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Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

unawatch.com

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Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#21

Post by exabrial »

If it has a flashlight and is beyond waterproof, I would maybe consider it.

My Garmin Epix watch is practically bullet proof. I've dove with it in open ocean. I've jet skied with it. I rock climb with it. It's surived 108miles of Unbound (the race) in mud, sun, sweat. I've water rafted with it. I've swam in crappy lakes, streams and jumped off cliffs. Hottubs? also no problem.

Zero chance a iWatch would ever survive these conditions.

Oh and despite all of this, the screen has not scratched, not even a little. Plus it has 5-10 days of battery life... and did I mention I always have a flashlight on me?

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#22

Post by gbil »

The title is misleading at least, to compete with garmin you need the similar offering, with swimming/waterproofing being the huge outliar here but also the ecosystem and like it or not features like the notifications.

Very valiant first effort for sure but after 6 years with a Garmin Fenix still holding 90% of its battery (and being able to replace it), I'm not their potential customer.

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#23

Post by arnejenssen »

For me the value of Garmin (Forerunner) is their proprietary algorithm for calculating Stress Level from HRV. It is the basis for the Body Battery measure. I find it useful to see how food and activity affects my stress levels.

I guess it would be possible to reverse engineer a similar stress level calculation. Perhaps AI-powered?

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#24

Post by hackingonempty »

This is cool because we need more open competition for the app/identity locked ecosystems of sports related electronics like gps watches, bike computers, and action cams. I hate how none of the major brand ones will work without at least signing up for an account and most wont work at all without the manufacturers app.

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#25

Post by PaulHoule »

mikestew wrote: post #8

I really want to like this watch. Price is certainly right, and it does all of the things I'd want out of a Garmin or Apple Watch Ultra. But what problem does this solve for me? In the Apple Watch use case, a replaceable battery would be nice. But in contrast to Garmin, I've never replaced a Garmin because the battery wouldn't hold charge anymore. I've never broken a screen (if one has a habit of that, Garmin and App…

The charging situation with Garmin is terrible, enough that when Venu quits charging I might go for the Apple Watch or anything that takes a charge...

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#26

Post by notesinthefield »

exabrial wrote: post #21

If it has a flashlight and is beyond waterproof, I would maybe consider it. My Garmin Epix watch is practically bullet proof. I've dove with it in open ocean. I've jet skied with it. I rock climb with it. It's surived 108miles of Unbound (the race) in mud, sun, sweat. I've water rafted with it. I've swam in crappy lakes, streams and jumped off cliffs. Hottubs? also no problem. Zero chance a iWatch would ever survive…

> the screen has not scratched

I believe this the least!

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#27

Post by rich_sasha »

weakfish wrote: post #12
mikestew wrote: post #8

I really want to like this watch. Price is certainly right, and it does all of the things I'd want out of a Garmin or Apple Watch Ultra. But what problem does this solve for me? In the Apple Watch use case, a replaceable battery would be nice. But in contrast to Garmin, I've never replaced a Garmin because the battery wouldn't hold charge anymore. I've never broken a screen (if one has a habit of that, Garmin and App…

For me, I want an open API I can pull my data from. Last I checked, you have to be a business to use Garmin's API. Apple certainly doesn't let you. My goal is to have a cron that runs on my homelab that pulls my health data into a DB I own, from various sources, and visualize it in Grafana.

Polar has an API where you can get more or less anything out. That bit is fine - sadly you can't put things in (like virtual cycling, or any activities not recorded on the Polar).

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#28

Post by TekMol »

arnejenssen wrote: post #23

For me the value of Garmin (Forerunner) is their proprietary algorithm for calculating Stress Level from HRV. It is the basis for the Body Battery measure. I find it useful to see how food and activity affects my stress levels. I guess it would be possible to reverse engineer a similar stress level calculation. Perhaps AI-powered?

If the algorithm is proprietary, how do you know it is calculating something meaningful?

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#29

Post by mikestew »

weakfish wrote: post #12
mikestew wrote: post #8

I really want to like this watch. Price is certainly right, and it does all of the things I'd want out of a Garmin or Apple Watch Ultra. But what problem does this solve for me? In the Apple Watch use case, a replaceable battery would be nice. But in contrast to Garmin, I've never replaced a Garmin because the battery wouldn't hold charge anymore. I've never broken a screen (if one has a habit of that, Garmin and App…

For me, I want an open API I can pull my data from. Last I checked, you have to be a business to use Garmin's API. Apple certainly doesn't let you. My goal is to have a cron that runs on my homelab that pulls my health data into a DB I own, from various sources, and visualize it in Grafana.

Apple certainly doesn't let you.

There are several apps[0] off the top of my head that pull data from Apple's HealthKit. Apple even has a framework for it: HealthKit. That said, I've never written to that API myself, but it observational evidence indicates that you can pull data from Apple just fine. The app I use to pull data off Apple and ship to Strava says as much.

[0] RunGap and HealthFit

Re: Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

#30

Post by lrae »

notesinthefield wrote: post #26
exabrial wrote: post #21

If it has a flashlight and is beyond waterproof, I would maybe consider it. My Garmin Epix watch is practically bullet proof. I've dove with it in open ocean. I've jet skied with it. I rock climb with it. It's surived 108miles of Unbound (the race) in mud, sun, sweat. I've water rafted with it. I've swam in crappy lakes, streams and jumped off cliffs. Hottubs? also no problem. Zero chance a iWatch would ever survive…

> the screen has not scratched I believe this the least!

Same. Both have plenty of scratches here.

I also don't see why an Apple Watch wouldn't survive all those mentioned things. Pretty sure I did all those things with an Apple Watch on, except for the specific 108 mile gravel race. But I don't see why it would fail that.

And both might absolutely scratch while climbing, and if you're unlucky and hit it in the wrong spot, also crack.

That said, if I were an athlete in any of those categories and did it all the time, I'd still absolutely choose a Garmin.

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