The Pebble watch

The Pebble watch

Intro

Summer eventually came (and went). The weather remains sunny and hot (as it should always be - if am to be asked) and people still go to the beach. And what can you see there? Well apart from water (obviously) and maybe sand, you may also see pebbles. The Pebble watch is what i am going to present to you today. And just like that, the worst ever intro in the history of (notjust) hi tech blogs was concluded.Okay people, you (most probably) may (not) have already read my first post ever that summarized my smartwatch adventures. In that particular post i have written about the Pebble watch: "Let here dully be noted that I would have bought a Pebble (Pebble) if there was one to buy, but come on people: Who wants to wait for six months in order to get one? Since it does nothing more than the Strata, to the best of my knowledge. Apart from the obvious hype, of course.  And okay it is infinitely more presentable / less embarrassing . One little comment here to Pebble's PR people: Please do not confuse people into thinking they are getting an e-ink screen. Thank you."First of all i did find a Pebble on ebay and bought it. The price was not a steal, but the seller was not asking for my kidney either. Or for a way to make enough money for a trip to the moon and back just by selling watches (that he had had the insight to back on kickstarter for the sole purpose of reselling at a later time with a premium price) on ebay. First class trip, that is. What i mean is there are a lot of ebay  UK listings for Pebbles that are asking for amounts of 250 EUR and above for an item that costs 150 USD if you could find one to buy. Which leads my train of thought to the fact that the Pebble kickstarter phenomenon (10 mil USD in backing while all they were asking for was a paltry 200 k if i am not mistaken) was a good thing, but also a bad thing. A good thing  for the company and the whole industry (too much hype is most times a big asset), but also a bad thing for the tens of thousands of backers and pre orderers (early adopters in general) who are queued and patiently (or not so much) waiting for their Pebble to be manufactured and then sent over.

The box

The box is minimalistic, absolutely compatible with the Apple way of environmental thinking (reducing cost, that is). The paper zipper is a good idea that provides a rather intimate moment with your beloved gadget. It actually offers a way to bond with the watch before you even have it in your hands. Kind of like unzipping the dress of your singificant other half. Please bear in mind that the Pebble zip if unzipped cannot be zipped back. Get it? All the box contains is the watch itself and the charging/sync cable, minus charger of course. Oh and a sign that tells you to log onto the website. Simple as that.

The watch

The watch is small, thin and light by smartwatch standards. You really cannot appreciate this if you have not tried to put up with the i'mwatch on your wrist for a whole working day (after that you would most probably have to recharge...). Trust me on this one. It feels a little cheap on the eye (the black one, at least) but manages to maintain a fairly good build quality. Considering the fact that the company did not manufacture anything before the successful kickstarter campaign, this means a lot. We can only hope for the best for the next Pebble iteration. The (ala Macbok) magnetic charging clip is a wonderful idea. If Pebble team ever reads this, please congratulate the person who thought about it. It adds a touch of class, as well as providing added value. A practical and simultaneously elegant solution!

The screen

The Pebble team used to call the screen an e-paper screen which confused people into thinking it was of the e-ink variety. It is not. It is an LCD which is perfectly readable in the brightest sunlight (you should visit the greek islands and especially the cyclades if you really need to redefine sunlight) and it also boasts a backlight which is cool and practical. The resolution is 144 by 168 pixels and it is enough for the 1.26 inch screen. Of course it is grayscale and of course it is always on (if you have used the i'm watch you may know what i am talking about...).

The strap

The strap is an interchangeable one with a widh of exactly 22mm. The most common width if am not mistaken. The key word here is interchangeable. The default provided strap certainly is uninspiring for lack of a better word. Let's just say that the strap is quite possibly the single most average (average has a negative meaning here) uhhmmm strap ever created. It is just a strap. Nothing more, nothing less. No wonder there is a whole bunch of people desperately seeking alternatives (just look at the size of this thread!). I can live with it though, at least for the time being.

Functionality

I have the pleasure to inform you that this smartwatch works quite well with both iOS and android smartphones. The basic functionality is there in both cases. CLI, SMS, notifications, runkeeper integration is there. Did imention it shows the time? Well, it does. In fact it can do just that in about every conceivable way through watchfaces. Watchfaces (official or not) change the way the watch performs it's primary (that was a joke) objective which is of course showing the time. (You may laugh now.)

