Hacker News Reader

Comment by threeseed | Hacker News Reader

Most of the top shelf watches are going to be fine. It's the Casio, Seiko and Swatches of the world that are going to be in trouble. As is every fitness tracker or health monitor.

But the best quote for me is this one:

"In the future though I see a risk: a generational fracture. The old people, you and me, sticking to the good old mechanical watches and the young people sticking to digital watches - their comfort zone."

View on HN

I'm curious how good the heart rate tracking is. Most current fitness gadgets suck terribly at tracking heart rate while exercising. afaik polar or garmin plus a chest band is the only thing that does a good job, whereas most fitbit type gadgets are only good at calculating resting heart rates. If apple can crack that, they'll find a lot of purchasers. And garmin / polar will be roadkill: their devices are expensive, single use, a big hassle (that damn chest strap is annoying, plus now you have two batteries to worry about), with shitty software.

The heart monitor technology used via diodes on these smart watches isn't very accurate. I can't seem to find the article I was reading but I remember a roughly +/- 10bpm error rate. That's also roughly what I've experienced myself on the LG and Moto watches I've tried.

That said, if you buy a Garmin or similar heart tracker watch, they package it with a Heart Rate monitor transmitter you strap around your chest. Garmin would love to be able to cut costs and keep everything in one piece of hardware, but the prosumer crowd who buy this hardware for Triathlons etc would be furious if the product was inaccurate.

I love the consistency of the HR data I get from my old-school Polar watch and band, but you're right, after a few hours the band is pretty uncomfortable. I was quite disappointed with the Basis watch. Even when it did work my HR would often swing up and down unpredictably.

If Apple nails the HR sensor, I will be stoked. I have often wanted to have an entire days worth of HR data so I can make better guesses about my daily caloric burn rate.

A good reference may be the Mio: http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2014/01/mio-link-first-look.html

> Casio, Seiko and Swatches

They're already in trouble. Astonishingly few people wear watches anymore. We're basically never more than a glance away from a time keeping device and display pretty much anywhere we are these days.

There will be no such fracture. Insofar as voice becomes a useful interface for services, smart watches will proliferate. They don't need to be unlocked as long as they're on your wrist. They eliminate the problem of talking to an invisible microphone that made Bluetooth headsets become less popular.

Smart watches will take off. For all ages.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com