this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2023

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The original Apple Watch lineup is officially obsolete (narwhal.city)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

47 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Yes, including the 18-karat gold model.

https://www.engadget.com/the-original-apple-watch-lineup-is-officially-obsolete-083825819.html

top 47 comments

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Good riddance. I had a first gen watch, and it was awful. Trying to navigate apps would take minutes. And forget about trying to use Siri with it. Even gen 2 was night and day in terms of performance, but I think gen 3 was when it really became a viable product.

I still miss my Pebble though. Really, if Apple would let people make faces for the damned thing and create a rich face ecosystem, that would remedy like 90% of my issues with the watch. And just putting the time on a pic isn't an answer. I miss things like the old LCARS face I had on my Pebble that incorporated all the other data into it (time, date, battery, now playing, weather, etc.). They need to let us do that with custom faces.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

100% agree. The first gen felt entirely rushed. Slow as molasses.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I love the Pebbles. I have a Pebble Time, just snagged a used Pebble Time Round 20mm from eBay so I'm looking forward to trying that out!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Your comment sent me digging. I had no idea that they could still function. I thought they were lost to time (lol), but apparently Google gave an update to the official app so the Rebble project could keep supporting all the functionality of the watch. Looks like it's Android only, though tbf Pebble always did have significantly more functionality on Android than iOS. But if it would work on iOS, I'd dig out my Pebble right now.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I think you can technically still use Pebble on iOS, but I'm not sure how. The previous owner of the watch has been using it with his iPhone 13.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Yeah apparently there's some weird side loading thing you can do, but you have to keep updating it once a week or it stops working.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

You can still use them with GadgetBridge if Rebble ever goes away too!

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago

I feel like the important part is that apple again is allowed to keep its old devices locked up after taking them our of support. This needs to become illegal.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Anybody else having non-buyer's relief?

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's an eight year old smartwatch. I feel like most of the target audience already has a newer model.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Now I'm curious what the newer models are for. Isn't it essentially a watch with notifications and buttons for music?

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Apple quickly pivoted it to a health tracking device. newer model have even medical grade ECG, blood oxygen level, fall and crash detection, etc. plus the usual activity tracking (steps, calories, workouts)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's pretty cool. Is that actually useful for most people?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I think so, yeah. For example if I crash my motorbike it will ask if I'm OK and call emergency services, providing them with my location, name, next of kin, etc if I don't respond.

So far, I've hit the "I'm OK" button the few times that feature has activated, but one day I might not be so lucky.

Mostly though, I like being able to see the accurate time (without needing to adjust it occasionally), the weather forecast, my next calendar schedule, a "traffic is normal" message while getting ready for work in the morning*, and read notifications without taking my phone out of my pocket.

(* if there's a car accident on my commute, my watch tells me to leave for work early, and which route is best to avoid the worst of the traffic)

The newer watches also have better screens, faster processors, more RAM, etc etc... and also lithium batteries don't last forever. So I seriously doubt anyone is actually using an eight year old watch unless they've had the battery replaced at least a couple times. They're not really designed to be taken apart so the cost to replace the battery isn't much cheaper than just upgrading to the new/better model.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Are there any good non-Apple equivalents for health tracking? Something that does pulse-ox for example, but isn't stuck in the walled garden.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

non-apple, yes. not stuck in a waller garden, I dont think so (garmin, and samsung make some alternatives)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I'm never buying a smart watch again. I bought into the Moto360 hype back around this same period. The watch was slow as molasses and basically next to useless. The battery wouldn't last a full day either. You'd look down to tell the time, and it would be blank. So phone out of the pocket, which is what they are supposed to help prevent.

It was the watch that made me realize that I'd rather just have an actual watch. The battery completely gave out on it sometime in 2018, and it looked like a PITA to fix, so now I have this really attractive gold watch with a nice band that's completely useless. Won't be handing it down to the grandkids, that's for sure. I've got a nice real watch now, and they can have that.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago (2 children)

if you bought the gold watch and now you feel cheated, you totally deserve it.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Seems to me anyone rich enough to spend so much on something so stupid might have gotten some other extravagant accessory to replace it already.

If anyone thought an electronic device would become a family heirloom they are really clueless.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

If anyone thought an electronic device would become a family heirloom they are really clueless.

I think the first good wearable computer ever made has great potential as something people might like to collect. I have the first ever (proper/good) laptop for example. It doesn't work anymore, but I still like having it (and I'd love to restore it some day - just because Apple won't fix it doesn't mean it can't be fixed... it just means Apple isn't maintaining a large stockpile of spare parts anymore).

In 20 years time, I bet those watches are worth a lot of money in good condition. An original iPhone recently sold at auction for $200,000.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

the first good wearable computer ever made

That's an opinion and a half! People might consider it collectable but they're not exactly rare.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

On the flip side, the gold still has its worth in gold... 🤷

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There's always been a weird market for "luxury" tech that's a gold-plated version of what everyone else has. I remember gold-plated pre-smartphone phones that went for ridiculous amounts of money; of course it becomes obsolete, it's targeting those with money but no foresight.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's targeting the ones saying stuff like "If you can afford a coffee a day... how much is a coffee anyway, like $100?"

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

It's one banana, Michael. What could it cost, $10?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (4 children)

It had been from day one, just in case no-one noticed.

The very idea of a "watch" that has a bunch of gimmics while completely fail the main job of providing the time over a long time without any hassle shows how absurd this product was from the very beginning.

