Samsung unveils its Galaxy Gear smartwatch. Tutorial: how to set up your Samsung Gear S3 watch Why Galaxy Gear smart watches won't turn on

Image caption Analysts find it difficult to predict whether this watch will be popular in the market

Samsung has introduced an electronic novelty - "smart watch" (smartwatch). The device will be paired with a smartphone based on the Android operating system. The mobile watch can be used for calls, notifications and launching applications.

The smart watch is also equipped with a 1.9-megapixel camera and 4 gigabytes of memory.

With the Galaxy Gear, Samsung has overtaken companies such as Microsoft, Apple and Google, which are also reportedly developing their own smartwatches.

The company called the gadget "a cult fashion item." However, analysts warn that the decision to use the watch as only an add-on to devices based on the operating system Galaxy Android can significantly reduce their attractiveness.

Earlier, Samsung announced that sales of its smartphones and mobile phones slow down. Now investors are expecting the company to develop a popular new gadget.

Samsung showcased its Galaxy Gear smartwatch in Berlin. They will go on sale on September 25th.

Samsung isn't the only smartwatch company. Sony will soon unveil Smartwatch 2, which will work as an app for any device running Android 4.0 or higher, unlike Samsung watches.

The Galaxy Gear will start at around $ 300, unlike Sony watches, which are priced at less than $ 200.

Risky move

The built-in microphone allows the Galaxy Gear to support S Voice, which recognizes voice requests... Information is given on a 1.63-inch display. The display matrix has a Super AMOLED resolution - 320x200 pixels. The built-in 1.9 megapixel camera allows you to take pictures without connecting to your phone.

The watch also supports functions such as gesture control, Smart Relay - transfer, for example, information from the watch to the phone and vice versa with one touch.

The watch allows you to make calls to your Galaxy Gear-linked phone without removing the phone from your pocket or purse, Samsung says.

Analysts find it difficult to predict whether this watch will be popular in the market.

In a survey of smartphone users in the UK and US, 65% have heard of a smartwatch. But of those who already have such a gadget, more than 40% stopped using it, because they either forget to put it on, or they are simply bored with the device.

In Russia, Galahy Gear is expected to go on sale in October.

Samsung Gear S3 is without a doubt one of the best smartwatches in the world. Their secret of success is very simple: great looks and many useful features. If a lot of different information is already written about the first on the Internet (photo and video reviews), then little is said about the smart capabilities of the watch. This article does Galagram with all the secrets and tips for setting up a smart watch Gear S3.

This instruction will be useful both for beginners who have just purchased a gadget and for confident watch users. We think everyone can learn something new for themselves and use the device to the maximum.

How to turn on Samsung Gear S3

To turn on the watch, press and hold the Power (Home) button until the screen lights up and the Samsung logo appears. If the device does not turn on, connect it to a power source for at least 15 minutes and then try again. Perhaps the clock was simply discharged "at zero percent." To turn off the watch, also press and hold the Power button. In the menu that opens, select "Shutdown" or Power off. Everything is simple and clear here!

How to connect Gear S3 to Android and iPhone

The watch is connected to Android (Android 4.4 and above) smartphones and Apple iPhone (iOS 10 and above) via Bluetooth. So this instruction is suitable for both operating systems. To connect the Gear S3 to your smartphone, install the Samsung Gear app from the store Google play or AppStore. It is worth noting that some functions may not be available on the watch due to the smartphone model. Of course, phones from the Samsung Galaxy line work best with the gadget.

• Turn on the clock
• Open the Samsung Gear app on your smartphone
• Update the Samsung Gear app to the latest version if necessary
• Click "Connect"
• Activate Bluetooth when requested by the app
• Follow the instructions on your smartphone to complete the connection

You can also connect a Bluetooth headset or wireless headphones to the watch. To do this, follow these steps:

• On the watch screen, tap Settings
• Then select "Connections"
• Tap the Bluetooth switch to activate the connection
• Rotate the ring around the screen and click on the Bluetooth icon
• When you see the name of the Bluetooth headset appear on the screen, tap on it to connect
• If you don't see a Bluetooth device, click Scan and then click the name on the device when you see it appear on the display

Well, the reverse action, to disconnect from a Bluetooth device (speaker or headset), do the following:

• On the Apps screen, select Settings
• Click "Connections"
• Click on Bluetooth device
• Click the "Settings" icon
• Click "Disconnect"

How to choose a different watch face

There are many different interchangeable watch faces for the Gear S3. Most are available in the Gear app on your android device, directly from the application, you can see, choose the appropriate one and set it as the main dial.