Watchfaces - Watchapps

Okay the good things start here. You want simple and elegant, you got it. You want real watch replicas, you got it. You want "get through with your phd before you even start trying deciphering the time", you got it. You want to create your own watchface on your PC or your Android phone, even featuring your own face, you got it. You want some added value on your smartwatch, you certainly got it. There are tons of watchfaces and watchapps that support 2-way communication with the phone, providing a quick and easy way to have vital info regarding your unread SMS/Calls/Emails/Battery status (among other things) available at a glance. You want to control the music player and see the album artwork on the tiny watch screen, you got it. You want the watch to vibrate half a minute after you forgot your 700 euro smartphone in the back seat of the cab that just achieved warp speed 9.6, you got it. You want to press a watch button to wirelessly release the shutter of your iPhone camera and even see the photo it took (Android only) in glorious grainy Black & White, you got it. You want to control your home lights, you got it.  You want boobs (shaking, that is), you GOT it!!!

Notifications

If you use it with an Android phone you can have all types of notifications on the watch, as well as manual control over what you see and what you don’t. The same can be done on a jailbroken iphone (the person who created and freely offered BTNotificationEnabler Cydia app should be nominated Sir - long live Mr. Conrad Kramer). It also seems that iOS 7 (even without JB) will indeed push all notifications over BT as well. 

STATEMENT: Do you believe in miracles? If no, THEN GOTO STATEMENT. (If you just got stuck in an infinite loop, do yourself a favor and skip to the next paragraph or start believing.)

Sports apps

A dream has come true ladies and gents. You can use your smartphone to track your run and see vital real-time info on the watch. You cannot select what to see for the time being, but still it is a great feature for fitness buffs. Runkeeper integration is offered out of the box, but other solutions also exist, for runners as well as golfers and cyclists. This truly is the way to go. Since most people already carry their phones (while desperately trying to avoid a heart attack at a later –possibly more proper/convenient–  time by forcing themselves perform in the heart attack red zone) in order to listen to their year old (best case scenario) playlist they have grown sick off but never had had the time and appropriate mentality to actually decide to renew (cannot but justify their behavior though – who among us actually wants to battle the (iTunes) beast?) it, why not have their current speed available at a glance on their wrist? It is already being recorded, after all. My humble opinion is that the sports app dimension is something to be pursued by smartwatch manufacturers if they really want the whole wearable computing concept to eventually take off.

Water resistance/Endurance

The Pebble is so good you may even mistake it with a dumbwatch. It is 100% water resistant (this does not mean scuba diving of course – but you can swim in it or take a shower) as long as you do not press the buttons under water and that is the way all smartwatches in the future should be (hear that Samsung Galaxy Gear?).  Who needs a (hopefully) curved OLED screen when you have to take the watch off your hand every single time you wash your hands or the gods of rain send some uhhhhm rain? Regarding it’s endurance I cannot say it is rock solid, but “pebble solid” is still quite adequate. Okay, it is not a G-Schock that can withstand World Wars 3 and 4, but it can take some regular wear and tear without breaking apart. And that is good enough for me.

Battery life

The battery life tops out at about 15 days for me, but i do turn the watch off at night and when i am not wearing it. But i am heavy user since a lot of notifications are coming on the watch. I think it is safe to assume that a week of operation can be expected if you have it on your wrist (BT enabled) 24 7. One week happens to be the absolute minimum for a smartwatch before it crosses the line between "It's Sunday and i have nothing to do. Why not charge my smartwatch?" and "What do you mean your watch doesn't tell the time? Is it out of battery? AGAIN? WTF?".

The bad news

There is only one big issue with the Pebble watch. It does not support unicode character set, so bye bye notifications if your mother language is not English. Which is my case. There is a workaround for android phones but still the Pebble team HAVE TO solve that problem which severely handicaps the Pebble's functionality. 

Should you buy it?

This is a tough one to answer. My initial gut feeling is “Yes. Go ahead and buy it.” The problem is you still can’t find one to buy. The bestbuy stock was sold out before you could say “I desperately want to buy a Pebble and I am willing to drive for three hours in the wild in order to visit the most remote bestbuy store where the locals will hopefully not recognize it for what it is and buy the whole batch in order to resell at a premium on ebay…” Original backers may have received (I am not sure though) but the tens of thousands of preorders are not shipping yet. I for once have preordered on January 2013 and have still not had any news on this one! (UPDATE: According to this if i had preordered a black Pebble it should be on it's way but of course it was a white one...)So let’s assume you actually can lay your hands on the precious. Should you still go ahead and buy it? I am not that sure, folks. The Galaxy Gear release is imminent (IFA, September 4) and you must see it before you fork out the money for a new smartwatch. The iWatch still resides in rumorland but I have a hunch it is coming soon, real soon. My advice is that you wait at least until after the Apple event of September 10 (or whenever it will take place) so that to reach a decision after seeing the big picture.