Apple and Nike Launch New Neutral-Toned 'Apple Watch NikeLab'

[Chair-Sama]

If it had serious runner's GPS features and LTE (including all voice and data apps), it would be a great device, especially to pair with a real camera and a real laptop with pro features. But alas...

I'm tired of all-in-one's like the iPhone. For me, it's the worst of all worlds. Not big or powerful enough for productivity, too big to serve as an unobtrusive everyday communication device. My ideal tech world is totally reasonable and achievable - Jetson's style communication on your wrist (including secure financial transactions), with productivity on a 15" screen you can carry with you, but only when you need it. Photos? Best left to a real camera if, like me, you don't feel the need to constantly post your life for the world to follow.

Unfortunately, hardware vendors currently have little financial incentive to focus R&D on devices that can't serve you audio/video ads 24/7 on a screen big enough to view them, so this (totally achievable) tech scheme won't appear any time soon.

Apple, Inc. certainly is no Apple Computer. Jobs saw success in inventing useful technology. Cook only sees $ in enticing sheep to buy advertising equipment. It's great for the shareholders - not so much for the rest of us.

the irony of you criticizing the need for a better camera, and using "steve jobs" and how he ran apple, in the same post.

you do realize the whole "al in one" mentality started with steve jobs?
HE's the one who wanted to combine the iPod, a phone and a internet communicator on one wider screen.
the way he actually described it was basicly: Jobs introduced the iPhone as a combination of three devices: a "widescreen iPod with touch controls"; a "revolutionary mobile phone"; and a "breakthrough Internet communicator".


He's the one that was pushing for better camera improvements throughout the life of the iPhone up until the 5s,

basically, this jetsons style lifestyle is the exact OPPOSITE of what Steve jobs wanted.
if it was what he wanted, he would have kept the iPod as the best MP3/music player, the Mac as the best internet communicator, and created the best stand alone Mobile device. not combined all three into a type of "All-in-one"


Hell look at the mac, This is a classic example to Steve Jobs genius(which directly contradicts what you want from life)

Taking the concept of the Screen and Desktop tower, and combining them into a All in one device( they even wanted to do this with a Mouse/touchpad and keyboard combo that never made it past the prototype and never was released)


while that type of future seems nice to you, its very clear that YOU alone are not the majority. and i think most people would agree. i personally like having a device i can pick up to do all these things in 1:
read a book.
check my work emails.
take a picture of my kids or family
watch a movie
listen to music
Check the daily visits for my various webpages
purchase the plane tickets for my business flight next week,
be able to having my digital boarding pass read for said flight, and not need to print it out.
print it out anyway, with a single tap, without even having to be at my house at the time
call my wife and check on the kids, since the youngest is going through day 2 of the flu
FaceTime with my wife while at the store, to confirm if this was the right item she needed me to grab for dinner.
get directions home with a step by step narration,
have my alarm go off to remind me to call my business partner since he should be waking up right about now(he's currently in japan on vacation)
be able to check the time in France to know when to expect the good morning text from our oldest daughter who's there on a school trip.

check the status of some of my fitness goals on my watch, like how many steps I've taken today and how active I've been, its my day off and it was "supposed" to be my lazy day for the week.
look up hotel prices for same previously mentioned business trip.
check the time, as I'm not running late for dinner.
check the traffic in the area and choose an alternate route.
get home and have a quick FaceTime with he wife and our aforementioned daughter on her trip,
take a nice photo of the dinner wife made and upload to social media being "that guy".

funny part is, in "your" future jetsons idea, i would need atlas 3-5 different electronic devices carried with me to eb able to do all of this (computer for work stuff, a separate GPS for driving/directions, a printer, an actual book or device who's Sole purpose it to read books, a phone, and a music player, a actual watch, and fitness watch/pedometer type device and lastly a tv to watch movies on)

now lets see, even if they were all modestly priced, having 4-6 devices like this, even assuming 50-100$ ea? this is easily well into the high hundreds of dollars(especially since the laptop, tv, and Stand alone GPS will all run you in the hundreds usually)
and id need a pretty large bag to carry them all around with me at the same time, or leave them all in my vehicle(which when you live in arizona and its 115 in july on a good day, thats not happening. temps in the vehicle can exceed 150 in the right conditions)

i can tell you right now, i certainly do NOT miss the days of carrying a Big old Letter carrier style bag on my shoulder filled with expensive Tech back in the 90's/00's.(camera, camcorder, laptop, walkman/portable cd player, garmin or magellan GPS in the car, which again you couldn't leave in your vehicle)

hell the only thing i find myself carryign around these days in my phone/watch/wallet and my laptop if its absolutely needed for work and I'm not going to or from my office, and with what I'm capable of doing with my phone now, even thats not needed as much.

