Smartwatch 3 - a major disappointment

[drlmiles1]

Had major loss of connectivity today on my SM3. The watch appeared to be connected to my Xperia Z, but no voice commands would work. I tried every combination I could think of, including resetting the SW3, but doing a Hard reset of my phone seemed to work. 

I have to say, coming from the fantastic SW2, I am extremely disappointed so far with this device, and regret buying it. My problems:

1) Limited vibration - no options to control severity and length of vigration (unlike SW2)

2) WhatsApp message comes up, and I want to read it later. But once I have swiped it away, there is no way to read it on my watch - I have to load it on my phone

3) Takes ages and loads of swipes to get at any Apps, whereas they were instantly accesible on SW2 (with most used on first page (option))

4) Just navigating to Settings, I have to click on screen, say OK Google (or double click on screen, which doesn't always register) then say Settings, then WAIT.... while it connects to my phone, parses "settings", then thinks about it, then finally loads Settings

5) Control of music playback is patchy at best, often failing to work, leading you to stab repeatedly at the screen, then suddenly it works and you have pressed to many tims. It happened sometime on the SW2, but far less often.

6) Step count that is just wrong - where is the ability to change sensitivity? One meal in a pub, I apparently walked 300 steps while sat down the whole time...

7) Lifelog functionality doesn't work - most of the activities simply did not register in Lifelog when connected to my SW3, and I ended up deinstalling it as my watch ran hot and burned up the battery in a few hours.

😎 Voice commands don't work a lot of the time. Often you will say the EXACT words needed to perform an activity, and a web page will open on the watch. However sometimes the same words WILL run the command.

I like the ability to speak a text message and get it sent, which I have used when driving quite successfully. But it was not work the cost of this watch solely for that functionality. And there are so few Apps available that are any good. I want apps that allow me to browse recent Messages and recent WhatsApp messages and pictures. I have not found any.

Is anyone else severely disappointed in this device and the platform it runs on, having previously had the excellent SW2 (which am sorely tempted to return to using)?

[drlmiles1]

9) Inability to have alarms set that you can turn on and off. You have to either turn a day of the week off (still leaving the alarm set on some other day) or else remove the alarm, then set it up from scratch when you want it again

[drlmiles1]

Bump - so is everyone else happy with their SW3?

[WillemV]

Hey mate,

I'm pretty happy with my SW3, but this is my first piece of Android Wear and so i have no baseline to compare it to.

As for your remarks:

1. it vibrates enough for me..

2. you kind of have to view the SmartWatch as a notification screen on your wrist, if you swipe away a notification on your phone you cant get that back either! That said, have a problem not being able to reply to normal text messages, this is very annoying as i then either have to open my phone go go through "Ok Google", so i'm not totally happy with the messaging capability.

3. install Wear Mini Launcher, this is a genious app and will make all your apps accessible by one swipe!

4. this is an issue with Ok Google, nto the phone or the watch. in the new version of Android (Lollipop) the last used apps or sections are stored at the top of the screen so rather than saying the word you can just click the button without too much scrolling.

5. I dont use Google Music, but I do use Deezer, there are sometime delays loading the track name and artist and album artwork but not in the actual controls for skipping or volume.

6. i dont really pay much attention to the step counter personally. Remember it is on your wrist, so if you're a violent eater it might pick them up as steps!!!

7. Lifelog is a waste of time, agreed!!! I've got 3000+ steps on my watch, but only 1000 on life log!?! **bleep**? i will be uninstalling this after a week's trial.

8. I've had teh same hit & miss experience with Ok Google commans, but i'm sure this will be the same if you do it from your phone, this isnt anything to do with the watch, just the Ok Google software.

9. havent userd alarms yet so cant comment

So in conclusion, i agree with you on points 2, 7 and 8, but i wouldnt classify the watch as "major dissappointment". I really like the watch, I often play with it and i think making your own watch faces is juts damned cool

I've installed several apps, but only 4 i use regularly, they are 2048 the maths game, WatchMaker for watch faces, Wear Buddy which alerts you when you leave your phone behind and Multi Calculator which has an amazing watch interface with history and scientific calculator operation like sin,cos, tan, log, ln, etc!

Some of the app i have on my phone recently updated with Wear interfaces too:

Headphones Equaliser is now controllable from my wrist - awesome!

ViewRanger shows altitude, GPS location, speed etc on my wrist, which is great, but is still uses the phone GPS, next update for standalone hopefully!

Endomondo running app has a tracker on the watch, much better than the Google Fit and LIfelog rubbish.

I'm waiting for some of the others to get on board now! Especially Deezer because i often stop playing music and then have to re-open the app from my phone, which is a pain.

I would give my SmartWatch 3 a score of 8/10 for the overall experience. This is very new technology, Android Wear is  only at version 1, i think as long as the technical gremlins keep getting ironed out things can only get better!

W.

[enja_ino]

I feel you, I'm experiencing a lot of the same issues myself.

The SM3 is so unreliable I'm contemplating recycling it into a cup holder.

/ Enja_Ino

[GerdS]

I selected the SWR50 for three reasons over its competitors:

1. the buitin GPS receiver

2. the good protection against housing scraches by the silicone around it

3. the reflective LCD

Regarding to 1. it is a full disappointment. Although the GPS receiver works as expected the builtin compass is just unusable. But both sensors belong together for me and are required for most standalone apps utilising GPS.

Although I tried to report this serious bug to SONY weeks ago it got not fixed with the 5.0.1 update and is more worse now than before with 4.4W2.

Seems SONY is running this forum just as an alibi for customer support and no SONY guy feels really responsible to seriously read the threads and forward discussed problems to their development departments!