Switching between third-party watch faces can be done on the phone as well as on the watch itself. To do this without using your smartphone and app, long-tap the current option on the screen, then swipe left or right to view the preset watch faces. After installation, you can click on the "Styling" tab and select the display colors, as well as customize it to your liking.

How to pay with the Gear S3 with Samsung Pay

A very useful feature as you don't need to carry your wallet or even your smartphone. Just spend hours at a compatible payment terminal. Here's how to set it up. You must activate NFC and set Samsung Pay as your default payment method before using Samsung Pay on the Gear S3

• On the start screen with applications, turn the frame to the "Settings" tab
• Tap Connections\u003e NFC, then tap NFC to
  enable this module
• Now choose the "Samsung Pay" payment method

Great, the setup is complete. Now, to pay for your purchase in the store, do the following:

• On the Apps screen, rotate the frame and select Samsung Pay (or press and hold the Back key)
• Scroll through the list of cards, select the card you want, and then
  click "Pay"
• Touch the top of the Gear S3 to the card reader
• Payment must be successful
• It's all!

How to enable the Always On display

Out of the box, the Samsung watch screen is configured so that it is activated only at your "request". In order to turn on the screen, you either need to raise your hand or press a key on the case. But there is one secret, how to keep the Gear S3 screen always active. It's something like Always On Display on. To keep your watch constantly “active” and showing the time all the time, do the following.

• Go to "Settings"
• On the watch and select the "Style" tab
• Click "Always On"
• Done!

How to take a screenshot on Samsung Gear S3

Continuing the topic of setting up the display, here's how to take a screenshot on this watch. First of all, all screenshots taken on your device are saved in the "Gallery". You can transfer screenshots from your Gear S3 watch to your smartphone. The screenshots transferred to your phone will be saved in the Gear folder in the Gallery.

To take a screenshot, simply press the Home key at the same time and swipe across the screen from left to right - very convenient as you can see! Go to the Gallery app to view all screenshots.

How to set the time

There are two ways: automatic, for which the time zone is automatically updated. And manual - when you set the time on the Gear S3 watch yourself. Below are instructions for these two methods.

Auto:

• Go to "Device"
• Click Date & Time
• Click on the "Automatic" tab to enable or disable the automatic date and time update function

Manual:

• On the Apps screen, go to Settings
• Click "Device"
• Go to "Date and Time"
• If necessary, tap "Automatic" to disable the automatic update function
• To manually set the date, click "Set date"
• Select year, month and day to manually set the date
• Then click "Set" (or install)
• To manually set the time, find the "Set time" item.
• Manually insert hours and minutes
• Now click "Set" (or install)

How to install apps on your watch

Since Samsung Gear S3 runs on Tizen 3.0 OS, popular applications such as Yandex Navigator, Google Maps and others can be installed on them. To download apps to your Gear S3, you must sign in to your Samsung account on your phone. If you don't have a Samsung account, select Sign Up and follow the instructions.

• You can download apps to your watch from your phone using the Samsung Gear app and the Samsung Galaxy Apps tab.
• Swipe left on the watch screen or rotate the frame until you get to the Get More Apps icon
• Select the application you want
• Select "Install"
• Once the app has been installed, you can access it from complete list your watch apps

How to download music to your watch

On the home screen of your smartphone, go to Applications. Select Samsung Gear. The Samsung Gear app may be located in the Samsung folder on some phones. Then do the following:

• Go to the "Settings" tab
• Click Submit Content for Transfer
• Tap "Select Audio Tracks" (may be called differently)
• Check the box next to the audio files you want to move to Gear S3
• Then click "Finish"

To automatically sync new songs to your Gear S3 while the watch is charging, tap the slider next to auto sync to turn syncing on.

How to set and reset a PIN

Since smartwatches do not yet have a fingerprint scanner, data protection is carried out using a regular PIN code. How to install the code and what to do if you forgot it, the tips below will help you with this.

To set a PIN:

• On the Apps screen, tap Settings
• Click "Security"
• Tap Screen Lock
• Tap Screen Lock Type
• Click PIN.
• Enter your 4-digit password
• Re-enter 4-digit PIN to confirm

To reset your PIN:

• Make sure the clock is off
• Press and hold the power button until “Rebooting” appears on the display, then release the key.
• On the "Rebooting" screen, press the "Power" key to confirm the device reset
• After that, the clock will be reset to factory settings along with the PIN

You should understand that Factory Reset will entail complete deletion of data from the watch. Use this method as a last resort if the information stored on the watch is important to you.

How to properly charge the Gear S3

The most important thing to remember is always use the original charger and battery to maintain optimal battery performance over the life of your Samsung watch.

You can charge the watch through the original accessory that comes with the gadget. To do this, simply plug the USB cable into a power outlet and plug into a power outlet or USB port on your computer. The device charges faster with a regular wall outlet. From a laptop, the charging process will be slightly slower.

