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DC Rainmaker takes the Apple Watch to 40M (140')

Julien

Julien

macrumors G4
Original poster
Jun 30, 2007
11,875
5,454
Atlanta
DC Rainmaker first reviews of the :apple:Watch are up today (he has a lot to go) and he pressurizes it in water to over 40M (140').:eek: This is beyond insane and proof the :apple:Watch and water are not a problem. He also swims laps for 1000m (0.65 miles) in it. There is no doubt [sarcasm] Apple is lying [/sarcasm] :D about how well the :apple:Watch handles water.

DC Rainmaker's :apple:Watch tests
 
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Julien said:
DC Rainmaker first reviews of the :apple:Watch are up today (he has a lot to go) and he pressurizes it in water to over 40M (140').:eek: This is beyond insane and proof the :apple:Watch and water are not a problem. He also swims laps for 1000m (0.65 miles) in it. There is no doubt Apple is lying :D about how well the :apple:Watch handles water.

DC Rainmaker's :apple:Watch tests
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Proving that the watch is more capable than IPX7. Meaning, if it gets water damage, don't count on the warranty covering it. (as they'll know you exceeded it).
 
fischersd said:
Proving that the watch is more capable than IPX7. Meaning, if it gets water damage, don't count on the warranty covering it. (as they'll know you exceeded it).
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I'm not worried if his warranty is covered. If mine ever gets to 140' and I'm attached to my :apple:Watch then the warranty will be the least of my problems.:D
 
can't wait for his full review! He is about the only one to trust when it comes to legit review now adays.
 
Julien said:
There is no doubt Apple is lying :D about how well the :apple:Watch handles water.
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It never was a lie, it is their safe bet for an exposure to water rating. We already knew the device could exceed that depending on the circumstances.
 
Apple set th official standard low so when people go crazy with it and it stops working they wouldn't have to cover it

Don't worry about sweating with it and taking it out in the rain, that's the main point, but if you want to shower with it and swim that's your risk
 
Eorlas said:
It never was a lie, it is their safe bet for an exposure to water rating. We already knew the device could exceed that depending on the circumstances.
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The watch working after being through the test, does not mean water hasn't entered it. Most of the electronics is encapsulated. If water entered you would properly not know until it started corroding stuff internally in the watch.
 
JayLenochiniMac said:
Yes, but it's short in duration. IPX7 doesn't necessarily mean it can't handle higher depth if shorter than 30 min or lower depth if longer than 30 min.
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He also swam laps for almost 30 minutes. In the past you have argued that dynamic swimming would be a lot more of a test than a 1M at 30 minute static IPx7 test (and I agree with that).

Also increasing the pressure to over 40 times the design test is an enormous increase by any measure.
 
Julien said:
He also swam laps for almost 30 minutes. In the past you have argued that dynamic swimming would be a lot more of a test than a 1M at 30 minute static IPx7 test (and I agree with that).

Also increasing the pressure to over 40 times the design test is an enormous increase by any measure.
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It'd be interesting if someone would take it to a point of failure, then we can see how truly robust it is.
 
A lot of reviews are quick to say that Apple has underplayed the watch's water resistance. However, the seals which keep the water out of the watch can/will corrode over time. If I'm not mistaken, exposure to salt/chlorine in water will speed up this process.

Until someone has used the watch for a few months and showered with it and left it on whilst swimming etc. I think it's too early to say it's definitely 'safe' to do anything with it around water.
 
JayLenochiniMac said:
It'd be interesting if someone would take it to a point of failure, then we can see how truly robust it is.
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He may yet, however if it had failed in the 40M test we would not know if this was good or bad since we would not know what it didn't fail at. We must know what it doesn't fail at and then proceed step by step to failure. However at this point we do now know it doesn't fail at 40M. ;)

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418 said:
....Until someone has used the watch for a few months and showered with it and left it on whilst swimming etc. I think it's too early to say it's definitely 'safe' to do anything with it around water.
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We KNOW Tim Cook has been showing with his for several months and I would bet may Apple tester also.

Also synthetic seals generally take years of exposure before significantly degrading.
 
Several man-minutes is not a full picture of device's durability and potential issues that only time can reveal. Let's see what we'll have after millions of man-years of life testing.
 
Julien said:
We KNOW Tim Cook has been showing with his for several months and I would bet may Apple tester also.
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I'm not sure we do know that - we know that he has showered with it at some point. Perhaps every day for several month, perhaps just a few times.
We also don't know that he didn't have one fail on him during that time - I can't imagine he'd tweet about that.
Finally, even the few months Tim Cook will have had an 'almost production' version for probably isn't as long as most people will expect the watch to last.
Even if generation 2 is only a year off, I'd rather have a watch which I can take to gym and out in the rain for the duration of that year, rather than a watch I take swimming for three months then have to keep completely dry because moisture started appearing under the screen.
 
Julien said:
He may yet, however if it had failed in the 40M test we would not know if this was good or bad since we would not know what it didn't fail at. We must know what it doesn't fail at and then proceed step by step to failure. However at this point we do now know it doesn't fail at 40M. ;)
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If there's a way to set auto-lock to never, then we can know.
 
I'm going to assume Apple built in a higher waterproof resistance, but are just making this first gen basically a beta test on that higher rating, and in the Watch 2, they'll claim a new feature of being waterproof.
 
fischersd said:
Yes, but the affects of each test would be cumulative. You need to use a different watch for each test.

If you want to see what it's IPX8 rating would be that is...
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Yes, but I was talking about progressively increasing the pressure to the point of failure, not a specific depth for an indicated amount of time (i.e., 30 min).
 
I hope this means the next ten could have a rating that would allow for swimming with the watch on. I'd love to do it, but I don't want to take the risk with this one.
 
Kavier said:
I hope this means the next ten could have a rating that would allow for swimming with the watch on. I'd love to do it, but I don't want to take the risk with this one.
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Where's the risk if they'll replace any water ingress under the standard warranty? They have no way of knowing if you exceeded 1 meter for 30 min.
 
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