A good automatic, mechanical watch is way superior on that behalf. As a bonus, it looks better. And you don't have to press a button to actually see the time.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (2 children)

… You do realize Apple Watches have had always-on screens for half a decade now? You don’t have to do anything to see the time.
And yeah, if all you use it for is to see the time, then it’s obviously not worth it. But can you listen to music through a mechanical watch? Can you use a mechanical watch to respond to text messages? Can a mechanical watch show you the map while you’re hiking?
Why even have a smartphone? You just need a landline phone. After all, it’s just pick up and dial, with a smartphone you have to unlock it to call.
Or maybe phones can be more than just phones these days? Just like watches can be more than just watches.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Just like watches can be more than just watches.

Yes. Like needing to be recharged every night, and being obsolete after a handful of years.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Apple Watches aren’t the only option, and watches don’t just go "obsolete" like they’ve gone out of date. Just because they don’t get more support doesn’t mean they’re unusable. This article is literally about how an almost decade old product still had official support until now, and it’s going to still be a usable product for years to come if you’re willing to put up with the slowness inherent to the first gen (seriously, 2nd or 3rd series and onwards watches could easily last over a decade or more)

Also, this criticism applies to smartphones too… but it doesn’t mean (most) people abandon their smartphones and use a Nokia 3310 for their multiple week batterylife over one that needs to charge every/every other night. The tradeoff of charging is offset ten-fold by the slew of useful features.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's an apple problem, not a smartwatch problem in general

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Any smartwatch that has the utility of an Apple Watch will also have the battery issues of an Apple Watch.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Yes the batteries are small, but other brands last much longer than Apple watches. And really, setting your watch down on the wireless charger at night is no harder than plugging your phone in or taking your regular watch off and putting it on your nightstand

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Those other brands will not have feature parity with the Apple Watch. I agree that charging the watch every light is not an issue.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Yes the batteries are small, but other brands last much longer than Apple watches

No they don't. Apple Watches have very large batteries and very efficient processors.

Other smart watches only get longer battery life if you avoid power hungry features... and you can do that with an Apple Watch. Apple's largest watch will last a full 30 days if you don't use power hungry features like wifi, heart rate monitoring, music playback, Siri, GPS, etc etc. The smaller Apple watches will last almost as long in the same mode.

Most smart watches that advertise long battery life have all (or at least most) of those features, and they don't last long at all if you take advantage of them. The Garmin FR965 (their largest watch) advertises "up to 25 days" battery life but that's with everything disabled (and it's also less than the 30 days you get with an Apple Watch). If you read the spec sheet for the Garmin FR965 it advertises "Up to 8.5 hours" if you make extensive use of all of the available smartwatch features. And that's the biggest/heaviest Garmin. The popular Garmins have smaller batteries - like half the size of the battery in that Garmin.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

That's my bad then. For some reason I was getting my info mixed up. Anyways, yeah 30 days is a long time but companies always bullshit like that where they say "up to". My galaxy watch 3 is pretty good on battery life, like a day and a half of me just using it regularly for time and heart rate etc. The biggest problem I have is that if I want to sleep track with it I need to remember to put it on the charger when I sit down at my desk and most of the time I forget so it dies on me.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

My Apple Watch needs to be charged ever night.

The watch I had before needed the time adjusted every night if I wanted it to be accurate to the second which I did. And adjusting was a painful process. You can't adjust the seconds - it resets the secondhand to zero and then you need to stare at a reliable timepiece (like maybe an Apple Watch), taking the regular watch out of time set mode at exactly zero seconds. If you miss it by a second... you need to wait an entire minute to try again.

I don't like sleeping with my watch on anyway, so placing it on a charger isn't a problem. And the battery lasts long enough it doesn't matter if I forget ocasinally.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

There are very affordable g-shocks with multi band, using radio signals to accurately set the time every night with an atomic clock as the source. I mean if accuracy is an issue.

The solar models also charge using sunlight and fluorescent lights but will still last about 1-2 years in darkness. Regular wear will always keep it charged.

Not to say an Apple Watch isn’t right for you. Just stating that non-smart watch options exist for those who just want to tell time, date, weekday, accurately with added stuff like alarms and stopwatch etc.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I never really got this argument, to be honest. I put mine on the charger when I take a shower in the morning. If I did a long workout that day, shortly before bed, too. Other than that, I wear mine day and night. It really doesn’t feel like a big deal to me. I wouldn’t wear a mechanical (or quartz) watch in the shower either.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If you have an apple watch do you leave home without your smartphone?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

I often go phoneless when I go hiking or jogging, yes.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I can see you're a watch enthusiast. But really, people don't buy smart watches to see the time. They buy them to more easily keep track of their fitness progress, (heart rate, bp, blood oxygen, etc.), and it's much easier to respond to a message without having to take your attention away from something else. We shouldn't be attacking the idea of a smartwatch because it's pretty cool, we should be attacking the companies tracking us, stealing our data, and making us pay absurd amounts of money for something that goes obsolete in a few years.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

If you have a fitness tracker - no problems with that. Needs a recharge after two or three weeks, which is not perfect, but still better than those "smart" watches that you have to feed daily.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago

I don't personally know anybody who got an apple watch to tell the time.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Ok, I'll be sure to use my automatic mechanical watch to check my decent speed and heart rate on my ski trip... Oh wait...

Personally I have a Garmin Fenix for the 3 week battery life but let's not pretend that a mechanical watch and a smartwatch fill even close to the same market segment... It's like telling someone who dropped 3k on a mountain bike to buy a car instead as it's faster on the highway: ok, but not comparable and not relevant

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Personally I have a Garmin Fenix for the 3 week battery life

Now that is a totally different beast than an Apple watch that has to be recharged daily.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

That's an expensive paperweight.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I'm waiting for the news that my automatic and Swiss quartz watches have become obsolete. That'd be news!