Android Wear Owners Thread

Zascar

Thought a thread might be a good idea. I just got an LG G Watch - very impressed with it so far. Can't comment on battery yet but looks decent. Depends on how much the screen is on obviously.

I really like how you can reply to messages and see facebook/whatsapp etc - I just wish I could go back in and check them - but you can only see them when they arrive. Voice recognition is very good. Music control is cool but I'd like to be able to see a list of tracks.

Still discovering apps but here are some I like:

Wear Mini Launcher: Easier to get to apps than the stock.
PixtoCam: See video from your phone on your watch
Here Maps: Excellent alternative to Google maps.
Strava - Running and Cycling app
Next Bus Dublin - very handy
Edit: More
Pear: It pairs your watch with your phone and notifies you when its out of range with a little message saying "Have you forgotten something?" - then you can make the phone ring so you can find it. Handy!
Wear Battery Stats
Slumber - turn off the screen while charging
Calculator - a Calculator!


Overall its great - but it is very much in its infancy, I'd expect some good updates in the coming months...

moleyv

Thanks for the Here maps link, that will be a great addition.

I have the LG G watch as well. Only got it today from eBay.

baldshin

Don't forget Facer and Watchmaker, for downloading and customising watch faces!

waynegalway

I've had a G Watch for about 2 months now. I like it a lot, but might have to sell it soon as I'm thinking of switching to an iPhone.

Anyway, on the battery, with screen set to level 2 (which is plenty bright enough for me), always on screen mode turned off, and putting it into airplane mode for the 7 or 8 hours I'm in bed, I can get 3 days easily out if it, as in 72 hours. Probably close to 80 if I let it run completely down. Can't complain about that.

heebusjeebus

baldshin wrote: »

Don't forget Facer and Watchmaker, for downloading and customising watch faces!

I've heard that 3rd party watch faces don't play nice with the G Watch R due to the chance of burn in on the POLED screen.

Zascar

I added a few more apps to the first post there. I hope more will get Wear support soon. That's very encouraging battery life Wayne. I have the G Watch too but last night it was at 25% although I was using it all day.


There are a couple of things that annoy me so far. When you swype away a notification its gone forever, I wish you could see a history. I'd like to be able to read text/facebook/whatsapp on the watch whenever I want. I blocked one app from showing up (Here maps) and now it won't run at all! I'd like to be able to control the time before the screen dims.

The launcher I linked above is a total necessity. I think its pretty hilarious how LG dont have this as standard, to get to a list of your apps you have to unlock the screen, scroll all the way down to the very bottom to "Start" click that and then see a list of apps. With Mini launcher you just swype in from the right and they are there in a grid. I'd bet with software updates in time this will all change.

waynegalway

Zascar wrote: »

That's very encouraging battery life Wayne.

Right now, the watch last came off charge with 100% at 11:30am last Saturday. Currently at 18% after 75-ish hours. I'm regularly getting that. I'm not a mad heavy user. Most email notifications I get I just delete them straightaway, so I'm not reading loads on the screen. I use it a few times a day to set reminders and send the odd text. I don't do notifications from FB or Twitter, because I was getting too many, so my use case is really just email and messages. It's pretty much just used as a convenient notifications panel.

MaceFace

I have the Moto360 that I got early December. Tried on both that and the LG G Watch R a number of times in the store and went for the 360 as it felt more elegant - the type of watch you can wear to a wedding or the gym.

Some of the other Apps I use...
Edomondo - in conjunction with a Polar H7 HRM, this keeps track of my workouts (all types). The wear app displays lots of info during the exercise - HR, time spent, calories, distance etc. etc.
Temperature - Control my NEST thermostat from phone
IFTTT - Bunch of receipes. More of a novelty.
Evernote - taking notes. I use this a lot on Windows and Android, so an extension.
Music Controller
Find my Phone
Watch face: Kronos Sunlight. By far the best watch face I found (functional and design).

The only thing I wished it had was GPS so I did not need a phone when exercising.
Haven't tried downloading music to the watch yet, but it is meant to work great.

Battery life - get a notification every hour. If I don't use it for exercise (with screen permanently on for 1 hour), I can get 48 hours out of it. On days I exercise for an hour and have Edomondo running for an hour, I get maybe 16-18 hours out of it.

I have never been into watches, but this is a watch I can see myself wearing permanently. Just the simple thing of getting notifications on the watch has improved my usage so much, particularly with FotMob.

