Apple Watch Hands-On
by Ryan Smith on March 9, 2015 6:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Wearables
- Apple
- Mobile
- iOS
- Apple Watch
By far the highlight of Apple’s Spring Forward event was the Apple Watch. Though announced back in September, Apple has not allowed any hands-on time with the device until now. So along with finding out the full launch details today, this is the press’s first chance to actually try out what’s the first new product line from Apple in the last half-decade.
As a quick reminder, Apple is selling the watch in 2 sizes, 3 styles per size. The 38mm and 42mm sizes are essentially men’s and women’s sizes, with the 42mm carrying a general price premium of $50; and while Apple doesn’t officially mention it, we know from previous leaks of their developer guidelines that the watches have different resolutions, with the 38mm coming in at 272x340, and the 42mm at 312x390. Meanwhile the 3 oddly named styles of the watch are the entry level Apple Watch Sport, the mid-level suffix-less Apple Watch, and the luxury Apple Watch Edition. Each version of the watch moves up in material, from brushed aluminum, to polished stainless steel, to 18kt gold.
Having a chance to try the Sport edition, I’m still not entirely sure what to make of it. The Apple Watch is essentially a wrist-mounted extension for your iPhone plus a sensor suite. That gives it a lot of flexibility – Apple’s still waiting to see what developers can do with it – but it’s also clearly a first-gen Apple product looking to find its place in the world. Apple has some ideas, but long term it’s going to be developers that make or break it and they are keenly aware of that.
In-hand (or rather on-wrist), the size feels right, at least for someone used to wearing a sizable sports watch in the first place. Though the Sport bands Apple had on-hand did not come in a size-Ryan. Interacting with it is definitely going to be a learned art; the only physical controls are the side button and the crown, so most interaction comes from touch interactions with a fairly small screen. The Apple Watch combines traditional touch gestures with pressure gestures from their new Force Touch technology, so interactions can come from swipes or touches of various pressure.
For today’s hands-on, the apps themselves are more proof of concept than real-world, as they were only setup to run through Apple’s demo material. The Watch offers an interesting selection of apps iPhone-tethered apps, shifting from a second screen for you iPhone to running scaled down versions of iPhone apps. Notifications, emails, etc can all be accessed from the Watch for communication purposes. You can also make calls from the watch, though in the admittedly crowded demo room it seemed to be a poor idea. Other apps included scaled down versions of Uber, and a scaled down version of iTunes for playing music through the Watch.
The other half of the Watch’s applications are focused on “native” functionality. This includes the actual watch face application – selectable and further customizable faces/skins of course – and applications that take advantage of the Watch’s sensor suite. The bulk of the sensor apps focus on fitness in one way or another, and this I suspect is largely due to the fact that the most “novel” sensor on the Watch is the heartrate monitor (otherwise accel/gyro are already on the iPhone). Fitbit, MS Band, and other fitness tracker users should have a good feel for what to do with this, while new users will take some guidance. Though since the interface is almost entirely iconographic, there will be a learning curve for everyone just to learn what the various icons mean and do.
The Watch appears to be running a heavily scaled down version of iOS, and in terms of performance it’s perhaps not surprising that performance feels like it’s yearning for a full Apple A-class SoC at times. Apps other than the clock – which is essentially part of the home screen – have a short but distinct loading time. Once you’re in an app most move smoothly as you’d expect, though flipping through one of the Apple fitness applications saw noticeable stuttering. Whether the load times and stuttering I saw is a limit of the SoC or the NAND I’m unsure, though as this is a pre-release device it’s entirely likely that Apple still has some performance tuning to go. What we’re seeing right now is generally going to be performant enough, but it’s not iPhone 6 level smoothness.
The million dollar (well, $10K+) question right now is this: is it worth it? That’s a question I don’t think a hands-on test in a closed environment can answer. I think it’s going to be a geek product before it goes mainstream – and this has been the case for Apple’s previous mobile products as well – as the novelty is certainly going to help get it off the ground. Whether such a watch is useful as opposed to just taking your iPhone out of your pocket is another matter; more than a few people I know gave up watches because their phone was convenient enough for a time piece, so getting them to buy back into watches is not a given, particularly since the Watch only has very limited functionality without an iPhone by its side to provide it with data (locally you have the sensor based applications, but not much more). Which isn’t to say that I’m for or again the Watch right now, only that I would need to test it at my own pace to figure out if and where it can fit into my life.
Anyhow, the Apple Watch hits retail on April 24th. So we’ll be back next month with a more comprehensive look at Apple’s latest foray into mobile.
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Nintendo Maniac 64 - Wednesday, March 11, 2015 - link
I'm viewing this on my good old Trinitron CRT and looking at the images it would seem that the rumors were correct about this using an LG OLED display, because those black levels are fantastic!RamyaS - Thursday, March 12, 2015 - link
Many apps were embedded in it.It made a hands on impression.There is also app fro health ,...etcAnd also various models in it <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUvH32_aUBw"&... Watch Models</a>
Morawka - Thursday, March 12, 2015 - link
Need video guys. your a pretty big site, need to record video of the hands on videosApple_iPhone_Service - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
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Brakken - Friday, June 5, 2015 - link
One of the Job's Mob bought a useless iWatch...Well, actually, I'm not a member of any 'Mob'. I loved digital watches when they first came out. This Apple Watch is the same kind of thing - except that it actually has extensive real-world uses for convenience. Much like having a mobile phone with pinch-to-zoom, a software keyboard, access to the full Internet, and extensive third-party and accessory support.
I was deluded by the hype around Android ICS and went for the first one available. Two weeks later I dumped the security-free, update-free, quality-free, Android freeware and got the iPhone 5. Considering that some spend INXS of $400 a weekend on partying and alcohol, I'm really not sure what the price-angst is actually about.
Especially when compared with the hideous, glitchy, ugly and under-powered, under-engineered junk competitors are offering as 'smart' watches.
Too bad a bunch of people are blinded by emotionality when looking at products that advance the state of the art rather than the products that are dumpted on the market with no resale value, no functionality beyond a PDA from 2002, and no design aesthetic at all.
As soon as LG or Sony releases a smartwatch that has a five-year lifespan, good resale value after that five years, and is supported by both third-party developers and regular updates, I will change my mind.
hitek1 - Tuesday, July 21, 2015 - link
I think this is the best device apple as ever created works so good does what I want it to do I am not an apple fan boy I live in the uk but Apple tech just works so much better than android/windows