Wearable is the tech hot word of 2014. Everyone is talking about it and analysts are predicting it to be the next big thing. What is wearable tech and why is it important to understand what it does for you?
When you boil it down, wearable tech can be described in a very simple way: technology you wear that gathers and presents information to you in an organized way. You might be asking yourself, “isn't that what my smartphone does?” The short answer is, yes. So where do wearable devices fit in the world of smartphones and tablets ranging all different sizes and shapes? The real answer would depend on the type of data that you are presented with and whether or not it is useful to you. Much as Apple accomplished with iPad, carefully placing it between smartphone and laptop, wearable tech will bridge a gap we didn't know needed bridging: our devices and us.
Think about what notifications do for you. They present quick indications of an email received, a text from a loved one or a missed call from work. These things are designed to present you information you need to know and allow you to act on it when you want. A wearable device such as a smartwatch can do this for you and not interrupt the flow of your activities. Want to know how many steps are you averaging in a day? You could download an app to your smartphone, run the app in the background and drain your battery nice and fast. Or you could clip on a fitness monitor, go about your day and gather the results when you get home. Which sounds easier? The point is, wearable tech should make the mundane tasks easier, present information useful to you and enhance your phone or tablet experience, not supplement it.
Now that we have an understanding of wearables, lets talk specifics. Drawing from personal experience, the Samsung Galaxy Gear and the Jawbone UP cover the range of wearable tech currently available; referring to smart watches and fitness bands.
An important distinction to make is the type of information you are looking for. A fitness band will present you with a very limited range of data that focuses on step count and sleep activity. This data is then processed by the accompanying app and presented in a useful way. For those of us looking for a little boost on our weight loss resolutions for this year, this data will help you better understand your activity level and find areas to improve. Of all of the fitness monitors currently available in the wearable tech market, they all do about the same thing, it’s the processing of the data that often differs.
Smart watches on the other hand provide a very different set of data and are often the most misunderstood. Personally, I have had the fortune of being able to experience two of the top smart watches right now: the Pebble and Samsung Galaxy Gear. In an effort to avoid a long winded comparison, I’ll point out two areas where these differ greatly and two areas where one is better than the other.
Let’s talk about two areas where these two smart watches differ:
Display:
The two smart watches approach the display with different mindsets. The Pebble’s E-Ink display allows for two things, exceptional battery life and direct light visibility requiring little or no backlighting and a screen that is always on. The downside to this is no color representation, simply varying levels of gray much like a calculator. The Gear on the other hand features a beautiful AMOLED display with full rich color reproduction and great resolution coupled with a high DPI.
Capability:
The Pebble offers limited functionality restricting the user to only be able to view notifications or screen incoming calls and change watch faces. The Gear on the other hand does all of the above but allows you to interact with the notifications to an extent. You are also able to expand the amount of notifications to include nearly all kinds of system messages including Google Now and Wallet.
Now we will cover what makes one better than the other:
Battery life:
I said before, due to the E-Ink display that the Pebble has, this affords a nearly 7 day battery life. Compare that to the Gear that has around 1-2 days.
Technical Ability:
The Galaxy Gear wins by a landslide in this category. The device acts as a bluetooth headset allowing you to make and receive phone calls right from the watch. The Gear is also running Android 4.3 at its core. If you have been around Android for any length of time, you know what that means: rooting and ROMing. This allows developers to give the device more capabilities than Samsung had ever intended. (Look up how to sideload apps and watch a video of someone playing Super Mario 64 on their Gear.)
The final conclusion I have made regarding these smart watches is this: The Pebble is a wonderful starting point for those who have no experience with a device like this. It’s not cumbersome and integrates nicely with your existing devices and wardrobe. The Galaxy Gear is a natural evolutionary step for smart watches. It takes everything that the Pebble does so well and expands it ten fold. It does more than what the market is ready for in early 2014 and is ahead of its time by almost a year. Look for copycats by mid 2014 with the true competition coming around by the end of the year.
The wearable tech market is only going to become more crowded and complicated as time goes on. If you are interested in this type of tech, it’s important to understand what we all will face in the near future. A wearable device should be an extension of your mobile and tech devices and enhance the overall experience.
As a final parting note: The Galaxy Gear has been the most impactful addition to my daily life since purchasing my first Android smartphone.
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