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Intel shuts down group working on wearables and fitness trackers

arstechnica.com

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Re: Intel shuts down group working on wearables and fitness trackers

#2
> The Peak never truly competed with Fitbit devices, and it certainly didn't stand up to the Apple Watch when that device debuted in 2015.

I actually really liked my Peak, whose battery lasted nearly a week, and which had a reliable heart rate monitor. After the recall, I tried an Apple Watch (v1) and various other smartwatches. The Apple Watch was, for my purposes, inferior to the Peak in several ways: the battery life was very short, it had no HR monitor, and it was very expensive. In my experience, the Peak even pushed notifications from my iPhone more reliably than the Apple Watch.

To be sure, the Peak wasn't beautiful, but as a V1 it seemed like a product with legs.

disclosure: I received my Peak for free from Intel at their ICAP conference.

Re: Intel shuts down group working on wearables and fitness trackers

#3

> The Peak never truly competed with Fitbit devices, and it certainly didn't stand up to the Apple Watch when that device debuted in 2015. I actually really liked my Peak, whose battery lasted nearly a week, and which had a reliable heart rate monitor. After the recall, I tried an Apple Watch (v1) and various other smartwatches. The Apple Watch was, for my purposes, inferior to the Peak in several ways: the battery l…

Similar feelings about my Pebble Time. The Apple Watch throws away the battery life and replaces it with things I don't need. I don't have a heartrate monitor though, and they went out of business before the v2 could add it.

As far as the Apple Watch's heartrate monitoring is concerned, it definitely has one. Not only that, it's significantly more accurate than any other fitness tracker's.

http://www.mdpi.com/jpm/jpm-07-00003/article_deploy/html/ima...

http://www.mdpi.com/2075-4426/7/2/3/htm

Re: Intel shuts down group working on wearables and fitness trackers

#4

> The Peak never truly competed with Fitbit devices, and it certainly didn't stand up to the Apple Watch when that device debuted in 2015. I actually really liked my Peak, whose battery lasted nearly a week, and which had a reliable heart rate monitor. After the recall, I tried an Apple Watch (v1) and various other smartwatches. The Apple Watch was, for my purposes, inferior to the Peak in several ways: the battery l…

Similar feelings about my Pebble Time. The Apple Watch throws away the battery life and replaces it with things I don't need. I don't have a heartrate monitor though, and they went out of business before the v2 could add it. As far as the Apple Watch's heartrate monitoring is concerned, it definitely has one. Not only that, it's significantly more accurate than any other fitness tracker's. http://www.mdpi.com/jpm/jpm…

I actually ended up with the Pebble Time also, and excitedly pre-ordered the Time 2. I would have been willing to pay so much more for it, and I wish they'd just told their backers that either everyone could pay an extra $100 or it was gonna go bust. I imagine I'm not the only one who would pay Apple Watch prices for a Pebble Time 2.

I have no idea what I'll get when my current Pebble bites the dust. I'm not sure which is more likely: that Apple offer a watch with more than a couple days battery life, or that Fitbit actually integrate the Pebble tech (and reliability) into their devices. Sigh.

Re: Intel shuts down group working on wearables and fitness trackers

#5
The writing has been on the wall for a while. The blogger DCRainmaker has superb coverage of the fitness tracking industry, has covered Intel's moves in this space pretty thoroughly - in the case of Basis we knew this largely a year ago.

https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2016/08/tech-tidbits-basis-close...

I'm curious if this affects the Recon Jet? This was one of the more innovative things Intel's wearable teams were working on, basically Google Glass for sports.

https://www.reconinstruments.com/products/jet/

Re: Intel shuts down group working on wearables and fitness trackers

#6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar feelings about my Pebble Time. The Apple Watch throws away the battery life and replaces it with things I don't need. I don't have a heartrate monitor though, and they went out of business before the v2 could add it. As far as the Apple Watch's heartrate monitoring is concerned, it definitely has one. Not only that, it's significantly more accurate than any other fitness tracker's. http://www.mdpi.com/jpm/jpm…

I actually ended up with the Pebble Time also, and excitedly pre-ordered the Time 2. I would have been willing to pay so much more for it, and I wish they'd just told their backers that either everyone could pay an extra $100 or it was gonna go bust. I imagine I'm not the only one who would pay Apple Watch prices for a Pebble Time 2. I have no idea what I'll get when my current Pebble bites the dust. I'm not sure whi…

I was in the same boat - I ended up replacing my third Pebble with a Garmin Vivoactive HR. It seems to have fulfilled all of my old requirements (notifications, good battery, custom watch faces, 3rd party apps), and then added a few I didn't know I wanted (GPS fitness tracking, Heart Rate Monitor).

Re: Intel shuts down group working on wearables and fitness trackers

#9

> The Peak never truly competed with Fitbit devices, and it certainly didn't stand up to the Apple Watch when that device debuted in 2015. I actually really liked my Peak, whose battery lasted nearly a week, and which had a reliable heart rate monitor. After the recall, I tried an Apple Watch (v1) and various other smartwatches. The Apple Watch was, for my purposes, inferior to the Peak in several ways: the battery l…

Similar feelings about my Pebble Time. The Apple Watch throws away the battery life and replaces it with things I don't need. I don't have a heartrate monitor though, and they went out of business before the v2 could add it. As far as the Apple Watch's heartrate monitoring is concerned, it definitely has one. Not only that, it's significantly more accurate than any other fitness tracker's. http://www.mdpi.com/jpm/jpm…

"it's significantly more accurate than any other fitness tracker's"

More precisely, according to one study, compared to other devices including Fitbit's 2014 model, Surge, Apple Watch in workout mode was found to be more accurate.

You know Apple Watch was in workout mode for the study because outside of workout mode Apple Watch only measures heart rate when you're still, according to https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204666 ... note that in workout mode Apple Watch battery life is "up to 8 hours" according to https://www.apple.com/watch/battery.html

The study did not examine more recent Fitbit models (Blaze, Charge 2, Alta HR) and did not examine Apple Watch outside of workout mode.

Disclaimer: I work for Fitbit but don't speak for Fitbit.

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