 

[M.PaulCezanne]

Well, I respectfully disagree. And wow, such a long reply. Far easier to type such lengths on a full sized keyboard than on an iPhone, eh?

 

[44267547]

Does your garmin do anything except stat tracking? How does it handle calls and texts? Can you unlock your smart door locks with it? Can you use it to pay for goods? Or is it only good at 1 thing?

In fairness to Garmin though, the Apple Watch is more than a fitness tracker. And Apple advertises this as such. Garmin is strictly a fitness tracker (With notifications) and it tracks fairly well with marathons, hiking, etc. Garmins primary focus is fitness where as the Apple Watch does have more capabilities for with the iPhone. Both great Watches.

 

[DeepIn2U]

the irony of you criticizing the need for a better camera, and using "steve jobs" and how he ran apple, in the same post.

you do realize the whole "al in one" mentality started with steve jobs?
HE's the one who wanted to combine the iPod, a phone and a internet communicator on one wider screen.
the way he actually described it was basicly: Jobs introduced the iPhone as a combination of three devices: a "widescreen iPod with touch controls"; a "revolutionary mobile phone"; and a "breakthrough Internet communicator".


He's the one that was pushing for better camera improvements throughout the life of the iPhone up until the 5s,

basically, this jetsons style lifestyle is the exact OPPOSITE of what Steve jobs wanted.
if it was what he wanted, he would have kept the iPod as the best MP3/music player, the Mac as the best internet communicator, and created the best stand alone Mobile device. not combined all three into a type of "All-in-one"


Hell look at the mac, This is a classic example to Steve Jobs genius(which directly contradicts what you want from life)

Taking the concept of the Screen and Desktop tower, and combining them into a All in one device( they even wanted to do this with a Mouse/touchpad and keyboard combo that never made it past the prototype and never was released)


while that type of future seems nice to you, its very clear that YOU alone are not the majority. and i think most people would agree. i personally like having a device i can pick up to do all these things in 1:
read a book.
check my work emails.
take a picture of my kids or family
watch a movie
listen to music
Check the daily visits for my various webpages
purchase the plane tickets for my business flight next week,
be able to having my digital boarding pass read for said flight, and not need to print it out.
print it out anyway, with a single tap, without even having to be at my house at the time
call my wife and check on the kids, since the youngest is going through day 2 of the flu
FaceTime with my wife while at the store, to confirm if this was the right item she needed me to grab for dinner.
get directions home with a step by step narration,
have my alarm go off to remind me to call my business partner since he should be waking up right about now(he's currently in japan on vacation)
be able to check the time in France to know when to expect the good morning text from our oldest daughter who's there on a school trip.

check the status of some of my fitness goals on my watch, like how many steps I've taken today and how active I've been, its my day off and it was "supposed" to be my lazy day for the week.
look up hotel prices for same previously mentioned business trip.
check the time, as I'm not running late for dinner.
check the traffic in the area and choose an alternate route.
get home and have a quick FaceTime with he wife and our aforementioned daughter on her trip,
take a nice photo of the dinner wife made and upload to social media being "that guy".

funny part is, in "your" future jetsons idea, i would need atlas 3-5 different electronic devices carried with me to eb able to do all of this (computer for work stuff, a separate GPS for driving/directions, a printer, an actual book or device who's Sole purpose it to read books, a phone, and a music player, a actual watch, and fitness watch/pedometer type device and lastly a tv to watch movies on)

now lets see, even if they were all modestly priced, having 4-6 devices like this, even assuming 50-100$ ea? this is easily well into the high hundreds of dollars(especially since the laptop, tv, and Stand alone GPS will all run you in the hundreds usually)
and id need a pretty large bag to carry them all around with me at the same time, or leave them all in my vehicle(which when you live in arizona and its 115 in july on a good day, thats not happening. temps in the vehicle can exceed 150 in the right conditions)

i can tell you right now, i certainly do NOT miss the days of carrying a Big old Letter carrier style bag on my shoulder filled with expensive Tech back in the 90's/00's.(camera, camcorder, laptop, walkman/portable cd player, garmin or magellan GPS in the car, which again you couldn't leave in your vehicle)

hell the only thing i find myself carryign around these days in my phone/watch/wallet and my laptop if its absolutely needed for work and I'm not going to or from my office, and with what I'm capable of doing with my phone now, even thats not needed as much.

