Why I Threw Away My Apple Watch | Hacker News Reader

Why I Threw Away My Apple Watch

jyriand.com

25 pointsjyriand54 comments

I genuinely don’t understand why this is a problem for some people. It charges in under 15 minutes while I shower each morning. When I’m traveling I do always forget the charger however.

Robot vacuums on the other hand are awful for me. I always leave small cables and things on the floor like a jacket on the back of a chair. Also it does a poor job of transitioning from a hardwood surface to a thick rug. It frequently fails to charge even sitting on the dock. Also it is louder than even my shop vac.

Some people just are forgetful. It doesn't matter how quickly it charges if you simply can't remember to do it frequently enough. That's one of the reasons I decided against a fancy smartwatch myself and focused on Pebble-style monochrome watches with longer battery life.

Which robot vacuum do you have? I have Roborock from like 2019 or so and it still works amazing.

To me it's a real life saver and a pleasure to use.

I do quickly scan the rooms and clean up stuff that I think it might otherwise get stuck at, but it doesn't take more than a minute. Considering the savings overall what it would otherwise take to use vacuum yourself it's crazy good. And I'm definitely a lazy person in terms of putting stuff away or leaving them unnecessarily on the floor.

I have special plastic boxes without lids I can quickly throw things like cables that I left on the floor before enabling the vacuum.

It's yet another device that needs regular charging. Don't we have enough of those already?

Well, no one’s forcing you to get one.

Somehow, this really resonates with me. I have used an Apple Watch off and on the last three years. While I have no problem keeping it charged, doing so is still a chore. When I wake up, I remove my iPhone, AirPods and Apple Watch from the charger. Some mornings it feels like my sole purpose in life is to dress myself in technology and while keeping the various integrated batteries topped off. I got the watch for the fitness functions and because I love technology. And the fitness functions are really good, closing rings have had me exercise more than I would otherwise. The problem I have with the Apple Watch is that it makes it really awkward to wear a real watch, one of the few pieces of jewellery that I as a feel confident wearing. Double wristing is not for me. It is a marvellous piece of technology can be really useful, but it limits me more than it enables me.

If charging is an issue for you, Garmin has smart watches available in a variety of styles with battery life up to several weeks (including solar charging on some models).

The main issue is not having a normal watch that is not a bunch of pixels. I love my G-shock and Seiko mechanical watch and as a bonus they are far better at telling the time.

I understand the issues you experience. I don’t get the point you are trying to make.

I have a cheaper smartwatch and a dirty cheap robot cleaner.

Cheaper smartwatch has e-ink screen, notifications, payment, health monitors, etc. It doesn’t have all possible smart features, but in return I got 30d battery life.

Cheap robot vacuum cleaner is based on basic sensors, no lidar or recognition systems. It gets stuck in cables, it misses 10% of spots, but it captures 2 cup sized ball of dust every day.

I am happy with both. Especially because I researched and found what works for me. Maybe the ‘best’, ‘smartest’ and most expensive products in the market isn’t neccesaary what everybody needs?

Which watch is this?

Garmin Instinct 2

What smartwatch models is it?

Garmin Instinct 2

Wasn't there a version with self winding but no surplus return to battery. It had no health sensors though as a extrem low energy device.

If I recall correctly the winding energy was directly used up for operations to spare the battery. Someone help me out, the core was some SOC from TI..

Sequent Supercharger smartwatch series perhaps?

I actually never heard about it but I guess we now live in the era of “gpt is your friend”. :)

Bought a watch to monitor fitness, then settles on a Casio that doesn't?

Retro Casios look great, to be fair. But, IMO, knowing the time isn't something I need to be solved on my wrist anymore given everyone carries phones.

I rarely carry my cell phone. I often even don’t know where it is. For telling time, I have an F-91W. It does a great job at that (except for when it’s dark, the silly light only barely illuminates the left side of the screen). I don’t know how long the battery lasts, but it’s been working for years.

W-86 for the win.

