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'Do Not Buy a Smartwatch Right Now' (droid-life.com)
Since Qualcomm is set to launch a new wearable chipset on September 10, Kellen from DoidLife argues against buying a new Google Wear OS-powered smartwatch in the meantime. The new chipset will be able to execute commands quicker, and provide for substantially longer battery life. From the report: This new chipset is said to be built from the ground up, will allow watches to look pretty when you aren't using them (like a normal watch sitting idly by your side), and extend battery life. More importantly, Qualcomm is betting that this Snapdragon Wear chip will "significantly change the Wear OS ecosystem, what you expect from a smartwatch." If you buy a smartwatch today, before Qualcomm announces this chip, you will be stuck with a 2+ year old Snapdragon Wear 2100 chip. All of the new Wear OS watches that have been announced recently, use that chip. It's old. It's never been great. And it's about to be replaced by something potentially game-changing for smartwatches. A report from WinFuture says that this new Snapdragon chip will be called the Wear 3100 and will allow for "Ok Google" detection even when the display is off. It is rumored to come with Google's Pixel-branded smartwatch, although DroidLife thinks that LG will be one of the first to launch a watch with this new processor. "This LG watch is said to have physical watch hands, as well as the smarts of Wear OS and a touch display," reports DroidLife. It is expected to make its debut on September 10.
How about I never buy a smartwatch instead?
I'm perfectly happy with my "dumb watch". It runs on an analogue CPU which requires winding, but main-spring battery life is about three days. It has an automatic winding pendulum that recharges the spring-battery when you wear it. The analogue OS on my watch comes with three built-in applications. One app, tells date and time. The second app is a timer applet. The third is a slide rule flight computer that allows you to compute time-speed-distance problems. The watch plays a cool "tick" sound when you listen closely. The only draw back to my analog watch is I couldn't find any App Store where I might download newer functions or change the "tick" sound. oh well....