Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch • Hacker News Board

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#221

Post by capitainenemo » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:06 PM UTC

rchaud wrote: post #209

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #202

I've got a friend who still uses a Palm Pilot (circa 1998) as a daily calendar manager/notepad. Works at Google and delights in telling younger colleagues it's a Pixel 8 prototype.

I'm sad that tech did away with replaceable batteries. I would love to use my 5-inch 16:9 Samsung phone from 2016. It still works fine, but the battery barely lasts an hour. Instead I have to use one of their gigantic replacement phones with a ridiculous 21:9 ratio.

The Samsung XCover6 Pro has an easily replaceable battery (and water resistance and physical buttons and dedication to 5 years of patching). In fact, I think it uses the same battery as the XCover from a couple of years ago. I just ordered mine yesterday actually. Kinda excited.

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#222

Post by hnbad » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:07 PM UTC

I still have one and wear it daily.

I need a smartwatch that tells the time, gives me notifications, doesn't blind me in the dark but is readable in daylight and lasts days without charging. Calendar access and weather are a bonus. The pebble does all of that.

I was somewhat excited when the Apple Watch was announced only to find out that it, of course, was going to be usable with iOS devices only and therefore not an option for Android users like me. I still haven't found a good alternative to the Pebble and all the lo-fi watches are primarily fitness trackers, which I have no use for.

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#223

Post by tootie » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:08 PM UTC

Belphemur wrote: post #58

keraf wrote: post #26

As a big Pebble fan, I was really sad to see the company go without any similar alternatives in the market (at the time). My watches ended up having various hardware issues over the years, so I switched to something else. The efforts Rebble has put in to keep these devices alive is amazing. If they grow bigger, I'd love to see them do hardware. In the meantime, I'm wearing a Withings ScanWatch [0]. Not as extendable…

Withings is great if you're looking for "health" watch but not really good as fitness tracker. For years, I used my steel HR (got a weird one branded Nokia because they had purchased Withings only to resell Withings to the founder a year later), loved the sleep tracking, health report etc... But the activity tracking wasn't the best, especially running. However the battery's life is out of this world. I loved the mix…

I bought a Scanwatch and have found the health data to be so inaccurate as to be completely useless. I explicitly wanted SpO2 and sleep tracking and it's just very wrong. It would wake up multiple times at night and the watch would tell me I was asleep all night. I'm sure it's just some limitation of the sensors, but the tech just isn't good enough to be useful

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#224

Post by danjoredd » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:11 PM UTC

I completely understand. They were good watches. I almost bought one, then changed my mind because I didn't have the funds and didn't want to risk overdraft. They went out of business the week after, so I never got the chance to get one

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#225

Post by porcc » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:12 PM UTC

tekchip wrote: post #115

dcormier wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there any comparable alternatives to Pebble even now? I’ve yet to see one, but I haven’t followed the market very closely since I stopped using one.

Surprised this hasn't been mentioned on this thread yet. Hardware wise the closest is probably the Pine Time from Pine64. Software and services wise this isn't on pebbles level though. https://www.pine64.org/pinetime/ As others mention hybrid watches are probably the closest alternative.

Pinetime can't hold a candle to the bangle.js: https://banglejs.com/

The bangle.js: - ships significantly faster - has an always-on display with similar 4 week maximum battery life - can be updated without flashing - has a thriving app ecosystem

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#226

Post by dkasper » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:13 PM UTC

I still daily drive an Apple Watch Series 3. I use it as a watch and a fitness tracker and have no complaints or reason to upgrade until it breaks. Battery life is still well over 1 day with my usage.

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#227

Post by hellomyguys » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:23 PM UTC

SanjayMehta wrote: post #72

maratc wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My iPod nano battery expanded and cracked the whole device open. I almost literally cried, as I loved that little device too much. Getting a replacement is not an option as any iPod nano battery is about 10 years old now. A sign of what will happen to all the Apple Watches out there.

I loved my 80Gb classic iPod. When its hard drive finally died I couldn't bring myself to dispose of it.

You can definitely replace the hard drive with parts online!

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#228

Post by SyneRyder » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:32 PM UTC

will0 wrote: post #217

SyneRyder wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And I have one more with a wasted battery that I intend to replace. I wish Rebble would offer a paid mail-in service to replace the batteries, to have someone trusted & reliable do the work. I'm down to about 2-days battery life on my Time Steel. I do have a replacement Time Steel that I bought on eBay, but I'd love to get this one fixed. I love Rebble, but I wish they did more to round out the service. I'm really…

We'd love to offer something like that, but there's all kind of considerations around liability with repairs. Plus we're entirely run by volunteers, and watch repairs take a lot of time. That being said, a store for refurbed Pebbles might be doable, but it would be a big time and cost overhead.

That's fair - I hadn't realized Rebble were volunteers. I'd hoped the subscriber money might stretch to also compensating people involved. I certainly wouldn't expect volunteers to be working on repairs out of the goodness of their hearts.

I guess my dream is for Rebble to be like a cross between Framework & iFixIt - somewhere you can buy all your spare parts (and accessories?), maybe find repair guides... and then to continue the Pebble mission by making new models that can run Pebble software on modern designs. I guess it's just a dream. But if there's only about 2k of us Rebble subscribers, I'm proud to be one of those 2k!

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#229

Post by frosted-flakes » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:34 PM UTC

capitainenemo wrote: post #221

rchaud wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sad that tech did away with replaceable batteries. I would love to use my 5-inch 16:9 Samsung phone from 2016. It still works fine, but the battery barely lasts an hour. Instead I have to use one of their gigantic replacement phones with a ridiculous 21:9 ratio.

The Samsung XCover6 Pro has an easily replaceable battery (and water resistance and physical buttons and dedication to 5 years of patching). In fact, I think it uses the same battery as the XCover from a couple of years ago. I just ordered mine yesterday actually. Kinda excited.

I'd buy one if it wasn't as slow and unperformant as all the reviews say it is. I want a Galaxy S10e in that package.

Re: Over 16k people still use a Pebble smartwatch

#230

Post by troyvit » Thu, Nov 03, 2022, 4:35 PM UTC

m-p-3 wrote: post #95

Sadly mine has a dead battery, and I'm afraid to replace it and damage the seal. I switched to multiple "cheap" smartwatches (Mi Band, Amazfit Bip) before settling on the bangle.js2, but despite the specs being similar, the OS on the Pebble feels way more responsible and faster. Hopefully that improves over time, and the main developer (Gordon Williams, who is also the main dev for Espruino upon which the bangle.js f…

Yeah I've been agonizing about the bangle for months now (thanks HN) and I saw a recent post from Gordon[1] that says the cutting edge builds are getting much faster.

[1] https://forum.espruino.com/conversations/381203/