DStatus Watch Face

Believe me, I love Apple and pretty much everything that is thought up by the incredibly intelligent people that run the company. Although there comes a point in time where I become sick of waiting for Apple to make a move, i.e. previously the Verizon iPhone and now the Apple Smartwatch, which they plan on integrating some sort of bio sensors into. While that’s all great and dandy, I would prefer to get my hands on one before I die of old age, so I got my hands on Pebble’s Smartwatch available both online and at Best Buy stores. From the perspective of a near-perfectionist, let’s see if this thing was really worth the $116 from Amazon!

Pebble’s Native Music App

I received the package in the mail about four to five days ago, and opening the package was pretty simple. Shrink wrap off, watch right on top. Assuming the center button on the right side of the watch acted as a power button, which it did, I had the watch up and running in seconds. With the iOS Pebble application already loaded up, after charging it up I was able to pair the watch with my phone in no more than half a minute and it was ready to go, notifications and all. The watch band fits my wrist perfectly even though my wrist is incredibly small. As a matter of fact, I’m using the second smallest notch on the strap! The watch itself is comfortable and non-intrusive, despite it’s strangely squarish shape and button placement. I haven’t once made an accidental button press, and I don’t see that happening in the future either. What’s especially nice is the ability to read the screen in direct sunlight. If anything, reading in direct sunlight is easier than reading in the dark with the back light. As a side note, the back light can be enabled by a flick of the wrist, or by pressing any of the buttons on either side of the watch.

Being that I’ve been an avid iPhone jailbreaker since iOS 1.0, I thought I’d take it a step further and download the Smartwatch+ app by Robert Hesse. The application is available in the App Store, but I got it from the Cydia Store for only $4.99. It had no issues immediately detecting my watch, and I went ahead and installed the Smartwatch+ application to my watch as well as the SmartStatus watch face (which I later deleted and got DStatus, a modified SmartStatus, pictured at the top).

What’s nice about the Smartwatch+ application is the ability to configure the three notification stacks at the bottom. I have the email client set to Gmail, messages set to BiteSMS, and Missed Calls set to the default iOS phone app (this can be changed through your phone). Simply enough, it will let you know when you have unread messages from any of the three applications indicated by the number within. The Smartwatch+ Pebble app also comes with some nifty things like a Bitcoin price checker, weather application, calendar viewer and more (click here for more info). Seriously though, enough about Smarwatch+. Let’s talk about the things I like, what I don’t like, and what could be improved in the Pebble Smartwatch.

Smartwatch+ Weather App

What’s immediately apparent about this watch is its ability to vibrate when you get any sort of notification from your phone. Prior to buying this watch, I’d forgotten about this feature that really makes the Pebble as functional as it is, because who would really want something as useful as a vibrate function replaced by some obnoxious blinking light? I even disabled the ‘Vibrate on Silent’ feature on my phone, which will minutely save battery on my phone. Regardless, all my notifications come through without a beat. My Snapchats, Instagram notifications, Facebook messages, SMS, emails… all of it! Although, if a piece of text is too long for your watch, the Pebble will shorten it just so you’ll get the general idea of what the text message is trying to say. You’re going to have to pull the phone out of your pocket to reply anyway, so I feel that this isn’t really a limitation to the watch. Also, when you have multiple missed notifications, it will let you scroll through them on your watch using the up and down buttons on the right side, and you can then dismiss them by using the center button.

Texts on the Pebble

Another cool feature about this watch is its screen. While it is only 144 x 168 pixels, it’s actually an e-paper display similar the ones you would find in the old Amazon Kindles. Unlike the Kindle, this screen refreshes at 30 FPS which makes the interface very smooth. If you find yourself complaining about the lack of a color display, you might want to turn your attention to the Pebble’s 5-7 day battery life. Since receiving the watch four days ago, I still haven’t charged it up. This is after installing and trying many watch faces, un-pairing and re-pairing the device, turning it on and off, and debugging the watch through Linux terminal. It’s a bunch of power in a nice little package… what more could you ask for?

Well, there are one or two things. A few hours ago, I had a little trouble with my watch, likely caused by my own faults to some extent. The watch kept disconnecting from my phone every few minutes, resulting in my watch to vibrating and pretty much annoying the hell out of me. I tried rebooting the watch, the phone, and re-pairing the device via Bluetooth, but nothing really did the trick. Thankfully, restoring to factory settings is easily achieved in the settings, and only takes about 20 seconds to do. After 10 minutes, I’d already re-installed all of my applications and watch faces. Why did this happen? I wish I could tell you that, although I truly was installing a bunch of stuff on my watch, so I probably messed something up down the roads.

Pebble’s Bluetooth Screen

Another thing I wanted to mention was the watch’s inability to clear a notification from the screen once it is read on the phone’s side. Originally I’d thought that this was due to restrictions in Apple’s SDK, but after speaking to a developer in the Pebble IRC, I’ve come to learn that the phone is sending data to the watch with such information but hasn’t really been implemented where as it could be made functional. Perhaps such a function will be implemented in the SDK later on, but right now it remains out of the range of functionality.

The last thing that has bothered me about the watch is, to my surprise, the charge cable. “How creative!” I thought, to implement magnets into their charging cable similar to that found in a MacBook. What they didn’t tell you is that the magnets aren’t inherently strong, so you have to make sure that the cable is properly aligned or it will fall off pretty easily. The three-hour charge was also a bit of a bother, but it lasts for 5-7 days after that so I mean, who cares?

Back Button and Charge Port

So what you’ve really been wanting to know is, was the purchase worth it? Personally I feel that it was money well spent, since the thing is attached to my wrist from the moment I wake up until the moment I fall asleep. The device is especially useful when I’m in class and can’t take my phone out of my pocket, but am curious about who sent me a text or email. Sure, this isn’t one of those electronics I’m actively excited about since a watch is used rather passively, but the watch is better on my wrist than not and I enjoy the little perks that come along with it. If I were to take the thing off my wrist for a week, I would probably say something along the lines of, “Damn, I wish I had my Pebble on me right now”. If you’ve got $150 to spend on one of these and what I’ve told you has appealed to you, go ahead and pick one up. I promise you won’t be disappointed.

If the widget below shows up, there’s some more images if you’re interested (most are repeated):