I received my watch beginning of this week and would like to comment on my experience so far, list the pro\cons and centralized a bit the requests.
If you have any comments i will add them to the list, to make it easier for Mobvoi, please list your phone model, OS version, App version, watch OS version
Review
I was not the real public for a smart watch as I was not really convinced about the utility of it, but the price point with GPS and heart monitor made the buy a no-brainer. I was looking to get more insight on my runnings and like some of you, I might be a bit of stats freak so recording all my runs sounded like a nice deal.
I'm not going to comment on the smart/connected features and will concentrate on my running experience.
First, the package is really nice in shape and weight. With the silicone band my charcoal watch is as light (49g) as my already small mechanical watch. So while I'm running I barely notice it. Also the band is a bit stretchy and thus help keep it snugly stuck on your arm, that should help with the heartbeat reader.
Once the activity is launched, you see the total time on the top at all time and then the bottom half can display one of: distance, calories, speed, pace or heartbeat. After a while the display will turn to battery saving (black and white) with the 2 selected info and will only refresh every so often (1min?).
Personally I would have liked to have more than 2 info at once as it's easier to just glance than fiddle with the watch to look at different stats. The screen is bright but in full sun you do need to use a hand to make some shade. Also the colors scheme for the different info is not perfect: the yellow used for calories is very visible, but the red/blue for distance and heart-rate are more difficult to see in my opinion.
To pause or stop the exercise, you tap the watch. Once the activity is completed, a summary screen will display the final numbers and ask you to save or delete. This works relatively ok and will synchronize with my phone next time the watch is connected. However, there is no way to review the saved runs on the watch and the export/synchronization with google fit does not work really (see bugs/requests under).
As for the battery, running an hour (with GPS and heartbeat, no music or other functions, not connected to the phone) uses 20%. On days where i don't run, receive a few notifications and use the display saving (black&white) mode the battery is down 10% after 12h YMMV.
Right now if I had to point the real deal-breaker missing features I would say:
- in activity notification: while some apps have a voice over that will tell the pace every miles, I would say that just a vibration/bip would be perfect.
- The compatibility with other apps is not there yet, I would say the easier would be to have a full raw data (GPX) export function instead of a useless image export. This would allow everyone to import their runs in their favorite app and let Mobvoi concentrate on other aspect of the OS.
Overall I think this was a great purchase, i was expecting young age "defects" as all early-adopters have to accept.
Let's keep faith in Mobvoi, they are still a start-up after all
Cheers!