BRAVO!A TRUE Mac user!

Out of everything I've gotten used to since my first Feature Phone (first to have Bluetooth: Ericsson T39m) being able to make 5hrs continuous calls, SMS, wireless calls (man that headset was HUGE the very first bluetooth headset). After all the smartphones I've used the advancement of the internet and such the BEST feature is FaceTime or video calling!

If I could relive some bad moments, I'd know with FaceTime I could have found the right diapers for my son. Sure Video Calling was capable in N.America BUT you had to be on the same carrier and capable phone. Apple solved this long before chat applications flourished so that making FaceTime took the (do you have said model phone does it have this do you have a data plan). Trust me I smirked like crazy heaving Jobs and Ive crush like newly attached Gaylord's in a loversboat dream but hey it actually worked out.

 

[Spendlove]

I highly doubt that you could buy this band on Ali Express, you could buy an approximation of the same color scheme in silicone rather than fluoroelastomer. I have seen third party sports bands that are of acceptable quality, I have not seen any that would pass for being the same as Apple's bands. They're not even the same material.

Yeah, not this EXACT model but pretty damn close. You cannot tell unless you touch them. £4 with postage for the lookalikie version or the unobtainable exclusive Apple Watch one?

I wonder which I will choose.

I have bought lots of 3rd party bands since they became available and they have all been brilliant and each one is a 10th of the Apple price or less (with postage!). However, I would like a nice quality leather strap for a 42mm space grey.

 

[Chupa Chupa]

Does your garmin do anything except stat tracking? How does it handle calls and texts? Can you unlock your smart door locks with it? Can you use it to pay for goods? Or is it only good at 1 thing?

It has notifications, an App Store, and other functionality, but I only use it for running. My daily driver is my AW -- which is where my frustration comes in because the AW theoretically could compete higher end sport watches but Apple chooses to only reach as far as a Fitbit.

The technological difference between a higher end sport watches like the Forerunner and entry Spartan and AW is, worst case, nill. You could make the case that AW's guts are more sophisticated than most sport watches and that it's underachieving functionally in this area.

But just as a top of the line Jigsaw won't help when trying to cut tree branches, the AW isn't a great too for running training. So it doesn't matter if the Forerunner is only great at one thing because the AW in its current iteration is a jack-of-all-trades, master of few. The main reason I keep my AW is its great at notification, "saving" and important phone call by letting you answer when you can't immediately get to your phone, and Apple Pay. So hopefully Apple will close the gap and make AW a true sports watch instead of giving it lip service. That is when I'll upgrade and ditch the Garmin. Until then, yes, the Garmin is a great tool for it's chief intended purpose.

 

[WRChris]

In fairness to Garmin though, the Apple Watch is more than a fitness tracker. And Apple advertises this as such. Garmin is strictly a fitness tracker (With notifications) and it tracks fairly well with marathons, hiking, etc. Garmins primary focus is fitness where as the Apple Watch does have more capabilities for with the iPhone. Both great Watches.

Yep I know that. Somehow this article about a Watch band turned into a pissing contest over which Watch is better at stat tracking and that's not even what's important to the majority of the market.
[doublepost=1492869456][/doublepost]

It has notifications, an App Store, and other functionality, but I only use it for running. My daily driver is my AW -- which is where my frustration comes in because the AW theoretically could compete higher end sport watches but Apple chooses to only reach as far as a Fitbit.

The technological difference between a higher end sport watches like the Forerunner and entry Spartan and AW is, worst case, nill. You could make the case that AW's guts are more sophisticated than most sport watches and that it's underachieving functionally in this area.

But just as a top of the line Jigsaw won't help when trying to cut tree branches, the AW isn't a great too for running training. So it doesn't matter if the Forerunner is only great at one thing because the AW in its current iteration is a jack-of-all-trades, master of few. The main reason I keep my AW is its great at notification, "saving" and important phone call by letting you answer when you can't immediately get to your phone, and Apple Pay. So hopefully Apple will close the gap and make AW a true sports watch instead of giving it lip service. That is when I'll upgrade and ditch the Garmin. Until then, yes, the Garmin is a great tool for it's chief intended purpose.

lol hopefully you don't use a jigsaw to cut tree branches. There's no way I would go to a garmin app ecosystem over an Apple ecosystem. I can see where dedicated runners would use that garmin but that's not the majority of people who are buying smart watches. It will only get better with its sensors and software

I use my Apple Watch when running and it does a fine job but I'm not training for the olympics or any event where I would need to know exactly what is happening down to the t

"Until then, yes, the Garmin is a great tool for it's chief intended purpose." So it is only really good for running?

