We received the latest attempt at the smartwatch market by Sony this past week, and I have been using it for a couple of days. My impressions of the device are pretty good thus far, though a more in-depth review will come your way once I have had enough time to put it through its paces.
We first got out hands on the new smartwatch briefly at the launch of the Sony Xperia Z1. In the darkly lit room, it was difficult to really get a good look at it. Now that I have used it for a couple of days, I can say the SmartWatch 2 is a pretty good looking piece of kit, much more so than I was expecting originally. The case is predominately matte black aluminium, which is polished around the bezel. It only has one button on the right hand side of the face, which looks reminiscent of the power button on the Xperia smartphones.
The silicon wristband was originally a concern ““ I thought it would be uncomfortable. Fortunately, it isn‘t; it sits quite nicely once you get used to it (after about 10 minutes).
The device needs to be paired with your smartphone and works with any Android device running 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich or higher. This is one advantage over the Samsung Galaxy Gear, which only works in conjunction with a Samsung device (and very few). The pairing is easy and seamless; I was able to complete it in a minute or two. This all works with Bluetooth, of course. You then install Sony Smart Connect from the Google Play Store and from that application you manage which apps you want on your smartwatch. There are Sony apps, Call Handling, Phonebook, Messaging, Gmail, Email, Facebook, Twitter, Weather, and Missed Call. There are also third party apps, which I still have to give a try.
The SmartWatch 2 is more of a second screen for your phone to display notifications, the watch face is always on, and when a notification comes in the watch vibrates and shows a short version of the message. It does a bit more than that, though. You can then connect your smartphone to a wireless music player and actually skip through music from the smartphone, or scroll through your images on the smartphone.
The battery life and performance have been good in the couple of days I‘ve had it strapped to my arm. I‘ve only charged it once and after two days it is still going, although I imagine I will have to plug it in pretty soon.
Thus far, the Sony SmartWatch 2 has many very good points mixed with some flaws. It feel like something is missing, but I‘m not quite sure what that is yet. It may be missing some imagination in the official Sony apps, and useful third party apps seem few and far between.
A full review will be coming soon, so stay tuned.
