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Pixel Watch 5

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Re: Pixel Watch 5

#281

Post by benrutter »

Manfrednotfunny wrote: post #279
edent wrote: post #81

I overheard a conversation between someone on the Pixel Watch team and a woman I know. He was quizzing her at a party about what features she used - which were pretty much step counter and payment. He somewhat dismissively sneered, "Well, you're not exactly a power user, are you?" I'm trying to imagine what being a "power user" of a watch is like. Can anyone enlighten me? I think smart-watches are much like Alexa. Wh…

Im still giving myself the illusion that tracking my sleep is doing anything relevant. I sleep bad -> buy watch -> watch tells me I sleep bad -> win/win? In the gym, i use the timer. But is it worth it to carry a watch all the time, keep it charged etc. for a timer? I'm considering buying a timer for the gym. We just do'nt need a lot of tech in reality.

Yeah, I agree - I think smart watches haven't yet evolved out of just being a fun tech gadget. If you just want a timer, I'd recommend just getting a cheap digital watch - you can get a casio for like 20 euros/dollars/pounds/etc and it'll give you a timer and the time/date and not much else. No cool tech gadget, but it 'll stay charged for 10 years rather than 2 days.

Re: Pixel Watch 5

#282

Post by benrutter »

ugi wrote: post #274
edent wrote: post #81

I overheard a conversation between someone on the Pixel Watch team and a woman I know. He was quizzing her at a party about what features she used - which were pretty much step counter and payment. He somewhat dismissively sneered, "Well, you're not exactly a power user, are you?" I'm trying to imagine what being a "power user" of a watch is like. Can anyone enlighten me? I think smart-watches are much like Alexa. Wh…

I used to consider myself a watch power user. I've started with LG G Watch in 2014 and had almost every generation in between, and from a lot of different manufcaturers Huawei, Skagen, Samsung, etc. I've even wrote and published a couple of Android Wear apps back in the day. I love the idea of having a computer on the wrist that I can program. But in the end, what I'm using it for is notifications, time, timer or sto…

That sounds like a cool project! Did you write it up anywhere at all? (or have any plans to?)

Re: Pixel Watch 5

#283

Post by tagyro »

armaansarkar wrote: post #187
futureshock wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Totally. I would say I'm quite a power user usually. I very carefully explored every feature my apple watch has and tried to incorporate as many of them as I could. Very, very few features stuck because they were genuinely helpful. Almost everything being pushed is a gimmick or a feature bullet point from some product manager. The actual good stuff: Time Workouts Payments The occasionally useful stuff: Notifica…

Personal favorite: unlocking my laptop

I’ve had multiple instances of my Mac unlocking while I was more than 5-6 meters away. At some point I decided not to trust the time of flight calculation and disable it.

Re: Pixel Watch 5

#284

Post by haskman »

If you care about privacy and owning your own data, then don't buy this, buy a watch with gadgetbridge support (https://gadgetbridge.org/gadgets/). I bought an amazfit active 2 a few years ago and it works fantastically with gadgetbridge on grapheneos. Easily gives me 5 days of continuous battery life as well.

Re: Pixel Watch 5

#285

Post by benrutter »

wlesieutre wrote: post #132
maccard wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love my Apple Watch. Alerts mean I don’t look at my phone which means I don’t unlock it and get sidetracked. I have plenty of ways to tell the time so it’s actually kind of useless for that. It’s a passable golf watch, a passable fitness tracker for running and it pairs with earphones so I can not bring my phone with me. I’ve occasionally used Apple Pay with it but that novelty wore off pretty quickly. I don’t care…

I found it was even better to turn off all the notifications entirely, then you don’t get distracted by the watch interrupting you either. There are very few things I actually need to know about right now .

I'm really interested by what notifications people have toggled. I only ever have text messages and whatsapp (urgh, I know!) enabled and don't get a huge amount of notifications during the day to distract me.

Do other people have more notifications enabled? More friends messaging them? Or just a lower threshold for what counts as too many?

