Gadgetory


All Cool Mind-blowing Gadgets You Love in One Place

ASUS ZenWatch Review!

2014-11-20
hey what is going on guys long hair from Android authority and the number of Android wear smartwatches on the Google Play Store has grown quite a bit in the last couple of months and every OEM sort of has their own take on what they think and Android wear Smart Watch should be including a soos company that I personally did not expect to see a SmartWatch from has joined in on the mix so with that being said let's go ahead and take a look at the Zen watch a soos is first Android wear SmartWatch so to be honest when a soos first unveiled the Zen watch back at Aoife I wasn't really all that impressed but now that I've had the chance to use it for a while I have to say that as soos did a really nice job with the design of the watch even though it's a square watch face they've managed to make the watch look really nice by using premium materials you're looking at a stainless steel construction for the body and clasp and the band is made of genuine leather so not only does it look nice but it feels very comfortable on the wrist it's also not very big or heavy the bronze / oranges color scheme isn't necessarily my favorite because it's somewhat hard to match with the rest of your wardrobe so at least for me it's not exactly an everyday kind of watch there are a couple of things though about the design that I really do like they might sound minor but I really believe it'll make a huge difference in the appeal of the watch one is how easy it is to remove the watch straps instead of having to use a tool like you would with most other Android wear watches on the Zen watch all you have to do is pull on the tiny little lever and the strap comes right off so it's going to be really easy and quick to put on any watch strap of your choice - is the metal clasp it just snaps together on your wrist with a press so not only does it make it very quick to put on the watch but unlike the tug and fastened variety that you get with the G watch R or the Moto 360 it's not going to damage the leather strap over time the only thing that I found slightly odd about the design is the power button is placed on the back making it really hard to get to when you're wearing it although it shouldn't pose too much of a problem since there aren't many instances where you'll need it except for powering it on the rest of the hardware on the Zen watch is pretty standard stuff for an Android wear watch its ip55 so it's dust and water resistant and you've got the usual heart rate monitor and pedometer built in overall though I would definitely say the design and build quality of the Zen watch ranks it up there with the best of what Android wear currently has to offer next up is the display and with the Zen watch you're looking at a 1.6 3 inch AMOLED display with 320 by 320 resolution and for a SmartWatch display it looks pretty good colors are nice and vibrant viewing angles are good and it gets pretty bright so it's easy to see outdoors one thing I really like about the screen itself is the fact that there's a slight curvature to it so when you're swiping or scrolling your fingers just glide across the screen so it feels a lot nicer and more natural to interact with the bezels on the display however are extremely thick due to the built-in bio sensor which we'll talk about a little bit later but since it's an AMOLED display you're going to get those really deep blacks so darker colored watch faces are going to blend in a lot better with those bezels taking a look at the specs design watch is being powered by a Snapdragon 400 and half a gig of ram pretty typical specs for an Android wear watch right now and considering how the Android wear OS is the same across all Android wear smartwatches the performance is on par with any other Android wear SmartWatch with the Snapdragon 400 it's fast and responsive with no lag or drop frames obviously there aren't a ton of things you can do on Android wear that is going to stress the CPU but navigating through the OS swiping through cards and interacting with notifications has been a very smooth experience so there's not a whole lot to say here about the performance except that it runs Android wear about as well as any other wear SmartWatch with Google not allowing OEMs to skinned Android wear the overall experience is pretty much going to be the same from one wear watch to another so there's very little that om s can do right now on the software side to differentiate themselves but a soos has done what they can by adding a few custom watch faces some of them show very useful information like the date battery life missed calls weather and your daily steps a soos has also built a few applications that integrate with these and watch the main one being the Zen watch manager so what the Zen watch manager you can customize your watch faces by changing the colors and the information you want to be displayed you can also use the Zen watch to unlock your phone so if your phone sees that your watch is nearby it'll bypass the pin or pattern and let you unlock directly into the phone you can also cover the watch with your hand to mute incoming calls or alarms send out SOS messages to emergency contacts find your watch with your phone or vice versa have they watched vibrate if you stray too far away from your phone and use it as a flashlight or compass although it's not really a flashlight it just illuminates the display of the Zen watch a solid color so you can use it as a makeshift flashlight there's a remote camera application and that lets you control the camera on your phone with your watch and you can take a photo by tapping on the display or simply just twisting your wrist a soos has also created a wellness application for tracking your daily step goals calories burned and measuring your relaxation and heart rate with the built-in bio sensor hidden in the bezels it's a little bit clunky and cumbersome to have to put two fingers on the display but it does work and seems to be fairly accurate finally let's talk about the battery life so it's a three hundred and sixty milliamp hour battery and I would say the battery life is pretty solid a soos claims that you will get a day's worth of battery out of it but I was actually getting at least two days worth of battery life even with the always screen on feature turned on and since this is an AMOLED display the entire screen isn't lit up even when it's in its dim state and you could probably squeeze a little bit of extra battery life out of it if you use a watch face with a black background charging the Zen watch however is a little bit clunky it doesn't use a dock or wireless charger instead it uses a large cradle that kind of reminds me of the original Galaxy gear it's not the prettiest or most elegant way of charging a SmartWatch and it's not going to look all that great sitting on your desk but it gets the job done the ascend watch is available now on the Google Play Store for two hundred bucks so it's one of the cheaper options at least in terms of price when you compare it to the competition and there you have it for the asou Zen watch with the stainless steel construction the curved display and the leather watch strap this makes these n watch one of the more elegant and classy Android wear watches that we've seen thus far and the additional Zen watch specific apps give this watch a lot of extra functionality the best part is you're getting all of this for only 200 bucks making these n watch a serious competitor in the Android wear space as always guys thank you so much for watching this review if you enjoyed it please give it a thumbs up down below we definitely appreciate that and also subscribe to the channel which is also down below if you haven't already and don't forget to check out our website for more in-depth coverage you already know what it is Angela Thor calm because we are your source for all things Android
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.