Place the watch on the charging dock, make sure it is properly connected to the gadget. The device will now start charging. While charging, the watch will display a battery charging icon with the amount of time remaining until the battery is fully charged.

How to improve autonomy

Below are some tips to help you get the most out of your Samsung Gear S3. Follow these instructions and your watch will run significantly longer.

• Set minimum brightness
• Disable smart display activation
• Disable Always On Display
• Turn off continuous heart rate reading
• Disable in GPS settings
• Activate power saving mode

The market for smartwatches appeared a long time ago, but devices of this class received at least some massiveness only with the arrival of Pebble. The young startup that turned the flywheel pushed tech giants into a new niche. Many companies have already noted themselves in this segment, however most of them have not done anything interesting with this type of device. However, the products mature and take on more and more complete appearance. Samsung Gear S2 is just in that adult league.

Samsung has been trying its hand at wearables for a long time, and the Gear S2 is in fact the company's sixth smartwatch. Let's figure out what the Koreans managed to do right on the sixth try, and where the engineers still have serious work to do.

Specifications

• touchscreen round display 1,2 ″ Super AMOLED, 360 × 360, 302 ppi
• RAM: 512 MB, ROM: 4 GB
• Bluetooth 4.1 LE, NFC, Wi-Fi 802.11 b / g / n
• microphone, gyroscope, accelerometer, heart rate sensor, light sensor, barometer
• battery: 250mAh
• protection against moisture and dust: IP68
• dimensions: 42.3 x 49.8 x 11.4 mm, weight: 47 g (without strap)

Appearance

Samsung Gear S2 for the Ukrainian market comes in a round box, thus hinting at the shape of the screen. In the box, the user will find the watch itself, a charging dock, and a smaller interchangeable strap.

The watch itself "to the front" looks minimalistic: a display, a grooved bezel and a metal bezel that can be twisted in any direction. The watch case is metal, made of stainless steel (316L) with matt anodizing. I like the overall simplicity of the design, because the eye does not "stumble" over pretentious elements, and you can wear this watch under any outfit.

The device contains two control keys (Back and Home) located on the right. If you are accustomed to wearing the watch on your right hand, this is not a problem - the interface can be turned upside down, but the buttons are still easy to grope and press.

The rubber strap included with the silver watch is white, the material does not feel cheap to the touch, as it was with the first generation of Pebble. Of course, the strap gets dirty, but it is elementary to clean it - we did it with damp wipes, but you can do it with running water.

Samsung claims compliance with the IP68 standard, which says: Gear S2 is not afraid of dust, and immersion in fresh water one and a half meters for half an hour will be tolerated without consequences. We didn't look for the mark at which the watch would fail, but periodically we “accidentally” washed them from the tap, when we washed our hands, drowned them in the basin a couple of times, and once even took a shower with them (this was really by accident). No hints of a glitch were found.

The build quality and fit of the parts are excellent, which is to be expected from a flagship gadget. The proprietary strap attachment perfectly fixes the bracelet, and the latch design itself excludes even the smallest backlash. If you do not know that the straps can be removed, it will seem that the engineers have fused silicone directly into the case.

Convenience

The rotating bezel around the perimeter of the display is the main control element for Samsung smartwatches: it is used to navigate menus, lists, and also acts as a tool for adjusting various sliders and serves as a controller in a number of games.

All competitors in the wearable electronics market use two control options: either touchscreen and keys, or only keys. Samsung has added a new control method that solves several problems at once: there is no need to smear sebum on the screen in vain and then clean it, the content is constantly in front of the user's eyes (which means that the display can be made a little smaller, this will not affect the final convenience ), on cool days you don't have to take off your gloves to interact with the gadgets.

This shell interaction tool is the best in the smartwatch market

The ring rotates almost effortlessly, but its movement is so precise that there are practically no random jumps over the desired menu, you just need to understand how much you need to scroll the bezel to get to the desired screen. The round interface was initially adapted to the new principle of interaction, which became possible thanks to the OS Tizen, the development of which is fully promoted by the manufacturer of the gadget.

The movable element allowed the company to install a small display without sacrificing convenience - 1.2 inches seem small against the background of competitors, but since the user does not need to constantly poke at the screen, the surface shown is enough for comfortable operation. The small display also allowed the company not to produce huge boilers, but to make quite a neat gadget for itself, which looks good on a graceful female hand, and for guys whose brushes do not look like logs, it also suits.

The regular version of the Gear S2 received a non-standard strap attachment - a dubious decision, which Apple also suffers. Of course, one would assume that the manufacturer is simply planning to cut additional profit on straps (at UAH 1,599 apiece, for a second), but this conspiracy theory does not stick to Gear S2 Classic, which received a standard 22-mm mount, and only only those presented use universal bracelets.

