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WatchOS 2/iOS 9 support for multiple watches?
- Thread starter Finiksa
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It wasn't mentioned in the keynote. Somehow I doubt it, but I don't have two watches to test it to be sure.
I just use two phones. I do the same with my photo libraries, use two MBPs, one for each phone.
I also keep them in two separate houses.
I also keep them in two separate houses.
I just upgraded to iOS 9 and watchOS 2 and there doesn't seem to be any way to pair a second watch. Looks like using a second phone is the only easy solution but I can't be bothered dealing with two phones. Looks like no new watch purchase for me.
i'm not sure why apple haven't done this already, to be honest, but I can imagine they will eventually. Perhaps they think that encouraging people to get 2 or 3 different ones takes away from being "their most personal device ever" when you can leave one or more on the side at home? (maybe they're hedging their bets for now, in case they work out how to do a round one the right way? if there's something apple hasn't perfected yet, they'd rather you think its a crap idea and sell you on it later, than rush out something they messed up, IMO)
anyway... i could see it working if you kept them all on charge (or at least charged up today's and tomorrows choices before bed?) and perhaps they're waiting to see if leaving one on the charger without taking it off would diminish battery life greatly?
anyway, imagine this:
watches are all on charge overnight (on the side, or wherever). phone is plugged in. all is kept synced to the phone while i sleep. (if a watch hasn't been used for a few days, maybe there's some photos to add, playlists to sync, workout data to sync over etc etc).
I wake up and choose my watch. I put it on my wrist. Wrist detection tells the phone I've put on my space black today. Phone unlocked with touch id, and so the space black on my wrist is active for the day. other watches sit at home, idle.
I wear it for the day, but that night I really want to wear my milanese loop. I drop my SB watch on the charger. Pick up the SS. The watch going on the charger tells the phone it MAY become inactive (because I may decide to put that back on after charging, no sense disconnecting); the SS going on my wrist tells the phone, time to activate me! Watch is 100% charged, so doesn't mind a little syncing on my wrist of the important things (activity, mostly - other things as above could have updated during the day over wifi anyway?)
And... repeat.
I think post os2 and the watch becoming more independent, this kind of thing really should be possible. What would happen if someone else put on your spare watch? Not sure, maybe a popup telling them your other watch is already active and flipping it into power reserve mode, so it just tells the time? (Great if you want to let your kid feel important by wearing your apple watch, I guess. From what i've seen, that'd definitely get used out here in China)
thoughts?
anyway... i could see it working if you kept them all on charge (or at least charged up today's and tomorrows choices before bed?) and perhaps they're waiting to see if leaving one on the charger without taking it off would diminish battery life greatly?
anyway, imagine this:
watches are all on charge overnight (on the side, or wherever). phone is plugged in. all is kept synced to the phone while i sleep. (if a watch hasn't been used for a few days, maybe there's some photos to add, playlists to sync, workout data to sync over etc etc).
I wake up and choose my watch. I put it on my wrist. Wrist detection tells the phone I've put on my space black today. Phone unlocked with touch id, and so the space black on my wrist is active for the day. other watches sit at home, idle.
I wear it for the day, but that night I really want to wear my milanese loop. I drop my SB watch on the charger. Pick up the SS. The watch going on the charger tells the phone it MAY become inactive (because I may decide to put that back on after charging, no sense disconnecting); the SS going on my wrist tells the phone, time to activate me! Watch is 100% charged, so doesn't mind a little syncing on my wrist of the important things (activity, mostly - other things as above could have updated during the day over wifi anyway?)
And... repeat.
I think post os2 and the watch becoming more independent, this kind of thing really should be possible. What would happen if someone else put on your spare watch? Not sure, maybe a popup telling them your other watch is already active and flipping it into power reserve mode, so it just tells the time? (Great if you want to let your kid feel important by wearing your apple watch, I guess. From what i've seen, that'd definitely get used out here in China)
thoughts?
What an oversight by Apple, but I guess there's still some problems they can't find a way to solve yet.
I just received my Gold 42MM Sport. I unpaired my Space Gray 42 MM Sport from my primary iPhone and then paired the gold. Was able to have Gold setup from the backup of Space Gray. Everything transferred over, even my Activity rings. Then I took my Space Gray and paired it with my secondary iPhone and restored that from the last backup on that device. Was a relatively simple process and don't really see any inconvenience switching the watches between the phones. Not ideal, but it could be worse.
How long did the restore take? The problem for me is that I'd be wanting to do it at least once a day.
Seems like a lot of work, just so you can have two of them. Apple products, at least the phones and watches are designed to be single usage products, that is they expect the consumer to only own a single watch and/or a single phone. The OS isn't designed to multiple watches and while there may be work arounds, I think those work arounds may get old over time.
i disagree that it's designed to be "only one of everything". the products are designed top down - that shouldn't preclude someone from having two watches.
think about ipods (pre ios) - they were an extension of your single music library. you could have more than one ipod synced to that library, but you couldn't sync a single ipod to more than one library.
icloud photo library, apple music are more recent example - access your photo library on as many devices as you want... but only one photo library at a time per device. actually, icloud in general... i can turn it on as many devices as i want, but switching would be a pain.
the watch would clearly have difficulties syncing up to two or more phones. but i can't see why two watches couldn't sync to one iphone, even if they had to be essentially identical (ie, no support for having different apps installed or notification preferences and such)
I think you will find that you will need to setup Apple Pay each time you switch between your two watches. If not, I like to know because I would like to purchase a second watch myself. Having to setup Apple Pay every time is one of the reasons I have not yet purchased a second watch.
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