 

[Chupa Chupa]

lol hopefully you don't use a jigsaw to cut tree branches. There's no way I would go to a garmin app ecosystem over an Apple ecosystem. I can see where dedicated runners would use that garmin but that's not the majority of people who are buying smart watches. It will only get better with its sensors and software

I use my Apple Watch when running and it does a fine job but I'm not training for the olympics or any event where I would need to know exactly what is happening down to the t

"Until then, yes, the Garmin is a great tool for it's chief intended purpose." So it is only really good for running?

Right, but as I said, I use my Garmin only for running. I don't think of Garmin as an eco-system, I think of it as the tool I need when I'm running -- my chainsaw. My AW is my daily driver -- my jigsaw for light projects. As AW stands now I'll never used it for running.

You may be right that the majority of AW users are not into training but I don't think you have any data to back that up. It's your own hunch. What I do know is that when Apple announced the AW it promoted Christy Turnlington's marathon training with the AW. So Apple itself WAS trying to make the link that the AW is a true sports training watch. But it's not - it falls way short of what a real sport watch does. It's why AW hasn't really cut into that market yet. But it seems it is (or was) a market Apple wanted to be in, not just to track walking, mete out notifications, and be a conduit for ApplePay.

Hopefully next AW iteration AW will become more versatile in the sports training field. I would love to not have to have a separate watch for training. I'm not training for the Olympics either -- way too old for that anyway. Heh. I'm not even that hard core. But I do like to know where I stand while running and after and mere lap times and delayed HR doesn't give me a complete picture to be able to make corrections while running and for the next run.

 

[CarlJ]

This band almost feels like Apple's response to many who say there are no watch bands that match the Space Grey AW.

Except it's got a shiny steel pin - everything else about the band and the watch that it is (only) sold with, is blackish (space gray aluminum, black holes) and cream, but the pin is shiny steel. Seems a weird choice. You can't get the band separately so I don't see how that would be a response. They do, in fact, give short shrift to the owners of the gray and black watches ("we really do care ever so much about fashion - we treat this as a fashion product - but we think you ought to put shiny silver lugs into your black/gray watch, because we can't be bothered to make a few more SKUs", sigh), but this is the first time I've seen them sell one of the dark (space black or space gray) watches paired with a watchband with bright hardware. Just... weird.

Whatever, the color combo doesn't do anything for me (an actual bright white/black "Imperial Stormtrooper" version would be amusing). It gives Nike a new exclusive, now that "just anybody" can buy the previous Nike/Apple watch bands separately. I've got the anthracite/black Nike band on my series 0 Space Gray Sport, and it's quite nice (and handy as we roll towards summer).
[doublepost=1492927700][/doublepost]

Yeah, not this EXACT model but pretty damn close. You cannot tell unless you touch them. £4 with postage for the lookalikie version or the unobtainable exclusive Apple Watch one?

I wonder which I will choose.

I have bought lots of 3rd party bands since they became available and they have all been brilliant and each one is a 10th of the Apple price or less (with postage!). However, I would like a nice quality leather strap for a 42mm space grey.

"You cannot tell unless you touch them" - yes, but I'm touching it the entire time I have the watch on - I don't care very much how it looks to others (the watch it there to suit my needs/whims, not to impress other people), but I do care how it looks and feels to me. I have a few of the 3rd party silicone bands, and its been hit-or-miss. I'd rather have a few really good (feeling) bands than handfuls of pretty-but-not-as-nice-feeling ones. But it's clearly a personal preference kind of thing, I can totally understand others making different choices given the same conditions.

On the other hand, I've got a very nice red knockoff of the Leather Loop, that feels perhaps 80% as good as the real ones and cost maybe $30 a year ago, and looks very nice with the Space Gray Sport (and isn't available from Apple at any price). If Apple offered the classic buckle leather bands with space gray lugs, I might own one or two of those at this point (I've seen people on the forums do some lovely conversions, but it's the principle of the thing - I shouldn't have to spend $150 and then immediately void the warranty and have a chance of messing it up - they should offer leather bands with blackened lugs if they're going to sell the watches in Space Gray/Black, otherwise those watches are kind of second-class citizens).

 

[thepixelpusher]

Makes me think of this.

 

[orbital~debris]

Cool Apple, always comforting to know that your hard work is dedicated towards releasing products in different colors while my new 2016 MBP has to be repaired for the 3rd time.

