[scblock]

This rant has nothing of value in it. Don't waste your time reading it. It tries to claim the only smartwatch that's any good is the Apple Watch. When the author tries to address the obvious counter of Garmin's smart watch products the only product discussed is a strawman version of the large and expensive Fenix 8, which leads me to believe they are ignorant of the broad smart watch lineup which includes things like the Vivoactive and Venu, which are absolutely smart watches first and fitness devices second (so is the Fenix 8, in reality).

And of course the Apple watch only syncs with Apple devices. So also implied is iPhone or don't bother.

Don't bother with this blog post.

[gruturo]

I wouldn't judge it so harshly. The Garmin side is indeed a wide gaping hole in the story, and I consider them actually well worth bothering with - but a lot of the considerations are interesting and resonate with me. The condemnation of google, how they betrayed the trust of consumers and partners, their fleeting, unstable attention, the damage it caused to companies and to trust in the product, is spot on.

I would have maybe added a mention of the extremely cheap watches (like an Amazfit I got for 49 EUR before I received an AW Ultra as a gift - but Xiaomi/Redmi, Huawei, even Samsung have stuff in that range) as they fit the described "What a Smartwatch Actually Does" use case perfectly at an amazing bargain price. If I really don't need much beyond telling time, showing notifications and maybe counting my steps, anything above 30EUR is going to be a really hard sell. We can add 20 EUR extra budget for a decent tracking of sports and fitness functionality. And the point is that, despite not admitting it even to themselves, really few people actually truly need something beyond these core functions which have stayed the same for a decade. As others observed in the past, the target user of an Apple Watch is someone who imagines themselves active and needing all the fancy stuff, but in reality doesn't.

I really do like my Ultra, and actually use the payment and scuba diving (as a backup) which go beyond the bare basics and set it aside from most competitors, whether cheap or not, but the reality is that I'd never have bought it myself. And I have no idea how the battery life is found acceptable by anyone - it's a joke. I can't leave 3 days without bringing its dedicated charger. One night out of every 3, my sleep quality isn't tracked as it's charging on the nightstand. Anything with less than 10 days (and I'm being generous) is - or should be - ashaming IMHO. Especially as a charging cycle every max 3 days means the nonremovable battery will turn them into e-waste within 6 years. Disgraceful.

[NoPicklez]

My gripe was with the closed eco-system argument against Garmin, but then mentioned about how Apple's also closed eco-system was a good thing because of xyz.

But yet you'll get the same watch experience with Garmin regardless of whether you have an iPhone or a Samsung or Google phone.

Additionally, I agree you can't talk about the obvious merits of another watch brand and simply package it up as a different product that can't be compared to Apple because Apple doesn't have a comparable feature set.

[SpecialistK]

Even if there were no other smartwatches in existence and it was iPhone + Apple Watch or Android + a Casio F91w, I would still take the Casio.

The iPhone experience is simply too inferior [for me / my uses] that even if I did encounter the flaws in Samsung watches (it tells me I have a notification and tracks my exercise), it's an accessory compared to a whole platform I don't care for.

[g8oz]

I've been very impressed with the Garmin vivoactive

[joezydeco]

"Google has had a decade, which is an eternity in consumer technology and roughly nine years longer than Google has ever sustained attention on anything that didn't directly monetise your search history"

I kind of liked that part. PREACH!