Other things.... the HRM built in is pretty useless. Fine if you are sitting still and the watch is sitting right, but no good for exercise.

Size wise - its fine. not bit at all. The LG G Watch R seemed bigger to me.
I have the official metal band which looks great and fits nice.

Atomic Pineapple

Have an LG G Watch myself and have worked with the Androd Wear SDK.

A couple of points that might be useful (Or could just be pointless) :

LG can't add the mini launcher, Wear is not open source like Android is, so manufacturers can't customise it or add their own apps by default. Only Google can change things with Wear.

You can open your apps with Voice. Just say OK Google and the name of the app.

If you do open the app from the settings screen the latest version of Wear remembers your most frequently chosen apps so they are subsequently really easy to open.

You can download music to the watch itself and you can see the list of songs when you do this.

Wear provides out of the box functionality for notifications from apps such as Facebook and Whatsapp so they work on your watch automatically. For more functionality the Wear SDK provides a way to create more fully functioning apps on the watch so for you to be able to see your Facebook feed or Whatsapp messages the developers need to create this.

If you've blocked an app from the watch you can unblock it from your phone again, I'd need to check but its either in the Android Wear app on your phone or in the app section under settings.

If you swipe away a notification by accident swipe down immediately and you will see that it is still dismissing it, tap the icon you see to bring the notification back.

moleyv

Anyone have some recommendations on watch straps.

I'm looking for a 22mm leather strap. Preferably a medium brown colour. Chunky but plain strap with a straight end.

I had it in my head to change out my stock LG G strap right away, but its actually fairly decent and comfortable. I would still like an alternative though.

I found westonwatchstraps.co.uk and they seem to have some nice offerings.

nc6000

Are these waterproof like most normal watches?

waynegalway

nc6000 wrote: »

Are these waterproof like most normal watches?

I believe that the G watch is about the best of them. Ip67

heebusjeebus

nc6000 wrote: »

Are these waterproof like most normal watches?

Ya the G watch R can be submersed in 1 metre of water for 30 minutes (IP67) so it's fine to use in the shower or bath.

Zascar

Found this cool app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=goko.ws2&hl=en its basically a mini store just for wear apps. Seems to have more than when I was on Google play.

One thing I cannot do is add tasks with Note to Self, to Google tasks. It was adding them to Keep, but I dont really use that. Does anyone know how to fix this?

Zascar

Has anyone else had the problem where it appears offline for no reason? How would I fix this?

flangemeistro

Has anyone purchased the Asus Zenwatch and if so what are your thoughts?

waynegalway

flangemeistro wrote: »

Has anyone purchased the Asus Zenwatch and if so what are your thoughts?

I was thinking about the Zen watch before Xmas when I was shopping around. It definitely looks nice, but what swung it in favour of the g watch for me was the IP rating. The Zen watch isn't as dust and waterproof as the g watch, and that was a big consideration for me. If the ip was the same, I would have gone for the Zen watch over the g watch, as it's definitely better looking. Functionality of Android wear is pretty much identical on all the current watches, so it's down to personal preference on looks, really.

Fluffy88

I haven't kept up-to-date with Android Wear since the summer when it was release. I just happened to be looking on Google play and saw the new watches, which look class.
The ASUS ZenWatch and the LG G Watch R.

Does anyone have any experience with them or better yet, experience with both the 1st gen watches and these?
The new watches look much sleeker to me, they look more like actual watches.
My interest has been piqued

Zascar

I finally figure out the Google tasks problem...

Basically you need to use Zapier and Evernote. Evernote has a working Android wear app, and Zapier can copy any notes to Google tasks.. Start a new Zap from Evernote to add task to Google tasks. When adding the zap you have to play around - you put "Content Text" in the "Title" box - but it works perfectly!

The limit on the free accounts is 100 zaps per month - and it refreshes every 15 mins - but that's enough for me for now!
Hope that might help some people with the same problem...

Tom Cruises Left Nut

Zascar wrote: »

Has anyone else had the problem where it appears offline for no reason? How would I fix this?

I had that issue but it was because my phone was set to time out data connections when the phone screen was off

Changed to leave them on and fixed

Zascar

Ok thanks, where is that setting?

Tom Cruises Left Nut

Zascar wrote: »

Ok thanks, where is that setting?

Do you have power saver on by any chance ?

OldMrBrennan83

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OldMrBrennan83

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OldMrBrennan83

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