I had an f91w until a friend broke the strap, he bought me the 86 as a replacement and the illuminator function was game changing (spent a lot of time in the dark due to work so it was welcome).

My son uses it now, he’s young so it’s a great watch for him.

Oh nice! I may put this one under the Christmas tree for myself :D

> But, IMO, knowing the time isn't something I need to be solved on my wrist anymore given everyone carries phones.

It varies; I like checking the time when my hands are full. Wristwatches got much more useful to me when my kid was born - with babies you almost never have a hand free to dip into your pocket just to check the time.

When I'm working on my car, or playing guitar, or just about anything interesting, my hands are full so it's nice to have the time on my wrist.

There's a reason wrist watches largely displaced pocket watches, and as far as telling the time goes, a phone is basically a pocket watch. I would like a fitness monitoring watch, and used a PineTime for it for a while. But having a completely bulletproof timepiece is more important, and a retro Casio fulfills that need in spades.

I got rid of mine because of the battery as well. The benefits didn't outweigh the extra mental overhead of having one more thing to manage daily.

Except for times when I want to capture health data, or when I'm exercising, I wear nothing. After all, I always have my phone with me, so I always know what time it is.

But when I want to wear a watch, my Garmin Venu SQ2 provides nearly as good activity and health tracking as the Apple watch, plus more sports tracking features... and its battery lasts days. It's also lighter and cheaper, so if I break it I won't be as upset.

> for times when I want to capture health data, or when I'm exercising, I wear nothing.

I think I’m misreading this - you exercise naked?

no wearables/tech

I wouldn’t do martial arts with a device tied to my wrist. The likelihood of an injury is too high, as an example.

Haha. Read it however you like. Yoga is the only single person sport I can imagine doing naked... running and weight lifting seems like a huge risk.

$40 smart watch from Amazon does most of what the Apple Watch does and battery lasts a week even wearing it all night. I occasionaly charge it while showering

Fitness Data would not be as accurate as apple and it would be sending a lot of tracking data back.

> I occasionaly charge it while showering

I didn't realise the Amazon watch was a self-winding mechanical watch. :)

I really like my Apple Watch. I use it for what it is, a glorified fitness tracker with additional "communicator" tech.

My only request would be that they make an "Apple bracelet" so that I can wear my nice mechanical watches. It's a pain to jump back and forth because the power reserves on the mechanicals will die, and resetting the time (or worst the date complication) is annoying.

I’m really jealous of the fitness tracking features of my Apple Watch wearing friends and really annoyed by their flashing displays.

I’d love to have the tracker only too.

Why don't you use a mechanical watch winder? https://www.amazon.com/s?k=automatic+wrist+watch+winder&hvad...

I kind of feel like I'm agreeing with the original post... but it's just more junk/tech in my home that I don't want.

Wear two watches and your problems are largely solved. You can even take off the Apple one for fancy events where you want to look like less of a… two watch wearer.

Ha... yea.. I can't become a double watch wearer ha. As someone who like actual watches, that's too much of a faux pas.

Love the Apple Watch. But yeah battery is huge drag to the otherwise lovely experience. It's barely enough to start with. Now after three years, at 79% of original capacity, it's become annoying. I actually cannot think of a watchOS function that can't be done in monocrhome. I miss my old Fitbit which could be charged during a shower before lasting almost a week.

I don't get it. You need to charge your phone anyway. You just make that part of the phone charging routine. I have a MagSafe triple charger next to my bed that I throw my phone, watch and AirPods on before I go to bed and everything's good for the next day. I also have a compact MagSafe triple charger for traveling that I keep in my go bag.

That is the ideal solution, but some people use it to track sleep, that require you to have it in your wrist while sleeping instead of charging.

For some time i used my older Serie 3 for sleep tracking while the serie 6 charged for the day, then the Serie 3 would charge during the day. That until they released the updated sleep tracker that was not available for the serie 3.

Now I personally charge mine while i am in the shower. But i have the battery run out on me some times.

