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Comment by solarkraft | Hacker News Reader

That few?

I wasn't a huge fan of Pebble, the company - they didn't sell replacement parts, for instance (the watch for geeks? yeah, sure).

For some crazy reason, though, to this day, this watch is still almost the only one that gets such a basic thing right: Telling the damn time.

The formula is as simple as it is unreplicated:

- Always telling the time

- Good battery life

- Buttons

Why nobody else makes such a watch is a mystery to me. The Amazfit Bip comes close, but it requires touch interaction and doesn't look as nice as the Pebble Time Steel. It's also supported by GadgetBridge though and also does heart rate tracking while having much better battery life (while being smaller!). When my Bip broke after a few months I bought another (5 years old at this point!) Pebble and am pretty happy with it. I could use some heart rate tracking, though.

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The actual number of Pebble users is likely far higher, this is just the count we get from our side at Rebble.

There are more Pebble users out there using Gadgetbridge for example.

> There are more Pebble users out there using Gadgetbridge for example.

There could also be many more users using neither. For example, my wife is still using the OG Pebble (the monochromatic one) with the official app and stock firmware, today. I was using my Pebble Time with the OG app/firmware as well, until couple months ago when I broke my phone and couldn't transfer the app to the new one, at which point I decided to go the Rebble route.

> Buttons

This is the killer feature for me and why I still use mine daily. I don't know why nobody else is doing this. With media controls on a shortcut slot I can pause whatever media I'm playing, switch songs, etc without even looking at the screen. No other smartwatch I've used comes close to that convenience.

I have a Fossil Hybrid HR Collider that allows this.

Real watch hands, buttons and an e-ink display. 7-10 days battery life.

It's a really nice watch.

Seems like a lot of reviews out there that indicate that the screen fails pretty quick - have you had any trouble with lack of contrast on yours?

Basically the only reason I got the smartwatch I got, is because it always displays the time, even if it runs out of battery, that it can vibrate when I receive phone calls, it keeps track of my heart rate and sleeping activity. The battery also lasts days rather than hours, which is pretty nice.

I don't exactly know which model it is, but it's a Garmin watch with the traditional hour/minute arms and a tiny little screen. But it really kicks ass at telling me the time :)

Maybe a Garmin vivomove HR, I got mine for the same reasons

> The formula is as simple as it is unreplicated:

> - Always telling the time

> - Good battery life

> - Buttons

I'm not so sure this is "unreplicated". Since bailing on Pebble I've had 2 Garmin watches which always tell the time, and have good battery life and buttons.

Tactile buttons, easy replies, and the epaper display. Such a simple combination, but I don't think we'll ever see a new one again. Seeing the time without having to shake my wrist like a maniac was such a game changer.

Haven't used a smart watch in 6ish years, so maybe they're better. From what I understand though, they still don't have always on displays for time, right? I hope I'm wrong and that they do.

From what I understand though, they still don't have always on displays for time, right?

Apple is on the fourth version that has an always-on-display, and Google's new Pixel watch has it. Can't say about any others with any confidence, but I'd be surprised if Apple/Google are the only ones.

Oh thank god. I'm just ignorant.

Garmin Fenix/Forerunner/Instinct meets all of these, though at a significantly higher cost than the pebble. It's worth it for me because I'm into the fitness tracking but hard to justify otherwise.

Coros Pace 2 has buttons and a crown but no touch screen. Its gets 2 weeks of battery life in real world use.

https://www.coros.com/pace2

Garmin watches do all of those things well, including heart rate and fitness tracking/etc. Take a look at the Vivoactive line. My Vivoactive 4 gets >1 week battery life depending on the number of notifications I get (vibration vs battery life).

"That few?"

"Why nobody else makes such a watch is a mystery to me."

There ya go.

Right. Apple sold 46.1 million Apple Watches last year alone.

There are always people who mourn the Pebble and I understand why. But the market has clearly shown you don’t need a week of battery life to be successful.

The market works in mysterious ways :). That also explains why ElectronJS is so successful.

People will buy whatever Apple makes lmao.

But in all seriousness it's the general public's lack of foresight to care about the direction these products go, they don't know what they're sacrificing all they see is shiny oled, whizzbang animations.

Same as the general apathy towards right to repair, the general public doesn't give two shits because they can't connect the dots: right to repair---->I can take it to the repair shop around the corner. Normies that hear about it will just think "well I'm not repairing stuff myself anyway".

Other than battery life, how does this compare to iwatch?

It has more buttons than an Apple Watch and is a lot simpler with less functionality, which for many is a draw.

I had two Pebbles and was very sad when it shut down - my Pebble devices are no longer functioning but I've been using an Apple Watch for maybe 6 years now and am very happy with it. Sometimes I miss the battery life, but I never feel like it's a restriction and the UI on the Apple Watch is really very good.

Garmin instinct - check - check - check

Most Garmin watches fit your formula

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