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Microsoft Band

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Re: Microsoft Band

#271

Post by mattmanser »

jacquesm wrote: post #218
jmsdnns wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does "the msft dude for YC" mean?

It means: try to get companies that otherwise would not go for Microsoft products to give it a try through free product samples, and talking down companies not microsoft. I really wished that companies like Microsoft, Google and so on would not have a 'HN guy' (and would not have non-disclosed HN guys either, Felix is at least above board on that), it can make it a lot harder to figure out what is a genuine user expe…

You're talking about their business arm as if it were the consumer arm.

To the best of my knowledge, no-one who bought the Zune ended up paying $50k to MS for it.

Re: Microsoft Band

#272

Post by eitally »

piotrkaminski wrote: post #123
sytelus wrote: post #117

While everyone is trying to make a watch that looks as traditional as possible, Microsoft is thinking radically different for how the future watch should look likes. That's some guts. At $200 this looks like great device with built-in sensors including GPS and UV that also talks to whatever phone you own. I also like the fact that heart rate monitor is always on. Addition of barometer could have been nicer, however.…

They claim a battery life of 48 hours under "normal usage" (read: no GPS), with a charging time of 1.5 hours. Though if it's supposed to be used as a sleep tracker, I kinda wonder when we're supposed to charge it.

If you compare it more closely to a Garmin than to a Fitbit, this is reasonable/comparable battery life. A Garmin GPS watch will track 8-15 hours of activity, if you're lucky ... but without GPS and in pure watch mode will last a couple of weeks.

I'd buy this to replace a Fitbit any day of the week.

Re: Microsoft Band

#273

Post by kalleboo »

chaostheory wrote: post #96
guylhem wrote: post #35

All the sensors + apparently a very lightweight OS + small form factor = I like it. The killing feature is the integrated GPS. As mentionned on the website, you can go without your phone. That alone could make it a buy if it supports wireless charging (I don't want to bother with wires in 2014) Also, it is multiplatform, which is a big plus. I do not want an android watch or an iwatch, but something that will work re…

I wonder if you can ping the MS Band's GPS similar to Apple's Find My Friends feature? If so this would be an awesome feature. My parents, who are older, don't like carrying phones. This would be really convenient safety wise.

It would need a radio transmitter for that. GPS is one-way.

Re: Microsoft Band

#274

Post by k_bx »

I wonder if some day someone would release a watch (or bracelet) that is able to have a sim-card and receive SMS. In a world of pin-code based authorizations and fast-dying-battery smartphones this looks like a thing I would own.

Re: Microsoft Band

#275

Post by ygra »

jezfromfuture wrote: post #234

where fit bit and apple tread microsoft will eventually follow.

It's not as if MS started working on this after Apple announced the Apple Watch ... both products have been in development for quite a while prior to that.

Re: Microsoft Band

#276

Post by jacquesm »

gadders wrote: post #267
jacquesm wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Person scaling with Azure here. It's pretty awesome and easy. And it's pretty expensive. Now, if your competitor is on an open stack and on real computers they will eventually run rings around you because they get more control and lower costs. The initial boost you're experiencing will turn into a straightjacket with a hefty pricetag over the longer term.

Stack Overflow seem to be doing OK: http://highscalability.com/blog/2014/7/21/stackoverflow-upda... I think there is a case for an open stack, but I think unless you pick a real dog of a platform good people can make it work well. It comes down to a "can I get good people for stack X?" as much as "Does stack X work or cost too much?"

Just like in the case of Trello if you already have the experience you can probably save money if you use what you already know how to use. In almost all other cases open source stacks are cheaper.

Stackoverflow and Trello are always held up as the shining examples of how the Microsoft stack is able to hold its own. That's great, I even know people that insist on running their web servers on Apple hardware. Whatever floats your boat. But if you're running a competitive business, if you're going to be using a lot of CPUs and if you will eventually (or already) be faced with lean and mean competition then you are probably better off on an open stack.

Try to imagine Google, Amazon, Ebay, DropBox or AirBnB on the Microsoft platform. And note that two of the above are re-selling their linux based platforms to other users at a profit.

Btw stackoverflow uses plenty of CentOS, I guess licensing from RedHat was too expensive?

Re: Microsoft Band

#277

Post by jacquesm »

gommm wrote: post #266
jacquesm wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could of course simply hire freelance sysadmin/devops guys. Initially those are not full-time jobs anyway. The choice is definitely not between going for a cloud platform versus hiring a bunch of people full time. There are other options.

Exactly plus at scale AWS doesn't do everything either, a sysadmin or at least consultants are still needed to navigate the gotchas and help with how to better provision the stack. AWS instances don't just scale themselves. There is one specific case when I recommend AWS instead of dedicated servers and it's for customers who have widely varying traffic with predictable peaks. In that case having the flexibility affo…

The only good use-case I know for AWS and it's ilk is if you need a 10,000 node cluster for a few hours to do some heavily compute intensive work which does not require a very large amount of data to be imported and exported afterwards. This is a pretty limited number of use cases but for those situations it absolutely rocks. Anything else I'd run the numbers very carefully.

Re: Microsoft Band

#278

Post by akst »

k_bx wrote: post #274

I wonder if some day someone would release a watch (or bracelet) that is able to have a sim-card and receive SMS. In a world of pin-code based authorizations and fast-dying-battery smartphones this looks like a thing I would own.

I think will.i.am actually released something this...

> Puls will require its own SIM card and mobile connection, but can completely replace a phone...

http://www.dezeen.com/2014/10/20/will-i-am-zaha-hadid-puls-s...

Re: Microsoft Band

#279

Post by joosters »

ethomson wrote: post #257
somberi wrote: post #243

Quoting an article from The Economist.com: "... Strikingly, one-third of users discard their devices after six months, according to research by Endeavour Partners, a consultancy. Some industry insiders speculate that the true number may be much higher than that. ...The novelty of being able to track your steps, calories or other metrics is appealing at first, but swiftly wears off. ..." Full article - http://goo.gl/h…

To compare Microsoft Band to a FitBit doesn't do the Band justice. FitBit is a toy - counting footsteps isn't "fitness" and a few LEDs isn't feedback. With GPS and an actual display, the Band actually has the ability to compete against Garmin and Suunto and actual fitness watches. My Garmin is bulky, can't lock a signal in a neighborhood with tall buildings and has software reminiscent of an Atari. And it was more ex…

But I think this makes it more difficult for the device to succeed. The market for simple fitbit-style pedometers is fairly small, so the market for more expensive devices must be even smaller?

Re: Microsoft Band

#280

Post by jacquesm »

mattmanser wrote: post #271
jacquesm wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It means: try to get companies that otherwise would not go for Microsoft products to give it a try through free product samples, and talking down companies not microsoft. I really wished that companies like Microsoft, Google and so on would not have a 'HN guy' (and would not have non-disclosed HN guys either, Felix is at least above board on that), it can make it a lot harder to figure out what is a genuine user expe…

You're talking about their business arm as if it were the consumer arm. To the best of my knowledge, no-one who bought the Zune ended up paying $50k to MS for it.

I'm not talking about their consumer arm at all. No idea where the Zune came from, I was talking about their $50K credits for using their cloud platform.
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