Smart Watch ICW001

Gadgeteer Hands On Review by Julie

March 15, 2004

Product Requirements:
Device:
Windows 98/2000/Me/XP with a free serial port

A Swiss master watchmaker by the name of Patek Philippe invented the first wristwatch in 1868. Now 136 years later, I wonder what he'd think of timepieces such as the SPOT and Fossil PDA watches. Would he appreciate the added features, or think that anything above and beyond pure time keeping is simply a waste? Things really haven't changed that much since the 19th century; as always the main function of all watches is to tell time. It's the way that watches convey the time that has really changed the most. First it was analog to digital and now it is from mono to color!

The Smart Watch from Field Technology CxMP Ltd. is the first regular watch that I have seen that has a full color LCD. I know there are watches with built-in digital cameras that have a color display, but usually these watches do not display content other than pictures in color. The Smart Watch (which doesn't have a camera) displays everything on its 256 color, 72x64 pixel LCD display.

Available in an assortment of colors (Orange/Grey, Orange/Black, Pink/White, Blue/White, Grey/Dark and Grey), this watch is made of plastic with a flexible rubber wrist strap. Although the watch feels solid enough to withstand normal wear and tear, in my opinion it has a somewhat toy-like appearance that maybe better suited for teenagers as opposed to adults. If you visit the manufacturer's website, it gives a clear impression that this watch is marketed towards the younger set.

Size-wise, it is only slightly larger than your typical digital watch. I found that it fit comfortably on my wrist and only drew the attention of others due to the bright orange face and strap.

There are two buttons on either side of the watch. These buttons allow navigation through the various modes and menus. An additional button on the face of the watch functions as the backlight and business card beam initiator.

The color display is sharp and crisp, but it is hard to read when the backlight is not on, or you are not in a well lit area. I believe the display is the reflective type that requires additional light in order to comfortably read it. This type of display is similar to the Color Gameboy or older color PDAs. All of the images shown in the review are either taken with flash or while the backlight was on. The face looks almost black when the backlight is off and you're not in direct light.

In addition to telling the time, the Smart Watch also has the following features:

• Phonebook
• Scheduler (with alarm)
• 100 year calendar
• Alarm
• Timer
• Stopwatch
• Picture viewer
• Melody player
• Data exchange (to and from) with mobile phones, PDA and PC via IrDA
• SIM card back up from mobile phones

Moving through the modes is pretty simple. Two of the buttons on the side of the watch let you scroll through the menu items, while other buttons allow you to select the specific mode.

The default mode is the Base Time mode. In this mode, the watch will display a different background depending on the time of day.

Rise and shine, it's a fried egg for 6am - 12pm

From 12pm - 5pm there's an umm, ahhh, thing that looks vaguely like something that might show up when you have a wardrobe malfunction...

5pm - 8pm displays what looks like a bug crawling on a basketball.

8pm - 12am shows bats flying by moonlight.

By default, the color time display will time out after 5 minutes and change into a plain white digital numbers on a black background. Pressing any button on the watch will toggle back to the color display. You can set the auto off time from 0-9mins. Setting it to 0 will cause the screen shown below to never display. Of course, it will also consume more battery power. By the way, the watch is powered by 1 CR2032 battery.

In addition to the Base Time mode, there is also a City Time mode. This is great for travelers requiring dual time functionality.

Of course there is a daily alarm that you can set and a 100 year calendar.

Where the Smart Watch shines is in its ability to download data from a PC. By installing a simple manager program on your computer, and plugging in a serial cable (yes, I said serial...), you can upload addresses, appointments, pictures and even melodies to the watch. The serial cable has a clip that has pins that fit into a special connector on the back of the watch. This clip is very similar to the Suunto SPOT watch.

There is 128k of available user memory that can hold:

2048 phonebook records with 41 characters
1024 melody records with 64 notes
27 pictures
1 full SIM card memory

A Memory mode screen displays the current status of the user memory.

There really isn't much to the manager program. Since you can't sync with Outlook or other PIMs, you have to basically input all the data by hand, which can be tedious. Like most Palm OS devices, you can create a business card that you can beam to PDAs (Palm and Pocket PC), and mobile phones.

A simple Phonebook is also included. With it, you can store name, phone number, mobile phone, fax, and email.

In Phonebook mode, the names get cut off due to the small screen size. Selecting an entry will display the rest of the information. Why wasn't this a feature on the SPOT watches?

The scheduler that is included is pretty weak. The appointments are one time only. No reoccurrences.

The picture viewing capability is the probably the most interesting feature of this watch. With it, you can load in up to 27 of your favorite pictures. The software allows you to either cut out a suitable sized square or resize the entire picture to fit the 72x64 pixel display.

A list of pictures installed on the watch is displayed in the Picture mode. Below you can see what the pictures look like on the watch. I know they aren't spectacular, but they are kind of fun. An added bonus is the fact that any picture can become your new watch face. By staying in the Picture Mode, the time will display at the bottom of the picture and will remain there until you switch modes. This is a feature that SPOT watches should have included out of the box!

How would you like to have the Gadgeteers on your wrist? ;o)

Just displaying art on your Smart Watch, would seem empty without also being able to listen to music on your watch. Ok, calling it music might be taking things a bit far... But you can record (and download from the manufacturers website) melodies that can be used for the alarm and schedule alerts. The tunes are strictly beep and boop variety, but hey, at least you can customize them.

There isn't much of a learning curve with this watch. The functions are easy to understand and are fun to use. Beaming info to and from a PDA or mobile phone can be a bit involved, but it is doable. While it might seem like this device is more of a novelty than a serious timepiece, the Smart Watch definitely gives us a taste of things to come. I can't help but think how much better the SPOT watch might be if it incorporated some of these same features.

How long will it be before we are all wearing high resolution, 65,000 color display watches on our wrists? Not long I say, not long at all...

 

Price: $160 from Brando

Pros:
Color display
Address book
Pictures
Schedule

Cons:
Display hard to see when backlight is off
Overall design looks toy-like