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Open Source Smartwatch

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Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#91

Post by muststopmyths »

pistoriusp wrote: post #14
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Check out the Amazfit Bip (S) watch. Cheap, sleek, waterproof, gorilla glass always-on display, battery lasts a month, does GPS tracking without smartphone connection and you can sync it via Gadgetbridge to keep all your data private without any account/cloud services.

Unfortunately they no longer make them. Or at least I could not find any to be bought.

Timex makes a $120 GPS Ironman R300. It's apparently a Huami/Amazfit backend.

I've been very pleased with it. Great battery life, even with GPS while running. I found it comparable to Garmins in that respect.

The chunky looks could turn people off, but I prefer ugly retro-looking stuff :)

Edit: here is DC rainmaker's review https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2020/06/timex-r300-gps-smartwatc...

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#92

Post by ryukafalz »

krzyk wrote: post #67

Lack of NFC :( But probably even if it had it it wouldn't work with Google/Apple Pay, for me payments using my watch would be the best application of "smart" together with notifications.

This is the frustrating thing about integrating with payment systems, it's far out of reach for a FOSS project like this.

Cryptocurrencies are better in that regard but few businesses accept cryptocurrencies, GNU Taler would also be better but I think that requires banks to be on board with it which they're also unlikely to do.

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#93

Post by ryukafalz »

BlueTemplar wrote: post #64
jbj wrote: post #16

After using a pebble time round since it came on the market, I really value the 4 physical buttons (back) on the left vs (up/select/down) on the right. I have never used a watch with a touch screen function, but I read oppinions of the watches made by fitbit after they aquired pebble, that it was a mix of touch screen and buttons. letting this have both technologies while being open source leaves a lot of room for de…

Weirdly enough, I prefer the more "toy-like" Pebble buttons to the more "solid-looking" Pebble Time ones : they are easier to find without looking, and easier to press.

Having had both, the Pebble buttons got a bit gummy over time whereas the Pebble Time buttons are still very solid. The latter seem more well put-together, IMO.

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#94

Post by kken »

Ok, just to make sure I understand this correctly.

- This is basically a commercial smartwach (the Colmi P8) that is based on a well documented SOC, the nordic nRF52832

- The open source version comes with an enclosure that is not glued shut, so that it is easy to access testpoints on the pcb.

- Development is done by accessing the nRF51 SWD interface with pogo pins or similar. The programming interface can be a standard SWD interface such as an STLink clone

Ok, sounds easy enough. It should be possible to just buy one of those smartwatches and crack them open? But OTOH the developer version is not much more expensive.

The main question is now: What software to run on it, that goes beyond a few experiments? Is there any kind of open source smartwatch OS that would run on this?

Edit: Corrected typo, of course I meant SWD interface, not SWM. (SWM or rather SWIM is for STM8)

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#95

Post by BlueTemplar »

ryukafalz wrote: post #93
BlueTemplar wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weirdly enough, I prefer the more "toy-like" Pebble buttons to the more "solid-looking" Pebble Time ones : they are easier to find without looking, and easier to press.

Having had both, the Pebble buttons got a bit gummy over time whereas the Pebble Time buttons are still very solid. The latter seem more well put-together, IMO.

Yeah, I guess that was one reason for the change…

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#96

Post by earthscienceman »

vinay427 wrote: post #82
asutekku wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree. GPS is primarily the reason why i got a smartwatch. It’s so much better now that i don’t have to carry my phone with me when i cycle or run.

Bluetooth with onboard music (on some newer fitness watches) really sealed the deal for me. After going through a Pebble some years ago, I realized that I didn't actually care about the "smart" features as long as my next watch had excellent GPS performance, Spotify or some other music platform, and an always-on display to tell the time.

Any recommendations? I would love a watch that was dumb as a brick but played music and had gps. Bonus points if it is extremely simple.

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#97

Post by jarnix »

kken wrote: post #94

Ok, just to make sure I understand this correctly. - This is basically a commercial smartwach (the Colmi P8) that is based on a well documented SOC, the nordic nRF52832 - The open source version comes with an enclosure that is not glued shut, so that it is easy to access testpoints on the pcb. - Development is done by accessing the nRF51 SWD interface with pogo pins or similar. The programming interface can be a stan…

:) not sure it's up to anybody to do it. To me "nRF51 SWM interface with pogo pins" means absolutely nothing, same for nRF52832 or STLink.

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#98

Post by wongarsu »

warrenmiller wrote: post #61
tinus_hn wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looks to be only only $25 which makes it a nice plaything. I think the storage is rather limited at 4mb though.

I thought it was a typo for GB maybe?!

4MB isn't that unusual in embedded devices. After all you aren't storing audio and video, at most a couple pictures for a 220x220px display.

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#99

Post by tguvot »

earthscienceman wrote: post #96
vinay427 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bluetooth with onboard music (on some newer fitness watches) really sealed the deal for me. After going through a Pebble some years ago, I realized that I didn't actually care about the "smart" features as long as my next watch had excellent GPS performance, Spotify or some other music platform, and an always-on display to tell the time.

Any recommendations? I would love a watch that was dumb as a brick but played music and had gps. Bonus points if it is extremely simple.

a variety of garmin watches have gps, built-in maps and music

Re: Open Source Smartwatch

#100

Post by deadw3ight »

donpdonp wrote: post #65

I have a pinetime and the form factor is great (until I lost the back plate, next one will be sealed). All the opensource activity around the watch is also great. The biggest drawback to me is only 64k of ram. Thats a Commodore64's worth of ram. The 240x240 screen is 57kbytes, it must have its own display ram. Also NordicSemi never seemed to be particularly opensource friendly. I'm hoping for a future RISCV edition o…

Yeah, the original Apple watch had like half a GB, and a raspberry pi zero ($5 price) has the same. Couldn't they have fit that within both budget and size?
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