Release 22mm strap adapters, don't torture consumers

For the past two and a half years, I have been actively using the first generation Pebble, which is made of plastic. In this unusually hot summer, it turned out that my skin reacts to the material of the pioneer of the smartwatch market with allergies. And in three weeks of testing the Gear S2, there was no hint of irritation, despite the profuse sweating in the midst of city races. But do not forget that this is individual for each person, so pay attention to the reaction of your body in the first days of using such devices.

What devices does it work with

Samsung says its Gear S2 smartwatch supports any Android smartphone 4.4 KitKat or newer, assuming 1.5GB of RAM or more. Our testing on 6 devices, ranging from the Samsung Galaxy S6 itself to the Chinese ones, showed that the manufacturer is not cheating.

The stability of the Bluetooth connection can be called satisfactory: the connection periodically disappeared and automatically returned, and the auto-switch to Wi-Fi worked well only in close proximity to the access point (up to 10 m), otherwise the watch constantly reported connecting / disconnecting from the network.

Functions and software

Gear S2 is primarily a gadget, but only secondarily a watch. Therefore, their capabilities are at the head of the table when choosing a device.

Pedometer

The step counter is one of the most useful features of any portable device - it makes you walk more in an attempt to achieve higher results (achievements!). With Gear S2, this will not be difficult, since our testing has shown that the watch steadily adds steps - on average, we are talking about an additional 10% for every 10 thousand. Considering that we are not measuring the dose of the drug here, then this level of error is quite acceptable. but the pedants will be disappointed.

A set of sensors automatically detects if you are walking, running, cycling or sitting still. If you do the latter for an especially long time, the watch will remind you that it is time to get away from the chair and take a few steps.

Pulse

The heart rate sensor works mediocre - the watch periodically cannot calculate this parameter, while there is no logic in failures: the skin is light tight on the hand, there are no tattoos, but sometimes the reading works perfectly, and periodically gives out an alert that information could not be obtained. I am glad that 9 out of 10 attempts work correctly.

The watch can track data on a regular basis as well as in manual mode. If you are monitoring your heart rate during sports activities, we recommend tightening the strap tighter to avoid interruptions.

Sleep tracking

Sleep tracking works no better (or worse) than those of specialized competitors such as Misfit or Jawbone - the clock captures the time of falling asleep more or less correctly, but with getting up, they often add too much, which is associated with the desire to “still lie in bed”. The accuracy of deep sleep tracking is difficult to assess, but the results are in line with the competition.

All data is synchronized with the proprietary S Health program, where you can not only watch the progress of training, heart rate, sleep time and the number of steps taken, but also enter other data concerning your body and health. The app is close to competing Google Fit and Apple Health in terms of capabilities, there are no particular advantages or disadvantages over them, at least for the vast majority of users.

Find your smartphone and watch

Smart watches are able to activate a sound signal on a smartphone (a melody set to a call is played), and in the Gear Manager application, you can search for a watch from a smartphone (if you suddenly lost it on your wrist). Since the device has no speaker, the watch will vibrate diligently.

If the smartphone is switched to silent mode, the search from the watch will ignore this restriction and the sound will be forcibly activated.

Alarm clock and timer

Smart watches can wake up with vibration. This is extremely convenient both for some activities (for example, when boiling an egg), and for getting up in the morning without the risk of disrupting the sleep of the second half or a small child. By the way, since the Gear S2 lasts more than a day on a single charge, the alarm will most likely become a popular feature if you are used to sleeping in a watch.

A small minus - the vibration of the watch is rather weak, if you sleep soundly, the Gear S2 may not reach you. We recommend that you check the effectiveness several times in tandem with a traditional alarm clock, on which you set a later wake-up time.

Notifications

The most important functionality that smart watches bring is showing notifications and the ability to somehow react to them. The Gear S2 is all right with this: the user not only sees push notifications and can reject them (on the watch and smartphone at the same time), but also gets the opportunity to fully respond. The latter is implemented in three methods: templates and emoticons, keyboard (telephone and qwerty), and voice.

The dictated answer turns into text, S Voice is responsible for this function. In practice, it is almost impossible to use it - it recognizes short phrases (3-4 words) well, but as soon as the user tries to dictate a sentence, success awaits him only in 20% of cases, the rest of the time incidents happen. The program may completely ignore what you said there and ask you to re-dictate the message. And then he will also misunderstand what you said. In English, the success rate is higher, somewhere around 40%, but how often do you reply to family and friends in English?

