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Ultra Owners - Are notification vibrations more noticeable than regular models?

PixelsMaster

PixelsMaster

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 11, 2016
148
412
Michigan
I’ve got a S4 and will likely upgrade if a new Ultra is released this Fall. Aside from the horrible battery life on mine, notifications are a huge disappointment. I leave my watch on silent 99% of the time but rarely notice notification vibrations (even calls sometimes).

Hoping someone that’s had a regular model in the past can comment on a more noticeable vibration with the Ultra.

I don’t know if I’m missing notifications simply because my body tunes it out or because it’s simply not strong enough. I also feel ‘phantom’ vibrations with no notification at times but that’s another topic…
 
From my experience, the vibrations are way more noticeable on titanium and aluminium watches than stainless steel. I currently have a SS S7 and an Ultra, and I can tell the difference in the strength of vibrations. It reminds me of the aluminium AW a lot

So the haptic engine is indeed the same, but as SS is a heavier material, vibrations feel lighter (from my experience)
 
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fwmireault said:
From my experience, the vibrations are way more noticeable on titanium and aluminium watches than stainless steel. I currently have a SS S7 and an Ultra, and I can tell the difference in the strength of vibrations. It reminds me of the aluminium AW a lot

So the haptic engine is indeed the same, but as SS is a heavier material, vibrations feel lighter (from my experience)
Click to expand...
I’ve got the aluminum model now. Disappointing, but good to know. Thanks! Maybe the Ultra 2 will have an upgrade.
 
I think Apple has deliberately made the notification vibration less noticeable / easier to ignore. Consider the vibration for the timer -- it's more prominent and keeps going until you turn it off, making it impossible to miss. I think the vibrations for turn-by-turn directions are also distinctive and hard to miss. I wish Apple would let us customize vibrations so that we can assign impossible to miss vibrations to particular notifications. But it's a difficult balance between prominent enough to notice but not so prominent it becomes annoying.
 
jamshandler said:
Have you tried turning haptics on to ’Prominent’? Although the trade off is more hit to battery life, which sounds like it isn’t great at this stage on your S4, OP.
Click to expand...
I also wonder, because it was absolutely no problem noticing the haptic vibration on my s4 with vibration strength set to Prominent. The haptic feedback in the user interface is/was (glass broken) actual stronger than my S7.
 
Feels roughly the same. I don't have a problem with the strength feeling underpowered, but I felt the same about my S7.
 
jamshandler said:
Have you tried turning haptics on to ’Prominent’? Although the trade off is more hit to battery life, which sounds like it isn’t great at this stage on your S4, OP.
Click to expand...
Significant1 said:
I also wonder, because it was absolutely no problem noticing the haptic vibration on my s4 with vibration strength set to Prominent. The haptic feedback in the user interface is/was (glass broken) actual stronger than my S7.
Click to expand...

Yeah, they've been on prominent since day one. My S4 still makes it through the working day. It might just be that I get so many notifications my mind just registers the sensation as 'background noise.'
 
PixelsMaster said:
Yeah, they've been on prominent since day one. My S4 still makes it through the working day. It might just be that I get so many notifications my mind just registers the sensation as 'background noise.'
Click to expand...
How tight/loose is your band? A wee bit tighter might help them be more noticeable. Just a thought.
 
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