Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Garmin's –$40B Pivot

readtrung.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 317 posts

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#21

Post by wil421 »

cassianoleal wrote: post #13
hx833001 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ultra has better battery life, most people don’t wear a watch while sleeping, so it’s easy to charge at night like you do with a phone anyway. It also enables you to do almost everything essential in terms of communication without a phone if you want to leave it. Garmin watches do not.

The Ultra is the most bizarre in the lineup. It's marketed at extreme adventurers, mountaineers, extreme hikers, etc. For that demographic, battery life of less than at least a week is a non-starter, not to mention 100% button navigation as opposed to touchscreen + dial. Those are really hard to operate whilst wearing thick gloves.

Garmin makes solar powered watches for adventures types in the back country. The Ultra is probably good for scuba diving since you aren’t doing it for so long.

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#22

Post by mcintyre1994 »

I think Garmin is a really good example of a company that benefits from Apple making the market so much bigger. I had an Apple Watch, got into running a lot, and eventually found the Watch too limiting (bad heart rate measurement, touch only UI were my main issues). I probably wouldn't have ended up a Garmin customer if I'd never got an Apple Watch though.

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#23

Post by rob74 »

Of course, the unmentioned elephant in the room here is that Apple watches don't work with Android phones (it's possible to use the "cellular" version with limited features without a phone, but you still need an iPhone to configure it), which means that ~70% of the market are up for grabs...

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#24

Post by mcintyre1994 »

cassianoleal wrote: post #13
hx833001 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ultra has better battery life, most people don’t wear a watch while sleeping, so it’s easy to charge at night like you do with a phone anyway. It also enables you to do almost everything essential in terms of communication without a phone if you want to leave it. Garmin watches do not.

The Ultra is the most bizarre in the lineup. It's marketed at extreme adventurers, mountaineers, extreme hikers, etc. For that demographic, battery life of less than at least a week is a non-starter, not to mention 100% button navigation as opposed to touchscreen + dial. Those are really hard to operate whilst wearing thick gloves.

I know the Ultra has an extra button, but I wonder if you can start a run on it in the rain (ie without using touch). That was what finally pushed me away from Apple Watch, and the marketing of the Ultra is quite funny if it doesn't solve it.

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#25

Post by dagw »

cassianoleal wrote: post #13
hx833001 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ultra has better battery life, most people don’t wear a watch while sleeping, so it’s easy to charge at night like you do with a phone anyway. It also enables you to do almost everything essential in terms of communication without a phone if you want to leave it. Garmin watches do not.

The Ultra is the most bizarre in the lineup. It's marketed at extreme adventurers, mountaineers, extreme hikers, etc. For that demographic, battery life of less than at least a week is a non-starter, not to mention 100% button navigation as opposed to touchscreen + dial. Those are really hard to operate whilst wearing thick gloves.

I know several people who own the Ultra, and while they are all 'outdoorsy' sort of people, none of them are even close to 'extreme'.

The market more likely is people that see themselves as "extreme adventurers, mountaineers, extreme hikers, etc", despite mostly doing half day rides at the nearest mountain biking trail, national park hikes where they spend one night in a cabin, and a weekend snow boarding at a ski resort.

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#26

Post by SirHumphrey »

mathieuh wrote: post #7

I don't know if their other product lines are better but the software and user experience of their Edge 1040 cycling computer is atrocious. It has every feature you could think of and some you couldn't but I swear it was designed by someone who has never ridden a bike. Even the navigation isn't great. Most of the time when I get to a roundabout it wants me to exit at the first exit, then immediately perform a u-turn,…

I have been looking around on a number of separate occasions for reimplementation of Garmin connect. Sadly i haven’t found anything yet.

As great as the hardware is the app is frankly atrocious and doesn’t inspire confidence with a company that is storing a lot of very sensitive personal information.

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#27

Post by Neywiny »

I think the article brings up a great point about how they pivoted. So many companies start out strong then resort to "the original" to try and get sympathy? Nostalgia? Idk who falls for that or why. Or they sell out to someone that'll gut them. These guys knew that their first success wasn't a GPS locator. It was a PNT device that met an unserved market. In that regard they haven't pivoted at all. I respect that immensely.

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#28

Post by scarface_74 »

NoboruWataya wrote: post #14

Interesting article. My partner bought an Apple watch a couple of years ago and I was shocked at what a poor value proposition it was. Very expensive and wouldn't even hold a charge for a day. I guess you get used to it but having to charge my watch every day would drive me mad. Obviously there are things it will do better than a Garmin (and things it can do that a Garmin simply can't) but overall it didn't make sens…

With my Apple Watch, I don’t need my phone when I’m running, swimming or at the gym. I can receive and return texts, make and receive calls and listen to music either stored on the watch or streamed over cellular.

Re: Garmin's –$40B Pivot

#29

Post by LandR »

KeplerBoy wrote: post #10
hx833001 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ultra has better battery life, most people don’t wear a watch while sleeping, so it’s easy to charge at night like you do with a phone anyway. It also enables you to do almost everything essential in terms of communication without a phone if you want to leave it. Garmin watches do not.

I thought the sleep tracking and resting heart rate tracking is one of the most important features of a smartwatch. pretty sure most garmin users wear them at night for these reasons.

I always thought resting heart rate while sleeping was a pointless metric ?

YOu can have a resting heart rate while sleeping in the 30s, yet your real resting heart rate in the 60s.

I don't need a watch to tell me if I was sleeping or not, I was there, I know if I was sleeping... I also don't see the point if it telling me if I got enough sleep or not. Again, I know if I didn't get enough sleep as I'm tired...

I also don't think it's sleep tracker is accurate, I've had my garmin tell me I have taken naps when I hadn't. I was just lying on the sofa watching a film and didn't get up for an hour or so. That doesn't mean I'm asleep.

Post reply on HN