Despite the built-in microphone, you cannot answer calls from the Gear S2, as there is no room for a speaker in the design. However, with an incoming call, you can press the green tube, after which the call will be answered on the smartphone. Is it helpful? It is unlikely, because in a car, the call answer button when connected to a headset is located, as a rule, on the steering wheel, but in other scenarios you will still have to take the device in hand.

A proprietary smartphone application allows you to choose which programs to receive notifications from and which ones should be ignored. In general, nothing new, everything is like the competition.

Dials

The Samsung Gear S2, although smart, is still a watch, which means it can display time, and it does it in style thanks to the support of a huge number of skins available in the app store. Many dials support a wide variety of settings, from the color of the hands to the information on the dial itself.

You can also use your own images as a base for the watch, which must be pre-loaded on the Gear S2 through the proprietary application.

Navigation

Native navigation is based on Here maps; a corresponding application must be installed on a smartphone for it to work. The principle of operation does not differ from what we saw from competitors: we set the route, then follow the prompts. When the user is 20 m (when navigating on foot) from the turning point, the watch vibrates slightly, and a pointer appears on the screen in which direction to turn.

Navigation is a little annoying at start: the application takes an incredibly long time to load (it takes 20-30 seconds from clicking on the icon to the start of walking!), And GPS data pickup does not always happen the first time. But if we managed to launch turn-by-turn navigation, then everything works fine.

NFC

The Gear S2 smartwatch contains a built-in NFC module, which, among other things, allows contactless payments. Ukrainian consumers can use this function with the Privat24 application: in the program on the smartphone, we activate payment via NFC, install the proprietary application on the watch, follow the instructions in the program. Then we just pay for purchases in any stores or trips in the Kiev metro (payment terminals must support PayPass).

An important detail - if your smartphone does not have an NFC chip, then you will not be able to activate contactless payment, there are no ways to get around this problem today, the PrivatBank employee said on the website.

Music

Smart watches can store on the built-in storage (4 GB) not only applications, but also photos (it is not clear why), as well as music. The latter makes sense for those who, for example, do not want to take a smartphone for a run or to the gym - connect wireless headphones or an external speaker via Bluetooth and enjoy your favorite songs.

Important: if the music player prevents the data from being indexed (the same "Play Music"), then it will not be possible to transfer such files to the watch. That is, you need to download files to your smartphone's drive directly from your computer or through a browser. It would be possible to work around this problem with proprietary service applications, but Google, like other competitors, is in no hurry to release software for Tizen.

Games

The app store for smart watches contains a (small) number of games of different levels of interest and with the obligatory mediocrity of the visual component. Of course, games on a smartwatch are not needed, but for a queue where you have to stand for just a minute, it will do. We recommend Bezel Reflex, a ball is displayed on the screen, which jumps up and down and changes color, and your task is to rotate the platforms, substituting tiles of the corresponding color under it.

Most of the games from the store seemed completely pointless due to decent loading times - some projects require the user to wait 15 seconds before starting the gameplay, which does not at all fit into the general concept of instant use in the queue. For more anticipation, you can get your smartphone out of your pocket, enjoying a much larger display and advanced graphics.

Branded application and software store

Samsung traditionally makes high-quality hardware, which either amaze with their manufacturability or please with exceptional accuracy. However, as a rule, everything is not so rosy with the software of the company. And this is true not only for older versions of the proprietary TouchWiz shell, but also for Gear Manager, an application that serves as a companion to the watch.

The basic functionality (updating the firmware, connecting to the clock, managing permissions for notifications) is implemented well, although in some places it is not obvious. The app looks more like a website than a native software, but this is more an aesthetic perception than a real minus.

But the company's programmers seem to have made every effort to make the most problematic software store on the planet. And, honestly, there is a suspicion that they did it.

The shoals of the store's work are not permanent, they appear a couple of times a week, but when they are, you want to throw out this beautiful device from a technical point of view.

What's wrong with screenshots of programs? Why in some of them only one frame is loaded, although five are attached in the description?

What is the general logic of clicking on "Installed" under the previously downloaded program launches, pardon the tautology, re-download the application? What for? For what?

Oh, also this:

Above, you see an example of how the S Health app not only needs a SIM card to activate to synchronize your activity, you also need to insert it into the first slot!

Add to this the impossibility to view all programs from one developer (even Samsung itself or the same "Yandex" - there is no such heading as "other developer programs"), the amazing slowness of the interface (web program, not otherwise) and just the most ingenious limitation - loading programs from the store are interrupted on some smartphones (for example) if you leave it! No, seriously, how could this be done?

Technical problems are annoying, but not for long - you don't have to constantly return to the store, because new software does not appear often.

