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Thursday, September 3, 2015

Thursday Poll: Pick a Smartwatch, Any Smartwatch.

Three round smartwatches stole headlines this week, all of which will be available at some point over the next few weeks. We have the new Moto 360 (2nd gen), Huawei Watch, and Samsung’s Gear S2 and S2 Classic. All look pretty fantastic, but each are different in their own way. Moto wants you to customize the hell out of theirs, while Huawei has given you options, but wants you to think of its watch as a high-end premium device. Samsung, well, it’s positioning itself somewhere in the middle, though it seems to have realized all that was wrong with previous watches and fixed them this time around, making watches that are worth considering.

We spent time with all of them over the last couple of weeks. Tim went hands-on with the Huawei Watch here. I also did my thing with the new Moto 360 here, and the Gear S2s here.

I’d have to say that if I were choosing one today, I’d probably go Huawei Watch. The combination of the premium experience, design, and choice has won me over. But that doesn’t mean I’m not super excited to spend ample time with the new Moto 360 and Gear S2. Decisions will be made here shortly, once our reviews are ready.

What about you? If you were picking a smartwatch today, which way would you go?

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

Samsung Pay Comes to Gear S2 in November

Samsung included NFC in the new Gear S2 and Gear S2 Classic for one reason – mobile payments. They confirmed today that each watch would become a part of its Samsung Pay mobile payments system this November, which is only a month or so after the watches become available to the public.

This is a big deal because the only other watch that currently does mobile payments is the Apple Watch. None of the Android Wear devices have NFC or can make mobile payments just yet.

Keep in mind that the Samsung Pay and NFC payment feature will only work if you are paired with a Samsung Galaxy device that has Samsung Pay. You won’t be able to pair this with say, a Nexus 6, and then make NFC payments because that phone doesn’t have access to Samsung Pay.

Still, watch payments on Android! It’s a start.

Samsung Gear S2 and Gear S2 Classic Hands-on!

Earlier in the week, Samsung made the Gear S2 and Gear S2 Classic official, saying that they weren’t ready to announce exact launch timing or price, but that they would be on hand at IFA for media consumption. With IFA in full swing, Samsung invited us to take the watches for a spin and get back to you all with our findings.

As a recap, the Samsung Gear S2 (and its brother, the Gear S2 Classic) features a 1.2-inch Circular Super AMOLED display (360×360), 1.0GHz dual core CPU, 512MB RAM, 4GB storage, heart rate sensor, NFC, WiFi, Bluetooth, and a 250mAh that supposedly lasts anywhere from 2-3 days. The watch runs Samsung’s Tizen OS, as well, instead of Android Wear.

The regular Gear S2 is rounded and sleek, with a minimalist futuristic vibe to its dark grey or white exteriors. The Gear S2 Classic is much more like a classic watch, with lugs and a somewhat fluted or rigid bezel. The Gear S2 comes with a rubber or silicon band that I actually didn’t find to be all that nice, whereas the Classic includes a classier leather band. Thankfully, you can swap bands pretty easily.

Each watch features a rotating bezel for navigation that is quite fun to use. They have touchscreens as well, but I just found it fun to rotate and rotate and rotate into widgets or apps because the bezel has this really nice, soft clicking to it as it rotates. I’ll need more time with it to decide if a rotating bezel is better for navigating a small screen than my finger, but so far I’m kind of buying in.

Speaking of apps, this watch – like the Apple Watch – is all about apps. While Android Wear may focus more of its efforts on glance-able information, Samsung seems to want you to actually use apps from within the watch. There’s nothing wrong with that approach, assuming developers can build out unique and simplified experiences.

Oh, and did I mention that these watches will work with almost any Android phone? That’s right, Samsung is ditching that Galaxy phone requirement for these in hopes that they can sell to Nexus, Motorola, LG, etc. owners. That’s awesome news!

In the video below, you should get a good feel for each watch, but you also get comparisons of each to the Moto 360 and Apple Watch.

Enjoy!

Samsung’s Gear S2 Will Work With Any Android Phone, Not Locked to Galaxy Devices

You know how you all passed on every single one of Samsung’s previous smartwatch attempts because they required you to own a top tier Galaxy smartphone? OK, that’s not why you passed. You passed because they were garbage. But, let’s say they weren’t garbage – you probably would have passed on them because you may not have owned a Galaxy smartphone. That stupid requirement from Samsung is about to change with their new watch, the Gear S2. Samsung has seen the open light and is making this watch (and the Gear S2 Classic) available to all Android devices upon launch (at least 1.5GB RAM and Android 4.4).

We still don’t know exactly when it will launch or for how much, but when it does, your Nexus, Moto, LG, or other Android device will be able to pair with them, just like you do any other Bluetooth device.

Samsung told us that the experience may vary slightly from phone to phone, but that you should expect most of the experience you would get had you paired with a Galaxy phone. Well, you won’t get the NFC-mobile-payment side of it, because that’s a Samsung Pay exclusive, which is also an exclusive to select Galaxy devices at this time. Other than that, it should be a fully capable smartwatch experience with 2-3 day battery life and a sleek design.

This news change any of your opinions on the Gear S2? Maybe our hands-on with it will.

Watch Samsung’s Gear S2 Showcase Live From IFA!

At 10AM Pacific (1PM Eastern), Samsung will take another stage at IFA in Berlin to further present to the world the Gear S2 and Gear S2 Classic smartwatches. Samsung first talked about these devices back at the Galaxy Note 5 launch, then officially announced them at the beginning of this week. But today, they will show them off, in action, and probably provide additional details about each that weren’t a part of Monday’s press release.

The showcase is being streamed live to the world, so if you have some free time here in about 45 minutes, feel free to watch along.

We went ahead and embedded the video for you below.

Google Intros Updated Street View App for Google Maps Users

Today, Google introduced an updated Street View application for both Android and iOS. For users on iOS, the new Street View app will replace the Photo Sphere Camera app, but on Android, it will simply be an update for existing Street View users in Google Maps.

With the updated application, users can view Photo Sphere galleries from across the world, and even upload their own panoramic and Photo Sphere shots instantly to Google Maps. If you visit a beautiful place or go on an insane hike, your content can now be viewed by others, giving them a taste of what they can expect at that location.

Of course, the basic Street View functionality remains intact, allowing you to see exactly what is outside of almost any address in the world. It’s always surprising to see where Google’s cars have been, whether it be in the streets of Brazil, or down your own block in the hometown.

Everyone, go grab the update.

Play Link

Via: Google Maps

Verizon’s Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge Get Updates to Android 5.1.1

Verizon began pushing updates to its Samsung Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge variants yesterday in the form of Android 5.1.1. The updates fix a bunch of bugs, but also introduce things like options for turning off the parallax wallpaper effect on the home screen, live wallpaper options for the lock screen, quick exposure adjusting in the camera when you focus on an object, and Chinese language support.

The updates should be rolling out any minute, if you haven’t seen them yet.

The update for the S6 will arrive as software version VRU3BOG5, while the S6 Edge will get VRU3BOG5.

To check for updates, head into Settings>About phone>Software updates.

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Thursday, September 3, 2015

Thursday Poll: Pick a Smartwatch, Any Smartwatch.

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