Another one who seemingly can't comprehend the concept of teams. Different teams who are tasked with different projects, simultaneously.
[doublepost=1492973360][/doublepost]

Yeah, not this EXACT model but pretty damn close. You cannot tell unless you touch them. £4 with postage for the lookalikie version or the unobtainable exclusive Apple Watch one?

I wonder which I will choose.

I have bought lots of 3rd party bands since they became available and they have all been brilliant and each one is a 10th of the Apple price or less (with postage!). However, I would like a nice quality leather strap for a 42mm space grey.

Given the amount of news I've heard & articles I've read about generic copycat products originating from Asia having dubious composition / quality control - I'll stick with paying for Apple's products. In some cases, products are known to have been made from toxic substances or incorporated prohibited chemicals. Apple tell you exactly what the product is made from, and adhere to European safety regulations etc.

Also, touch is as important as appearance for something you wear!

 

[CarlJ]

Another one who seemingly can't comprehend the concept of teams. Different teams who are tasked with different projects, simultaneously.

Look, he came here to complain, one can't let logic, reasoning, or critical thought get in the way of such an important task.

 

[satchmo]

Except it's got a shiny steel pin - everything else about the band and the watch that it is (only) sold with, is blackish (space gray aluminum, black holes) and cream, but the pin is shiny steel.

Are you talking about the lugs that are shiny? From the pics, I don't see any steel visible. They look like every other sport band where the rubber is flush against the watch casing.

 

[CarlJ]

Are you talking about the lugs that are shiny? From the pics, I don't see any steel visible. They look like every other sport band where the rubber is flush against the watch casing.

What? No, not the lugs - the pin that is the fastening mechanism for the band around your wrist. It's a cream-colored band, with a strong pattern of black-lined holes... and a silver-colored steel pin sticking up through one of those black holes, instead of the blackened pin that would have matched the holes and the body of the watch. And the shot of the inside of the closure makes it clear this isn't a trick of the light. It's a weird choice for a company that presents itself as catering to fashion with the watch.

It's not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, and I have no designs on getting either this watch (my series 0 still works great) or the band (which isn't available separately anyway), so I don't care that much, but the choice seems really weird to me.

You're Apple, you have complete control over this product, you wax poetic about chamfers and finishes, you're presenting this as a fashion-conscious item, it's a special exclusive combination and when it's worn, it is entirely dark metal, a cream band, black lined holes, ... and a shiny silver pin. Every visible bit of metal, aside from the pin, is dark gray. And you already have dark gray pins in stock, used on your black bands. So why not here? Did someone forget? Were they expecting to pair it with a non-SpaceGray watch up until the last minute? If the band were entirely cream, absent of any other decoration, you could argue the black pin would be distracting ... but the band is filled to the brim with black colored holes. The silver pin is completely out of place. And the band is not intended to go with any other watch, you can only buy it with this space gray model.

To my knowledge, every time they've sold a watch paired with a sport band, the color of the pin has matched the watch, including them doing bands for, say, the gold colored sport watch with a gold colored pin when the same band is otherwise only available with a silver pin.

I can see the reasoning in most of what Apple does (not agree with all the time - not by a long shot - but at least have an idea where they're coming from), but this one insignificant thing leaves me completely mystified.

 

[thepixelpusher]

Makes me think of this.

Or this.

 

[Spendlove]

Or this.

Now THAT would be a cool watch face.

 

[mattopotamus]

Will people gonna realize what the Series 1 is? ... it's not the orig Watch, a 2nd gen product and is not Stainless. 'Series 1 SS' does not exist.
I think Apple's new naming was to trick people and blur the shortcomings of the orig Watch..

yeah, pretty bad naming scheme. I mean the OG.

 

[CarlJ]

I think Apple's new naming was to trick people and blur the shortcomings of the orig Watch..

I think it's much more simply a matter of, Apple doesn't retcon names very often, and they want to keep things simple, so "Series 1 and 2", not "Series 2 and 3".

yeah, pretty bad naming scheme. I mean the OG.

Common parlance for the original watch nowadays is "Series 0".

 

[mikedis]

Not that anyone is still watching or paying attention to this thread, but I definitely think it’s a good lookin’ combo.

 

[trainwrecka]

Not that anyone is still watching or paying attention to this thread, but I definitely think it’s a good lookin’ combo.View attachment 1490359

Why do you have a napkin on your wrist?

 

[mikedis]

Why do you have a napkin on your wrist?

I was trying to do something with the white balance, but it didn’t work out.