Tizen

Samsung Gear S2 runs under the proprietary Tizen OS, which has a positive impact on a decent battery life. In addition, the manufacturer managed to achieve a high smoothness of the interface, which pleases. More precisely, the smoothness occasionally disappears, you literally see a slideshow on the screen, but this happened only twice during the entire testing period, so let's write it off as an exception.

However, the proprietary solution has its own problems: the number of third-party programs is small, and most of what is in the store is generally useless. It's good that the platform is tightly integrated with Android, making it easy to respond to notifications in the same Telegram, even without a proprietary program for Tizen.

Things aren't so smooth with iOS

Smart watches are not a competitor to the Apple Watch in general from the word at all - the Koreans have not released Gear Manager for iOS (although they promised back in January 2016), which is why iPhone owners simply cannot use this gadget (or rather, all functionality will be limited to push to the watch in the amount available in the notification shade). And this is Samsung's mistake, since the accessory itself turned out to be extremely interesting, some Apple users would definitely try a round watch from Koreans instead of the expensive Apple Watch. Or was Apple itself missing the app in the App Store? (Actually not, for now, but when the app hits the app store is unknown.)

Working hours

Of course, during the initial setup and software download, as well as a detailed examination of the capabilities, the battery was returned in less than 10 hours, but as soon as our sample began to be used in normal mode, everything immediately became much better - the average autonomy was two days and another 10-15 hours on the third. For 10 hours of sleep, the device loses about 12% of the charge, while sleep tracking is active.

The charge speed from 8% to 100% through the stock charger took 2 hours 43 minutes, which is not very good at first glance if you want to always track your sleep. On the other hand, an hour of charging is sufficient for a full work day and night, so long energy recovery times are more of a specific feature than a disadvantage.

Up to the reference Pebble, which work under our load for about 6 days, samsung flagship far, but these devices are not competitors to each other - the Korean device should be compared with solutions based on Android Wear and watchOS, which work less on a single charge. It turns out that Gear S2 in its class belongs to the long-livers.

Competitors

The Samsung Gear S2 is Tizen's flagship device, which doesn't stop it from competing with Android Wear smartwatch makers. Now there is a clear leader on this platform - Huawei Watch. The Chinese smartwatch offers the maximum of OS features, an excellent 1.4-inch screen, and a nice look. At the same time, the size of the display does not allow to call them compact, and the price is menacing - 9999 UAH. The only clear advantage of the Huawei Watch is the number of programs written for Android Wear.

Apple Watch

Huawei watch

Apple Watch, as the only device that fully interacts with iOS, is available in several versions, starting from just over UAH 10,000 for a compact model. The device will face a tough battle with the much more affordable Gear S2 once the company releases the app for iOS. Of course, this will still not be full support at the system level, but the noticeable difference in price and appearance will certainly play into the hands of the Koreans.

The best on the market, with tons of problems

The Gear S2 smart watch is officially available in Ukraine for UAH 6999, which is almost the cheapest accessory of its kind in the country. At the same time, even if the choice was wider, all the same, the Samsung device would have to be compared with the flagship platforms: Apple Watch (from UAH 10 399) and Huawei Watch (UAH 9999).

What we have? Samsung Gear S2 works longer than the aforementioned competitors, although they do not differ functionally, they also contain premium body materials, and they do not lose outwardly (and for me they even win by a serious margin). Moreover, the rotating bezel and mechanical buttons allow you to perform most of the trivial actions without touching the screen, that is, the glass remains not tattered, and with the onset of cold weather this will bring another bonus - Gear S2 owners do not have to take off their gloves to see new notifications. Today, no company has a better solution for managing watches.

The size of the display, coupled with the "bezel", remains sufficient for comfortable gadget control, and the dimensions themselves make the device universal, especially against the background of massive Huawei Watch, which not every girl will be ready to put on her graceful wrist, fearing that huge boilers are simply break her arm.

All the advantages of Samsung Gear S2 are opposed by the proprietary fastening of straps (this is not Apple, there are few disappearing Chinese counterparts for Korean smartwatches), inferior software for a smartphone, as well as a meager app store. And if the mount is more of a claim to "find fault", then the software is very frustrating.

Without activity in the store it will be bad in the future, especially with the release of new services and messengers, which will continue to appear primarily for the more popular and already known watchOS developers with Android Wear, while Tizen will remain afloat by a group of unofficial enthusiasts. customers and developers who paid millions to Samsung.

Should I buy

The lack of software will be important only for active users who constantly want to install something new, the rest of the existing set of software will be more than enough. In reality, a proprietary application for a smartphone is rarely used (ideally, once at all, to configure the device and download the necessary software from the store). There are fitness functions, the operating time is decent, the appearance is not for everybody, but those who like the round display will be satisfied even after months of use. And the bezel in practice turned out to be not a far-fetched excess, but extremely logical and in a convenient way interaction with the interface.

