Gadgetory

we reviewed Samsung's gear live earlier this week but to some the LG G watch is the more pure manifestation of Google's new SmartWatch platform so how does it fare as the more minimal ambassador of Android wear let's find out i'm michael fisher with pocket now and this is our video review of the LG g watch the mission of a SmartWatch is to make life easier to improve on the experience of using a smartphone by allowing you to keep it in a pocket or across the room while at the same time not missing messages calls and emails and other notifications the nondescript water-resistant G watch does a fairly good job of delivering those notifications popping up inbound messages on cards modeled after those from Google now these cards are the anchor point of the whole OS containing everything from weather reports to calendar items to how many steps you've taken and so on all the while the G watch is also telling you the time with one of many available watch faces on its IPS LCD which is not as crisp as some others we've seen but which delivers vibrant color fair daylight visibility and good touch response there's also an always-on mode available so you don't need to tap the watch to see the time it'll show a power saving watch face until you raise it at which point usually the display comes to life and the Snapdragon processor spins up inside and here's where the G watch becomes something more with the screen on an Android wear device will respond to voice commands you can tell the watch to send a message take a note plot a course to the closest dance club or whatever and translate words into other languages and more you can also launch apps with your voice third-party titles are limited to just a few for now but they're off to a good start already in terms of layout and polish and functionality - it's really handy to have a food recipe right on your wrist when you're cooking and being able to say hail a cab to your watch in order to summon a lift is just awesome that's just a sample of what's already in place and if the rapid growth and third-party wallpapers is any indication the future is bright for the Android Ecosystem unfortunately we're not quite there yet and everywhere you look with the G watch you're presented with a reminder of just how 1.0 this version of Android wear really is that starts with the hardware which is so bare-bones it's almost like a reference design you'll need to change that 22 millimeter wrist band if you want to add a little pizzazz the more irritating shortcomings are in software with our number one complaint being voice dictation one of the great things about Android wear is that it's not a one-way notifier like other smartwatches in theory it allows you to dictate replies to but honestly it's bugs City if the person you're texting with sends another message while you're drafting one the watch will act as though it's sent your message but it hasn't also the voice prompt has a hair-trigger which forces you to rush unnaturally not even giving you enough time to think before it sends and if your message goes too long well you might as well just pull out your phone because that's not gonna work either sorry period that's what happens when you try to say too much in an email period because apparently emails are only meant to be like 10 words long period fish period didn't catch that in contrast to voice dictation on most Android phones this is an infuriating feature that diminishes the entire Android wear experience unless you're just saying yes or no and if Google's intention was to limit you to that it could have just incorporated preset replies like other smartwatches do we're hoping for other usability fixes to the homescreen cards change positions seemingly at random and if you clear one accidentally you'll have to go to your phone or risk a quick voice command to get it back same thing with third-party apps which are very beneath everything else in a list of input suggestions that might as well be hidden we get at Google we're supposed to talk to the watch but even if it worked flawlessly we don't always want to talk to it thankfully there's already a third-party launcher app to address this which again bodes well for the future the G watch also occasionally disconnects for seemingly no reason at all which is of course annoying the G watch comes with a sturdy magnetic charging cradle that you can stick to your bedside table and it works very well a good thing since you'll be charging the G watch at least every other night we've been able to squeeze two days out of it with light use but that's further than you're likely to get after eight days of testing the G watch with several Android smartphones we've got a good handle on its ups and downs on the bright side it's not bad looking it does it's a notification job fairly well and most importantly it packs some very cool potential we do expect it to quickly improve over time and we're looking forward to the after the buzz treatment in a few months but the LG G watch is on sale right now then between the buggy voice interface unintuitive UI and unimpressive battery life but we can't say we'd recommend it in its current form to anyone but the most die-hard Android tinkerers if you're curious how the other Android wear launch device fares check out our Samsung gear live review available right now here on YouTube and also see how the two match up in our head-to-head comparison until next time this has been michael fisher with PocketNow thanks for watching and we'll see you next time