My Frustration as a true Apple Fanboy

[MJBarnes]

Hello, all.

Long time lurker, first time poster...

I have pretty much bought every 1st (and 2nd, and 3rd, etc) generation Apple has sold in the last 20 years and after owning a Pebble, Samsung Gear 2, Samsung Gear S, and an LG G Watch, I could not wait for the Apple Watch.

I have read many posts from folks that say that even though apps are very slow to respond and sometimes not responsive at all, that for a 1.0 product, this is acceptable... Really? This has never been acceptable for a product Apple has released. Every time I have bought an iPhone, iPad, new App Store, iBooks, anything, it worked perfectly right out of the gate. And I am not a casual user. I have both a 128GB iPhone 6+ and iPad Air 2 loaded with games, application, etc... I pretty much do everything I can on Apple products... I am about as big of an Apple fanboy as you get, while still being able to appreciate other competing technology.

I digress... I am not sure if it is the Quality Control that Apple put in to the application approval process or the applications themselves or what it is, but the Watch does not seem 100% ready for prime time.

I know this has been said 100 times before, but the Apple built in applications work as expected, however sometimes loading my weather, sports scores, news, etc is a lesson in patience. I know I am not supposed to use these as "stand alone" applications and only as glances, but shouldn't I be able to access a glance without watching a spinning ball for 30 seconds or more sometimes? If we are supposed to use the watch in 15 second glances as Apple said we were, Applications should load much quicker and be more responsive.

I don't mean to offend anyone and I am not returning my watch, but as a true Apple Fanboy for 20 years, this may be the first product that I can honestly say I don't think is ready for primetime. Maybe if Apple released this as a watch without 3rd party apps (similar to the original iPhone) and baked the application store in later once there was more time to make sure it worked perfectly 100% of the time, it would be more acceptable, but to me, this seems more like a .80 product launch instead of a 1.0 product launch.

Thanks for listening.

 

[cmichaelb]

Hello, all.

Long time lurker, first time poster...

I have pretty much bought every 1st (and 2nd, and 3rd, etc) generation Apple has sold in the last 20 years and after owning a Pebble, Samsung Gear 2, Samsung Gear S, and an LG G Watch, I could not wait for the Apple Watch.

I have read many posts from folks that say that even though apps are very slow to respond and sometimes not responsive at all, that for a 1.0 product, this is acceptable... Really? This has never been acceptable for a product Apple has released. Every time I have bought an iPhone, iPad, new App Store, iBooks, anything, it worked perfectly right out of the gate. And I am not a casual user. I have both a 128GB iPhone 6+ and iPad Air 2 loaded with games, application, etc... I pretty much do everything I can on Apple products... I am about as big of an Apple fanboy as you get, while still being able to appreciate other competing technology.

Everything has worked perfectly? No issues whatsoever?

No software issues at all?

 

[diablo2112]

Apple's native apps aren't slow, it's only the 3rd Party Apps. And to date, no watch app developer has access to the watch SDK. Give it a few months, you'll have decent and fast 3rd apps soon enough.

 

[adammull]

I've already turned off 3rd party apps except for American Airlines for tickets.

But it is totally ready for primetime for native apps. I'm loving it.

 

[MJBarnes]

Everything has worked perfectly? No issues whatsoever?

No software issues at all?

Actually, minus a very small hiccup here and there, as I have always said to family and friends thinking of buying an Apple product, "They just work".

I always attributed this to Apple writing the software for their own hardware instead of 3rd parties, multiple phone vendors (Windows Phone, Androis, etc)... When you create your own OS for your own hardware, good things normally happen.

So, no, maybe not 100% of the time, but probably 99% more than any other product I have ever used.

With Apple, it is expected that when you buy it, it will work right out of the box. At least that has become my expectation.

 

[silverblack]

This reminds me of those complaining the lack of iPad apps when the 1st gen iPad was released. People applied their expectations on iPhone apps on their iPads.

 

[Tammster]

I have had no more issues with this new product than any other new product or software release. For me, there is always something. Thank goodness... the issues have always been minor (for me, but pretty major for others) and a short-term annoyance at the worst.

 

[greytmom]

Hello, all.

Long time lurker, first time poster...

I have pretty much bought every 1st (and 2nd, and 3rd, etc) generation Apple has sold in the last 20 years and after owning a Pebble, Samsung Gear 2, Samsung Gear S, and an LG G Watch, I could not wait for the Apple Watch.

I have read many posts from folks that say that even though apps are very slow to respond and sometimes not responsive at all, that for a 1.0 product, this is acceptable... Really? This has never been acceptable for a product Apple has released. Every time I have bought an iPhone, iPad, new App Store, iBooks, anything, it worked perfectly right out of the gate. And I am not a casual user. I have both a 128GB iPhone 6+ and iPad Air 2 loaded with games, application, etc... I pretty much do everything I can on Apple products... I am about as big of an Apple fanboy as you get, while still being able to appreciate other competing technology.

I digress... I am not sure if it is the Quality Control that Apple put in to the application approval process or the applications themselves or what it is, but the Watch does not seem 100% ready for prime time.

I know this has been said 100 times before, but the Apple built in applications work as expected, however sometimes loading my weather, sports scores, news, etc is a lesson in patience. I know I am not supposed to use these as "stand alone" applications and only as glances, but shouldn't I be able to access a glance without watching a spinning ball for 30 seconds or more sometimes? If we are supposed to use the watch in 15 second glances as Apple said we were, Applications should load much quicker and be more responsive.

