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Comment by Sodman | Hacker News Reader

Another original Pebble kickstarter here. I still feel that "smart" watches peaked with Pebble. Long battery life, physical buttons / no touch-screen, waterproof, shows notifications / allows basic actions to be taken on them. That's all I wanted from a smart watch, and it provided it all!

I don't know who decided that I need to be able to make and receive calls on my watch, have a color screen, or any number of the other "new features" modern smart watches push. I wouldn't mind a HRM, but I'd still prefer a 1-week battery life.

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I really like my TicWatch Pro. Obviously it's underpowered, has too little RAM and storage, and the GOOG badness makes me sad.

That said, it allows me to read my heart rate, reply to messages, have a customisable Linux terminal prompt tell the time/date, and store an SSH key for when I need it.

This is the peak, IMHO.

The next peak will be when it doesn't have teh GOOG OS.

Things move slowly, but I'm getting a PinePhone (just had the email about Brexit messing up shipping) because if we can help get a proper OS onto devices, we should.

Nothing should peak so early that it gets forgotten about for another "generation".

I really want to know more about the usecase of having to store SSH key on your watch.

You know when you're marching on the Capitol and you've left your phone at home so the Feds don't know it's you and you nick Pelosi's laptop then need to SCP (or rsync over SSH seeing as SCP is getting binned) all the files back to your server?

Nah, me either. Especially as I'm in England. Please don't send the black helicopters.

Having something critical on your watch (PGP/SSH) means you're never stuck without it. I'd love to be able to plug it in as a bootable USB with Tails on. I seem to recall someone doing that for phones so it might be possible!

The reason I always need keys... Mum uses Linux (my choice) and I admin it from 200 miles away when she can't get her game to run.

Fossil HR Hybrid ticks most of your needs. It isn't waterproof as a Pebble, though buttons on my Pebble 2 disintegrated (I also had a Pebble 1 KS edition). Doesn't have touch screen. Battery life 2 weeks (approx). Shows notifications, can control music, doesn't have color. You can even put the smart display off, or customize it (slightly). It has 3 buttons. What I miss is an option to put Bluetooth off.

These do seem nice! I'd like waterproofing for swimming, but in reality it's not a deal breaker.

Garmin is your friend here. Ticks all those boxes + 10 day battery life with regular use.

I've looked into Garmin as they seem fairly rugged and seem nice for hiking/biking/running, but wow are they expensive. I struggle to pull the trigger on what is essentially a computer with a limited lifetime.

I've had my Garmin for about a year and it's great. I don't intend to replace it for many years. I got it on sale, I think that's the key.

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