Do you not use your iPhone or Windows Phone as your main device, do not like to clog all desktops with programs that are good if you launch them once, and also feel aesthetic pleasure when you look at the Samsung Gear S2? Take it without hesitation, especially since this is the cheapest flagship among smartwatches.

Basically not using Samsung technology? Is your house cluttered with appliances with an apple logo on it? Are you in a dire need to roll out a fresh beta? Pass by, the Gear S2 won't deliver a tenth of the fun you can get with a watchOS or Android Wear smartwatch.

4 reasons to buy Gear S2:

• excellent assembly, pleasant appearance
• a rotating bezel is an almost ideal method of controlling a smart watch
• compact size without compromising the information content of the screen
• decent battery life

4 reasons not to buy the Gear S2:

• small amount of software
• you have an iPhone or a Windows Phone smartphone
• you want to buy the much more expensive Gear S3
• you have convinced yourself that a smartwatch is a useless toy

P.S. Gear S3

Samsung at IFA 2016 a new generation of watches, Gear S3. Actual models are a little larger, their appearance is more brutal. By the way, they cost significantly more (one and a half times). The manufacturer assured at the presentation that Gear S2 will be sold and developed in parallel with the new product, which means if you are more inclined to the hero of the review, then you can buy them without fear that the Koreans will not release updates and will soon stop supporting the device.

After several weeks of testing the Samsung Galaxy Gear, I'm sharing my opinion on this smartwatch with internet, camera and many other features.

The Samsung Galaxy Gear is a really interesting device. It is a mini smartphone with a tiny screen that you can wear on your wrist. I am deliberately writing a mini-smartphone, because the Galaxy Gear is also a full-fledged device. It has a 800 MHz processor, 512 MB random access memory, 4 GB of internal memory, Bluetooth 4.0 LE, gyroscope, accelerometer, camera, battery and works on the basis of a modified Android platform. It is possible to launch external applications and from smartphones of previous years it actually differs only in the largest screen and the absence of 3G or WiFi.

Samsung Galaxy Gear view

The appearance of the Samsung Galaxy Gear is strikingly different from the design of Samsung smartphones. The watch case is metal with massive screws, and the strap is ribbed. The color scheme of the straps is not very pleasing - white with golden metal, black, green, gray, orange and just white.

It seems to me that future versions will not be so awesome, but the functions will be more thoughtful. At the very least, Gear needs to be developed in this direction.

Because the Gear today is primarily designed to view the notifications that appear on a compatible smartphone. In addition, you can use it to take photos, measure time, launch applications, count steps, receive and make calls, monitor media on your smartphone, and even a little more.

All of these additional features can be useful, but I'm not sure if this is enough to satisfy and surprise potential buyers. After all, this is a watch and it should perform different functions from those of a smartphone.

For example, long battery life. In testing, the Gear's battery lasted two days, which is certainly more than a smartphone, but it's a watch. In addition, this gadget must be loaded with a smartphone near a tablet or computer.

Samsung had to make some pretty big decisions when designing the Gear, because smartwatches must have a lot of bells and whistles.

Galaxy Gear Ease of Use

The most important thing in everyday life is the ability to manage notifications. It's a little hard to get used to the fact that, besides the phone, the watch can also vibrate, but when this happens, you realize how much the ability to view notifications on the watch makes life easier.

Provided that you get to the function of enabling notifications. The Gear Manager application creates a pairing between your smartphone and smartwatch. Gear Manager, a control settings app along with watch apps, is a tragic piece that discourages anyone from using this mechanism. Mainly because it's ugly, illogical and chaotic. Gear Manager is often buggy, writes that it cannot connect to the watch, and all settings do not work. In general, the mechanism clearly requires improvement.

For several days, I had no idea the Gear supported more notifications than just selected Samsung apps. The option with the ability to integrate notifications with any received notifications from any application installed on the smartphone is hidden under the key of highlighting / deselecting additional notifications. This is a huge problem with Samsung's interface - additional options will not work until you check the box. Moreover, such options, the presence of which is not mentioned in the main menu.

Once the box was checked, the Gear showed everything it was capable of. He began to inform about Gmail emails, what was happening on Twitter, Facebook or Instagramie and other applications that are used daily.

I quickly realized that while walking the dogs, when only one hand was free, checking email with the Gear would keep my smartphone out of my pocket. Having received a message on Facebook Messenger, I read it on Gearze, confirming that I cannot unsubscribe immediately - without pulling out my smartphone.

It is for this reason - not having a camera, pedometer, or other apps - that Gear proved to me that a smartwatch makes sense.