I don't mean to offend anyone and I am not returning my watch, but as a true Apple Fanboy for 20 years, this may be the first product that I can honestly say I don't think is ready for primetime. Maybe if Apple released this as a watch without 3rd party apps (similar to the original iPhone) and baked the application store in later once there was more time to make sure it worked perfectly 100% of the time, it would be more acceptable, but to me, this seems more like a .80 product launch instead of a 1.0 product launch.

Thanks for listening.

Gotta disagree with you. I'm extremely happy with mine.

 

[matrix07]

I know this has been said 100 times before, but the Apple built in applications work as expected, however sometimes loading my weather, sports scores, news, etc is a lesson in patience. I know I am not supposed to use these as "stand alone" applications and only as glances, but shouldn't I be able to access a glance without watching a spinning ball for 30 seconds or more sometimes? If we are supposed to use the watch in 15 second glances as Apple said we were, Applications should load much quicker and be more responsive.

You're correct. A glance should be a glance, not half a minute waiting. We should require reasonable quality control from Apple product and your issue is reasonable. But if it's because it's 3rd party app maybe Apple can do nothing about it. It will be fixed when that dev got the Watch at hand and have a time to fix it with real Watch.

 

[ihatephish]

Are you expecting the same relative speed and snappiness of a newer iPhone or iPad model? Not gonna happen. It's as if you're making up being the owner of all of those previously mentioned products, because if you had, you'd remember how slow they were when they first came out.

 

[Leeabe]

Some people really shouldn't be early adopters. They didn't understand what they were getting into.

That said, I am happy with the watches performance and have no doubt it will get better with time. The developers need some time to get used to the new platform and for the tools to mature.

 

[Pinksteady]

Oh my god

 

[cmichaelb]

Actually, minus a very small hiccup here and there, as I have always said to family and friends thinking of buying an Apple product, "They just work".

I always attributed this to Apple writing the software for their own hardware instead of 3rd parties, multiple phone vendors (Windows Phone, Androis, etc)... When you create your own OS for your own hardware, good things normally happen.

So, no, maybe not 100% of the time, but probably 99% more than any other product I have ever used.

With Apple, it is expected that when you buy it, it will work right out of the box. At least that has become my expectation.

Im pretty much of the same opinion but even with iOS 1 Apples mobile OS's have been buggy to some degree or another. They are hardly perfect but still much better than the competition IMO.

 

[mightyjabba]

I kind of wish that Apple had released the Watch without support for third party applications and just added them when they were ready to provide native apps that run on the watch. Owners of the first iPhone will remember the "web apps" that we were supposed to use at first -- they sucked just like the current crop of watch apps (mostly) suck.

 

[adammull]

I kind of wish that Apple had released the Watch without support for third party applications and just added them when they were ready to provide native apps that run on the watch. Owners of the first iPhone will remember the "web apps" that we were supposed to use at first -- they sucked just like the current crop of watch apps (mostly) suck.

Yes. Exactly.

 

[iPhone1]

Hardware was ready. Software needed work. Lucky for us the latter can and will be updated.

 

[ToroidalZeus]

Actually, minus a very small hiccup here and there, as I have always said to family and friends thinking of buying an Apple product, "They just work".

I always attributed this to Apple writing the software for their own hardware instead of 3rd parties, multiple phone vendors (Windows Phone, Androis, etc)... When you create your own OS for your own hardware, good things normally happen.

So, no, maybe not 100% of the time, but probably 99% more than any other product I have ever used.

With Apple, it is expected that when you buy it, it will work right out of the box. At least that has become my expectation.

Nah that's just marketing fluff. In reality it was Steve Job's will alone that made Apple "just work."

 

[jonnyb098]

Attention people. Unless you want a damn cellular plan for your watch, then the watch has to be tethered to the iPhone. Not to mention fitting the radios in the watch. If you want to blame anyone blame the scum bags on Wall Street threatening Apple doom if they don't release a new product. So yes.....the watch launched too early. Everyone is blaming all the wrong people for all the wrong reasons.

 

[Mobster1983]

I do agree that it is slightly annoying to have to wait several seconds to get a glance from apps on the Apple Watch. However, as others have said, I am only having this issue with third party apps as they pull new information from the phone.

I am sure this will be solved as developers get their hands on the watches and can make their apps update more efficiently.

 

[bunnicula]

Are you expecting the same relative speed and snappiness of a newer iPhone or iPad model? Not gonna happen. It's as if you're making up being the owner of all of those previously mentioned products, because if you had, you'd remember how slow they were when they first came out.

I've been imagining during this whole launch the degree of panic some of the posters in this forum would've had over their iPhone taking 48 hours to activate.

Because that's exactly what happened to mine in 2007. My son bought one and his activated immediately. Mine took 2 days.

It was a pain. But, it finally activated, then I got to enjoy it overheating and the battery draining like crazy until the software update that made it overheat more often and then there was that time that they recalled all the wall chargers because they might catch fire. I think it finally started to work really well after a few months, but there were pretty much no apps and it got confused when I had to take a call and was on another one. Hehehe... Remember that?

Ahh... good times.



It was really fun. And I think the Watch is fun, too.

It's interesting to observe a product from its initial incarnation into what it has/will become.

 

[Lucifer666]

Maybe it's the whole secrecy thing that has produced a dearth of 3rd party apps, and it's going to take a while.

The developers will need to be humiliated a bit for them to get on it, (which is always fun anyway, right?

 

[The Doctor11]

Oh yeah I agree. Trying to use a third party app is pretty much a joke. I only use trivia crack and some times USA Today. USA Today had quite the load time though.