Ok... This thing is awesome...

[KPOM]

Ok for all of you who is saying that it saves you checking the phone. How are you doing this? Because with my watch, when a mail notification comes in I can only dismiss it. And then later I have to go to the phone to mark it as read. Super annoying.

Often times I delete it from the watch.

 

[BeckyG]

Did you actually does all that or you just tell us theoretically? I read that some people are having problem with bluetooth headphone when exercising and it doesn't give me much confidence.

I have exercised three times with bluetooth headphones (Samsung Circle Gear) since I received my watch on Friday. No problems at all, and I agree with the thread starter that the convenience of not being connected to my phone around the gym is quite freeing. (My gym is very small, so perhaps the continuous close range made for the quality bluetooth connection?)

 

[Kovich]

Am very happy with my watch but have noticed the following:

It and the iPhone together are not good at working out which weather to display in a complication so I often get a blank where the weather is supposed to be on the watch face: even though the glance does show the weather

It is true that the third party apps can be slow and laggy. Is hard to work out what factors drive their being so as at other times the response time is a little slow but bearable.

I can't work out how to use the Activity app and this should be easy. Why is "walking to work" posted as exercise and not movement. How can I possibly have had 6 hours of standing so far today.

No issues with battery life though.

 

[cardfan]

I like it too. Some things more and some things less than the OP. I'm not big on measuring health stuff but do work out. Plus that doesn't make much sense to me anyways on what it does monitor or if its even accurate. Maybe I just need educated more on it.

Is it 700+ worth (plus the time to maintain the watch, charge it, etc) me liking it is the question. No doubt the discreet notifications is compelling. I'll see how good it works out with some normal work days coming up.

 

[thekeyring]

I can't work out how to use the Activity app and this should be easy. Why is "walking to work" posted as exercise and not movement. How can I possibly have had 6 hours of standing so far today.

Don't have a Watch, so sorry if this is unhelpful, but...

Exercise is considered a "brisk walk and above" on the Apple Watch. So your walk to work counts as exercise, which is great! Much cheaper than paying for public transport and paying for a gym membership on top of that.

Also, does the 6 hours refers to 6 separate hours in which you've stood for 1 minute?

 

[dotnet]

I can't work out how to use the Activity app and this should be easy. Why is "walking to work" posted as exercise and not movement. How can I possibly have had 6 hours of standing so far today.

Ah, you skipped too quickly through those four or five intro screens that were shown when you first started the app. No problem, you can relive this moment by watching the Activity guided tour

 

[matrix07]

I have exercised three times with bluetooth headphones (Samsung Circle Gear) since I received my watch on Friday. No problems at all, and I agree with the thread starter that the convenience of not being connected to my phone around the gym is quite freeing. (My gym is very small, so perhaps the continuous close range made for the quality bluetooth connection?)

Thanks.

 

[RayDonovan]

I feel the same way but hey, what do I know? Isn't it cool to hate on Apple products these days or is that just in these forums?

It seems to be the cool thing to do from what I've seen on Facebook. Mostly from people in undeveloped countries with bad spelling. Look at ANY verge article they post on Facebook. It's ridiculous.

I really cannot grasp why people would even go to so much effort.

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So picked of SS with white band and been using it for a couple days now and I gotta say, it truly has "changed my life."

Ok, so now to give some clarity on the above grandiose statement: it's a lot of minor things that add up.

1. First and one of the best, it reduces anyone's "douchebag" level by -10 points as having the watch give give you flick-of-the-wrist glances of all incoming notifications allows you to mentally filter things out 300% faster than pulling my phone out (not to mention the side effect of now reducing my chances of dropping it) just to check and see if it's something that needs my immediate attention (I'm a small business owner in advertising and am bombarded with both relevant and irrelevant information all day). And the gesture of checking your watch in public has been socially acceptable for 100+ years. A train conductor could be yelling "all aboard" WHILE flipping open his pocket watch to check the time as people loaded on. It's much less off-putting than a couple in a restaurant with both their noses 3" from a phone. Even if this thing helps with 5% of those instances in society I'll take it.

2. The activity app is VERY motivating. I love being reminded to stand and stretch every hour with a simple tap on the wrist and calm tone. Additionally, setting goals and constantly see them in a complication at bottom of screen when checking time is a great reminder to take the steps. Finally, I don't know if they did this on purpose but an "open" circle when you haven't reached your goals is VERY motivating. And by motivating, I mean in an irritating way like someone stopped the microwave with 2 seconds on it and it's been flashing for the past 20 minutes and you can see it out of the corner of your eye while at your desk at work. You just want to get up, walk over and hit the clear button. In the same way, you wanna walk those extra steps to close that circle.

3. Apps will become more fleshed out and native once WWDC happens and they open the API's up, but as it stands, it's super nice to be at the gym and leave my phone in my bag and workout with just Bluetooth headphones without messing with strapping a 6" piece of toast to my arm and twisting it around everytime I get a text or want to search for a song. I can simply run completely wirelessly and easily take calls, respond to texts or tell Siri to "play Dean Martin" and it starts streaming from iTunes Match. (Side note, the watch music glance controller works with streaming spotify too somehow, so skipping, pausing etc works. Kinda nice until proper app comes out). But all to say, using my watch as Apple TV remote while cooking in kitchen is awesome, checking weather or chance of rain in the coming hours, or searching for a spark plug on Amazon with my voice while in garage is awesome. I can't wait to see what developers do with this thing.

4. Saves tons of phone battery for me. I know some people are complaining of less battery because of Bluetooth drains, but I'm gaining a lot of life cuz I'm just not messing with my phone very much. Not sure how this is for everyone else tho.

5. Style: so this will be different for everyone but I've had a blast creating a few different watch face "presets" I switch between depending on what I'm doing. When I'm at work I have lots of complications up with a digital time readout for maximum efficiency. After work though I change it to a minimal watch face with traditional dial. This, combined with fave colors and band colors to match your wardrobe has been fun and gives this particular smart watch one of the best lifestyle matching and taste options.

All to say, I've definitely been enjoying this thing a lot and all the conveniences have changed how my last two days have been in small, but meaningfully convenient ways, and I'm looking forward to see where it goes...

Commence "cool story bro" comments in 3...2...1...

Nice review. This at least gets us who are still waiting on our watch a bit more excitement

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I think you're going to be surprised. Looking at one's watch is a universal sign for "I'd rather be somewhere else" or "This is boring, how long has it been?" It is pretty rude in certain circumstances, while pulling out your phone is seen as productivity. Your company may think you should be paying more attention to them, but at least on your phone you are obviously checking on a text message or phone call or something. It'll take a while for people to get used to the fact that a watch can have the exact same meaning.

Just try not to yawn while you're doing it too lol

 

[brock2621]

I like it too. Some things more and some things less than the OP. I'm not big on measuring health stuff but do work out. Plus that doesn't make much sense to me anyways on what it does monitor or if its even accurate. Maybe I just need educated more on it.

Is it 700+ worth (plus the time to maintain the watch, charge it, etc) me liking it is the question. No doubt the discreet notifications is compelling. I'll see how good it works out with some normal work days coming up.

I definitely went with the $700 option because of the sapphire and I knew I'd be hitting it accidentally against stuff but technically the barrier of entry for the exact same functionality is $400, making all the aforementioned conveniences more accessible.