Outcome

I take back my words that “smart” watches are meaningless. In addition, thanks to the Samsung Galaxy Gear, I now know what should be in a universal watch:

Excellent notification management system with the ability to perform actions such as Android notifications, a battery that can hold a charge for at least a week (Samsung Galaxy Gear is not perfect for this parameter), small size, user-friendly interface and elegant, but nothing remarkable design.

Korea's Samsung has announced its first Android smartwatch, the Galaxy Gear, at IFA in Berlin. The device is designed to work in conjunction with a smartphone or tablet, can take photos, recognize voice commands and has already received several dozen special applications.

Design and features
Technically, the Galaxy Gear is a smaller and stripped-down smartphone from three years ago with no Wi-Fi or connectivity. The Super AMOLED watch has a display with a diagonal of 1.63 inches and a resolution of 320 x 320 pixels, a single-core 800 MHz Exynos processor and a Bluetooth module with support for the cost-effective Bluetooth Low Energy standard for communication with the "parent" device. The device has a 1.9-megapixel camera built into the strap, as well as two miniature speakers. The microphone is built into the end of the strap, which means that when the watch is worn, it is on the inside of the wrist.

The main part of the watch, which makes up a single whole with the strap (alas, it will not work to replace it with your own, only for the multi-colored versions from Samsung), has impressive dimensions - about 36.8 by 56.6 mm with a thickness of 11.1 mm. The front bezel, flanking the screen, is made of metal and the strap is made of rubber-like plastic.

In addition to the screen, the Galaxy Gear has only one control - the power / lock button. In addition, the device can be connected via USB and transfer files to it, including applications. Samsung promises that galaxy battery Gear (capacity 315 mAh) is enough for the device to work for more than a day without recharging. True, this will depend on the frequency of its use, mainly on how long the screen remains on.

Another important clarification - so far Gear is working only with the smartphone also announced the day before in Berlin. Galaxy Note III and the tablet Galaxy Note 10.1 2014. In the near future, Samsung promises to release a firmware update for the Galaxy S4, which will allow "make friends" with the watch and it, and in the fall - similar updates for last year's Galaxy SIII and Note II. Samsung smartwatches are apparently incompatible with Android devices from other manufacturers, which puts them in a losing position in relation to more universal, although not so functional solutions from Sony, Pebble and a number of other manufacturers.

What Galaxy Gear Can Do
Unlike the Pebble smartwatches with an e-ink screen, the Galaxy Gear has to turn off the display to save power. That is, to see the time, it is not enough just to look at the device, you also need to press a button on it. But by pressing it, you can use a lot of functions without taking the smartphone paired with the Gear (you need to put a special application on it) from your pocket or bag.

Since this is a clock, then, of course, you can display the time in digital or analog (hands) form, the type of clock can be selected in the application on a smartphone, the digital version is also capable of displaying the weather. From the same application, you can call the Gear detection function, if the gadget is lost somewhere, the watch will start making a sound.

You can scroll the watch screen by viewing installed applications... The standard functions include control of music playback on a smartphone, a pedometer that calculates the distance traveled and calories burned, and synchronizes data with the S Health application for the Galaxy line of smartphones.

With the built-in camera, you can shoot 720p video or photos. The microphone allows the device to integrate with the S Voice voice control system used by most current models samsung smartphones... Using voice commands, without taking your smartphone out of your pocket, you can set an alarm, initiate a call (if you wish, you can speak by holding the watch to your ear) or ask for the current weather. You can dial and call directly from your watch using the on-screen dialer. You can also create calendar events and text messages from the clock.

The watch with vibration and sound can notify the user about incoming messages, calls and other events. Moreover, if you saw an alert, for example, about a new letter on the watch and took out a smartphone to read it in its entirety (the watch will show only the first few words), then, according to Samsung, the Smart Relay function will immediately display its text on the screen of the device. Voice Memo allows you to dictate a bright thought that suddenly occurred to your Gear, or to record a conversation, and then convert the recording into text on your smartphone.

The Galaxy Gear can also be used as a "key" to your smartphone. The Auto Lock function makes it possible to lock the smartphone every time the paired watch is more than one and a half meters away, and unlock it when the "owner" returns.

At the same time, more popular services - for example, Facebook and Twitter - have not yet presented their applications for Samsung smart watches.

Samsung has promised the Galaxy Gear will go on sale in 140 countries on September 25. In the US, the device will cost $ 300, which, taking into account the traditions of the Russian market, in our country, most likely, will convert thousands to 15 rubles. There are some doubts that the device will be popular with such a price tag - after all, for 15,000 today you can buy a completely high-quality full-featured (although not the most advanced flagship) smartphone from one of the leading manufacturers.