Pebble Smartwatch Review
I’ve been carrying a Pebble around my wrist for 2 months now, and my life has only gotten better because of it. Whenever my iPhone gets an alert, my watch will vibrate and show the notification on the e-ink display of the watch. Incoming calls show a two icons, one is to accept the call and one is to decline. Sadly, at the time you cannot silence the vibrations from the watch so as long as the call is incoming, the watch will continuously vibrate in pattern until the call is either answered and declined. In this article I am going to talk about three things: My youth and how I got into the watch scene, the Pebble App Store and reasons to get the watch and reasons not to get the watch.
The reason why I bought the watch was because I indulge in electronics and enjoy the technology inside it. Back when I was young, my father showed me a watch I thought only science-fiction could bring to life. What got my attentions to small electronics was a watch that could control analog television sets. The watch could power them on, off, and change channels from around 50 feet away. It was my favorite toy to sneak away from my dad and go to school with and have the teachers baffled as why the televisions are turning off and on. Back to the present, I am now harnessing the power of a device that controls and interacts with my phone with endless possibilities. I have gotten a few looks here and there and even a few people asking what I was wearing. I couldn’t be more happier to show them this fantastic watch on my wrist. It’s really changed how I handle tasks on a day to day basis.
Next, the Pebble App Store is where you can download and install various applications and watch faces for your Pebble. I have downloaded a plethora of watches and applications to my watch, however, the watch only has little memory, 32MB if I am correct. If you install over the allowed limit (which is 8 items), the downloads are sent to the Pebble Locker where it is suspended in your phone’s memory for later use. Dislike a watch face or get bored of it? Just open the Pebble application and tap on the watch face or applications and send it to the locker. From the locker, you can either save the applications or watch faces for later use, or just up and delete them entirely. Right now I have a Creeper face (from Minecraft) as my primary watch face. The applications from the watch are SmartStatus, Mr. Runner, start9 (a TwitchPlaysPokemon viewer), EverNote, Hatchi, Smartwatch+, and Icon Pop Quiz. The watch faces I have on are only the basic three that come with the watch (and are permanently stuck) and the Creeper watch face. In the locker are even more faces and applications, there is even a Flappy Bird clone in there. It’s nice being in control of what the watch will look like. You also have control over music from the watch, where you can pause, play , skip backwards or skip forwards in the menu.
Finally, the reasons of getting and not getting a smart watch. When the first iPhone came out, it was a pioneer of it’s technology and usability. The year 2007 brought the first iPhone into existence and everyone with a load of cash wanted in on this magic device. It was just amazing what the iPhone could do in 2007. Then along came the years where Apple launched the next iPhone with even better technology baked inside of it’s case, and the snowball effect kicked in and now we have plenty of smart phones to choose from, like the Motorola X, to the Galaxy S5. Everyone is one-upping each other in the smart phone arena. Now we head back to the smart watches, where Pebble was first introduced in 2013 in a KickStater campaign. Thousands of people backed the project because nothing of the likes was seen before, and were intrigued on how this could live up to. It was mass produced and mostly everyone who bought one was happy with it. But Pebble is only a pioneer in the smart watch game, as more and more companies are scheming ideas and putting them to the test. Just a few days ago, Moto360 smart watch was announced powered by Google’s Android Wear. Samsung has a smart watch, that is touch compatible, (where the Pebble is not) and new iterations of the Galaxy Gear (Samsung’s watch) will have cameras attached to it. There is more room for improvement on new ideas, which a lot of companies are doing. Apple is said to be in on the game with there own smart watch, but nothing is revealed at all. Remember this also, most of the watches will only connect to certain phones, where as the Pebble can connect to either iOS or Android. So right now, Pebble is the pioneer of smart watches where improvement is guaranteed over the coming years, so waiting can help you out in the long run.
Smart watches are just entering the modern arena of play, where years from now we’ll have more advanced watches and look back on when it was small and just starting to make way into the modern world. Pebble does have a more classical, metal version of their watch, which is more expensive that the original Pebble. There is so much more room for improvement here for years to come, that will satisfy other peoples need that can’t be satisfied by today’s smart watch. If you want to be an investment in the future, grab a smart watch and watch as the world around you evolves into something beautiful. This is the year of wearable tech, as more and more new innovative products are being developed such as Google Glass. If you enjoyed this article, stick around for more articles in the future that will interest you just the same.
If you want to purchase a Pebble Smartwatch, go to GetPebble.com for more details.
Rating 5/5 Stars