verb (measures calories that were burned) and "burnt" as the adjective (measures burnt calories). It the article's sentence it seems you could interpret it either way.

    British (and Americans who think it sounds more sophisticated) tend to use "burnt" as the verb.

  7. Re:Burnt? by fustakrakich · · Score: 1

    Exercise products (more like gimmicks) are designed to sell to anybody who will buy them. The thing does come with a watch, right?

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  8. You all wanna get/stay fit? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Eat a little less pasta and little more greens. Nopal cactus will make you lose weight so fast, people will think you have AIDS

  9. Thrilled! by penguinoid · · Score: 2

    I bet your health insurance company would be thrilled to be able to track your fitness and raise your premium should you be less than ideally active.

    --
    Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
  10. Unlock a Windows... by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 2

    >> even use it to unlock a Windows PC without typing in the password

    I don't need a wristband for that. :)

  11. Can it diagnose for Ebola? by dmt0 · · Score: 1

    Can it diagnose for Ebola? If everybody wears wearable gadgets, can we force-quarantine people based on the data from their devices?

    1. Re:Can it diagnose for Ebola? by neurovish · · Score: 1

      Can it diagnose for Ebola? If everybody wears wearable gadgets, can we force-quarantine people based on the data from their devices?

      don't give anybody any ideas

  12. Re:More tracking of people by krakelohm · · Score: 1

    Or not.

    --
    You are all a bunch of idots.
  13. Re:Burnt? by alvinrod · · Score: 2

    By definition, exercise will always be hard. If it were easy, there wouldn't be much gain from it as it wasn't taxing our bodies.

    Technology and science can make exercise more efficient by learning the most effective means for exercising and being able to accurately measure it. We might learn that following a 20 minute daily workout routine that satisfies certain conditions such as heart rate level, etc. is as effective as older routines that were an hour long and that we can use technology to help us avoid other behaviors with negative health impacts such as remaining seated for prolonged periods without standing and moving around a bit.

    However, the exercise will still be hard work. You don't build muscles if you don't strain the ones you have. Perhaps some day we'll eventually have a pill that will just grow them for you without the work, and to some degree we already have substances that have that effect to certain degrees. It's a bit like learning math. You aren't going to get good at it without practice and some hard work. We can identify alternative learning styles that may suit various individuals better than other approaches, but at the end of the day, effort still needs to be expended to grow.

  14. Does it automatically monitor sleep quality? by MarkvW · · Score: 1

    Does anybody know whether or not it automatically monitors sleep quality.