Gadgetory

it was over two years ago that we showed you what life was like on the very first pebble the product that smashed crowdfunding records and almost single-handedly launched the modern SmartWatch era pebble would go on to sell over a million units in both standard and steel trims and when the sequel pebble time hit Kickstarter this past March it broke another record by being the first Kickstarter project in history to raise a million dollars in 49 minutes but where the original pebble launched in a relative vacuum pebble time has some stiff competition from some pretty big players now that its shipping to eager early adopters it's time to see how it stacks up I'm Michael Fisher with PocketNow and this is our pebble time review pebble has always had kind of a unique look to it and pebble time is no exception instead of continuing in the vein of the aggressively angular pebble steel it takes a different tack with a slimmer smoother casing defined by matte plastics and a huge metal bezel this is probably the most polarizing element to the design it's made of PVD coated marine grade stainless steel and it's round corners give pebble time a very friendly very inviting look but the bezel scratches very easily and the low screen to body ratio also makes it seem quite antiquated like an old television set factor in the red color of our review unit and the pebble time seems almost juvenile fortunately you do have a choice in color and it's also easy to swap wrist bands we choose a standard 22 millimeter attachment so you can find one you like at a price that works for you future bands from pebble hardware developers will be able to plug into the watch's expansion port to add more features and even if you just stick with the stock band its soft stretchy material is very comfortable on the wrist pebble time is also shower and swimming friendly with 30 meter water resistance the gorilla glass display protection is pretty tough and the watch is so lightweight you might forget you're wearing it until you get a message anyway you'll read those messages and you know the time on a 1.25 inch ePaper display that finally brings pebble into the world of color screens but it's not the color you're used to it's far more muted than a more common LCD or AMOLED panel and it's lit by a very dim blueish backlight that only comes on for a few seconds on a button press or with a firm shake of the rest sadly depending on watch face it doesn't always have enough contrast to read it clearly on the upside it is always on you don't need to push a button just to see the time as on some other watches and its energy sipping technology is mighty kind - battery life more on that in a second where pebble time shines is in software version 3.0 brings an entirely new interface based around something called the timeline a very smart feature that makes the pebble less notification drone more personal assistant from the watch face you just click the down button to show what's happening right now on your calendar you can keep clicking down to see further and further into the future or click up to go back in time and see what you might have missed and it's not just the calendar appointments either depending on what apps you have installed you can see sports scores news headlines missed calls and more and the more devs build timeline compatible apps the more useful the timeline is likely to get speaking of developers there are lots of them as a press time pebble claimed over 8,000 apps in its app store roughly double what Android wear and the Apple watch offered as of a couple months ago these range from stop watches and weather trackers to tide clocks for certain harbors around the world all of which you can download and install through the pebble time companion app there are thousands of watch faces as well in almost every style you can think of and you can even make your own pretty easily apps and watch faces alike are accessed by pressing the center button on the right side to open the vertically scrolling menu you can go back to the watch face by pressing the left side button and if you want you can assign specific apps to a long press of the up or down buttons for quick access most interface actions are accompanied by animations - yeah they're a little on the cutesy side but there's zippy enough that they don't slow down the interactions much at all and they really do a good job of completing pebbles unique charm no other SmartWatch has this fun bubbly personality it's really kind of nice pebble started out two years ago as a very simple notification device and it still performs that core function quite well texts calls event reminders emails anything you've selected as important will buzz your wrist when it comes in if it doesn't require a reply you can read the whole thing right on your watch and move on with your day or you can reply with a canned response or by dictating into pebbles microphone which works fairly well while the debate continues to rage about the utility of the SmartWatch in general I made up my mind after a week on the first pebble two years ago it's awesome you really can't understand how useful it is until you've tried it yourself it will completely change the way you use your smartphone by giving you a thousand fewer reasons to reach for your smartphone to the course of the week and a week is exactly how long pebble time lasts on a single charge the company promised seven-day endurance and even with my very heavy notification traffic that's just what I got better yet even when the battery ticked down to 0% on the seventh day and all the smart features shut down it still continued telling the time four hours after it should have died when I finally plugged it in it only took the pebble time an hour to charge back up to a hundred percent after which I was set for another whole week that's battery life the Apple watch and Android wear can only dream up so it's easy to forgive the pebbles finicky to sensitive magnetic charging cable because you just won't use it that often if you're a first-time pebble user it'll probably take you most of that week to get used to the way this watch does things for voice recognition and rich notifications to work you need to install the Android wear app on Android so pebble can leverage its architecture and many actions like controlling media take more steps on pebble and work with a narrower range of apps than Android wear but in other respects pebble is a very powerful instrument because of its motivated developer base which includes big names like if this then that GoPro Yelp Evernote and that's not even counting the fitness and health titles that tie into the pebbles motion sensors and what limitations do exist pebble cleverly embraces weaving them into its messaging as a kind of geek cred the interface and branding are littered with retro style 8-bit design that gleefully calls out the offbeat display and software graphics and reminds us that pebble is more indie accessory than fashionista bling so far that sense of identity and an early start have kept the company healthy even in the face of the massive competition that's arisen since 2012 pebbles fanbase plus with the contrarians who always prefer the underdog alternative will all but ensure the economic success of pebble time and its forthcoming follow-up pebble time steel also for iPhone owners it's a much cheaper and much simpler alternative to the pricy Apple watch but pebble really can't afford to rest on its laurels for all its innovation and personality pebble time is still less i grabbing than much of the competition in terms of fit and finish and display technology and the result is a product that doesn't really feel like it earns it's nearly $200 price tag in the world of wearables fashion counts and for the same money you can get a much nicer looking device from Google to whose ecosystem is growing at a much faster rate by the way the upshot the pebble time is a solid simple SmartWatch with some great ideas driving it and if you do buy one you'll probably grow to love it just as much as I loved its predecessor I was just hoping for something a little grander from the parents of the modern SmartWatch for more on pebble time check out our full text review and talk it now available June 26th and see our feature article on using it with an iPhone for a less Android centric take of this device also at pocketnow.com until next time this has been michael fisher with pocket now captain to phones on twitter thanks for watching and we'll see you somewhere further down the timeline you