Re: Pixel Watch 5

#287

Post by louisbourgault »

futureshock wrote: post #156
edent wrote: post #81

I overheard a conversation between someone on the Pixel Watch team and a woman I know. He was quizzing her at a party about what features she used - which were pretty much step counter and payment. He somewhat dismissively sneered, "Well, you're not exactly a power user, are you?" I'm trying to imagine what being a "power user" of a watch is like. Can anyone enlighten me? I think smart-watches are much like Alexa. Wh…

This. Totally. I would say I'm quite a power user usually. I very carefully explored every feature my apple watch has and tried to incorporate as many of them as I could. Very, very few features stuck because they were genuinely helpful. Almost everything being pushed is a gimmick or a feature bullet point from some product manager. The actual good stuff: Time Workouts Payments The occasionally useful stuff: Notifica…

Interesting that the alarm is such a far down feature for you. I use a galaxy watch 4, and i dont think i can ever go back from a silent alarm. Nicer to wake up to, and doesn't wake up everyone in the house as well

Re: Pixel Watch 5

#288

Post by cyberpunk »

futureshock wrote: post #156
edent wrote: post #81

I overheard a conversation between someone on the Pixel Watch team and a woman I know. He was quizzing her at a party about what features she used - which were pretty much step counter and payment. He somewhat dismissively sneered, "Well, you're not exactly a power user, are you?" I'm trying to imagine what being a "power user" of a watch is like. Can anyone enlighten me? I think smart-watches are much like Alexa. Wh…

This. Totally. I would say I'm quite a power user usually. I very carefully explored every feature my apple watch has and tried to incorporate as many of them as I could. Very, very few features stuck because they were genuinely helpful. Almost everything being pushed is a gimmick or a feature bullet point from some product manager. The actual good stuff: Time Workouts Payments The occasionally useful stuff: Notifica…

I would happily ditch my phone entirely if i could have ms authenticator (needed for work), signal and my train ticket app working on it, alas no. Maybe someday.

Re: Pixel Watch 5

#289

Post by Propelloni »

louisbourgault wrote: post #287
futureshock wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Totally. I would say I'm quite a power user usually. I very carefully explored every feature my apple watch has and tried to incorporate as many of them as I could. Very, very few features stuck because they were genuinely helpful. Almost everything being pushed is a gimmick or a feature bullet point from some product manager. The actual good stuff: Time Workouts Payments The occasionally useful stuff: Notifica…

Interesting that the alarm is such a far down feature for you. I use a galaxy watch 4, and i dont think i can ever go back from a silent alarm. Nicer to wake up to, and doesn't wake up everyone in the house as well

Can't speak for the OP, but I, for one, don't wear a watch while sleeping. I use a Junghans alarm clock from 1989.

I use my watch for time, step counting, and ringing/vibrating. Having my phone on silent and not missing calls (not messages, messenger are not allowed to send notifications to my watch) is such a step up for me :)

Re: Pixel Watch 5

#290

Post by t_mahmood »

edent wrote: post #81

I overheard a conversation between someone on the Pixel Watch team and a woman I know. He was quizzing her at a party about what features she used - which were pretty much step counter and payment. He somewhat dismissively sneered, "Well, you're not exactly a power user, are you?" I'm trying to imagine what being a "power user" of a watch is like. Can anyone enlighten me? I think smart-watches are much like Alexa. Wh…

Having a Garmin, ruined me with awesome battery life, but after I melted it, I was using Amazfit ActiveEdge (can't find straps, the watch is still ok), which made me realize, I'm fine with it, both serves what I need, with over week of battery life. And, that matters the most at the end. Having ADHD, a smart watch is a life saver. But charging it everyday? Nope, who have time for that!?

Alarms are crucial, I have 8 alarms set, just to remind me of passing time.

Calendar is also very useful, for quick glance, externalizing of information is really important when you have a bad memory

Sleep tracking, at least I know how long I might have slept. Surprisingly, Amazfit detects going to sleep very consistently and reliably then Garmin (not counting, sleep level detection accuracy) which did surprise me a lot

Activity reminder, it reminds me I'm sitting for too long, and have a goal set. Which is really useful for me.

Steps, weather, notifications all are pretty important, to keep me off mobile. If I open the mobile, it's given I'll lose focus and lose a large chunk of time.

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