I use my Series 4 for sleep tracking.

I normally have it in Theater Mode so that the display is off except when I explicitly touch it or press a button [1]. That saves a lot of power.

In the evening when I've finished dinner and sit down on the couch to do the NYT crossword puzzle, read a while, and maybe watch a little TV I put the watch on the charger which is next to the couch. It is usually in the 35-50% range when it goes onto the charger.

Sometime in the next hour or so I'll notice that it has finished charging and put it back on.

[1] There is a setting for that somewhere in the settings, but it is faster to just swipe up and tap the Theater Mode icon. That also turns on silent notifications, but the icon for that is right next to Theater Mode, so another tap on the same screen undoes that, leaving it just in Theater Mode.

TL;DR Author threw away watch because they keep forgetting to charge it and managing charging cable was difficult.

There must be reasonably easy solutions to both of these problems.

I have a wireless charger next to my bed, I go into the shower, put it on there, come back and it's good for another day or so.

I know, right?

It's not as if the watch doesn't prompt you to charge it either.

Even with the Ultra and it's 2-3 day battery life will charge up from almost empty to 100% in 45mins

Forces you to shower in order to use a watch

Nice feature

Plus the robot vacuum in the article forces you to clean up your floors instead of letting all the Lego bricks and objects build up.

The smart devices really help us improve our lives.

I bought an Apple Watch, I also don’t use it because of the charging.

The sleep data would be the only thing really valuable to me, so taking it off at night would defeat the purpose, and travel too often to keep any sort of permanent setup.

I don’t know that there is a good solution.

TL;DR^2: Person finds a tool not useful to them and stops using it.

Just changing some habits was useful in managing this.

- firstly, turn off the Always On feature - this saves an immense amount of battery and I'm not staring at my wrist half the day anyways.

- IN the morning, when I have my coffee - slap it on the charger at my desk.

- Showering - slap it (or simply leave it) on the charger, then get dressed and put it on

- In the evening when I'm cooking/eating dinner, slap it on the charger.

I find that a 30-minute charge time is enough to juice it up for 8h or more. It is often fully charged in an hour or so.

This description makes you seem like a slave to your own technology

Or he accepts the tradeoff of current battery technology vs utility. (Personally, I just charge it at night with my phone and its never a problem.)

Thanks, and yes - it sucks but you can work around things like this. I don't know anything that does what the watch does for me, either equally or better.

I am Deaf, so notifications (vibration) on my wrists are immensely useful. I can't hear the phone buzz or beep when my hearing aids are off.

I also have ADHD + ASD - Reminders/To Do alerts me to things I need to be doing, shopping list, task list, etc. and Timer lets me cope with time blindness by making me aware of the passage of time. It's now safe for me to play a quick 30m round of my favorite game. Calendar at a glance keeps appointments and daily events in front of mind.

I have 3 alarms set - one on my wrist, my bed shaker and my smart lights (I have a cycle that goes from blue-green-yellow that works effectively well in waking me without being harsh).

Activity tracking makes sure I get up every hour (Thanks a lot, time blindness) and move a little. I pair getting up with getting some water. Without which, I would probably sit at my desk and lose a whole day from it. I forget my vitamins always, so I have a medication alert for that.

I never remember to check the weather so having it on my wrist makes sure I always know what it's going to be like outside.

I am always forgetting my phone, so the LTE on my wrist lets me know if someone is trying to reach me (my closest knows to just simply ring me for the alert and then send messages).

It's tremendously useful and lets me appear to function like a normal person.

Some things require routines. If you don't take daily shower you will forget to charge your watch, if you don't tidy up then cleaning robot will not do its job.

I would not get a cleaning robot for the same reason (I'm a messy person and my place is too small) but I know people for whom it works really well

This is why I use a whoop. I just want a health tracker without charging and mental overhead.

> Before our robot could start his work, I had to clean the floors.

Typical

Know how to starve a robot? Hide the food stamps under the charger.

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