Gadgetory

the quest for a SmartWatch replacement continues leading up to Christmas a coin flip literally decided for me between adding this Scogin hybrid or a vector to my wish list so we'll chalk this up as one of the luckier chance decisions I've made in recent memory truth be told I was leaning towards the hybrid as I've been a fan of Scogin design in the past but never thrown in the cash to own one adding some nifty features to a simple stylish watch face was just the push I needed so I'm glad the coin flip worked out this way the connected line of watches is a clean way to deliver basic notifications while tracking activity a secondary dial on the faces multi-purpose giving you a percentage of your step goal and offering four zones for notifications which we'll talk about more in just a sec three buttons activate functions on the watching can be customized for some simple phone controls the whole affair is sealed up and powered by a single replaceable watch battery estimated to run for up to six months though the more often this watch vibrates for alarms the faster that battery will run down this allows for a water resistance depth rating of up to three atmospheres or roughly thirty meters a very nice piece of mind feature there it's a stainless steel casing which thankfully doesn't interact with my skin issues and the watch uses standard 20 millimeter straps on quick-release pins to easily swap the band out for replacement all very traditional and watch like in the best way possible using a low-power Bluetooth connection the Scogin connects to an app on your Android or iOS device for managing watch features and fitness tracking the watch face is so simple you'll be using your phone to get all of your options and controls there are three buttons on a watch the top shows you the date the middle button can toggle between time zones and your alarm and the bottom button is user customizable it can be used as a leash to locate your phone or is a toggle for a music player which is what I've set mine to do in the app you can set your activity goal and then as you move around you'll see your progress here the opposite side of the dial points to four regions in the app you can select up to six people and up to 6 X to correspond with those four regions and when you feel a vibration and look at which region the arm points to you'll know which alert you're receiving a somewhat important drawback to the system there's an odd collection of apps which are compatible it doesn't seem to support every app installed on your phone so this is definitely an area where we hope the developers can expand support in the future as it stands now it's an interesting exercise in forcing the user to simplify their digital lifestyle I don't believe Skagen really approached these limitations with any kind of philosophy but it did force me to examine what I considered mission-critical communication now this isn't the kind of watch I would normally wear as a fitness tracker spoiler alert will soon be checking out a qua weight fit but adding activity and sleep tracking to a nice watch is a nice touch a minor concern here that the Scoggin seems to slightly overestimate activity we'd never recommend using a product like this for medical grade tracking but this watch consistently delivered about 100 extra steps per thousand when compared to my misfit ray totally helpful for tracking your general trends though the connected app will sync with google fit up by jawbone or Under Armour's record lastly the system could use a little polish with Android 7 I regularly open the app on my phone to find the connection between the watch and the phone had been severed the app seems to be shuffled off when in the background and ignoring battery optimizations on my v20 helps keep the connection alive with more consistency not necessarily the fault of the developers but this should be addressed during the watch setup or app installation you need to be able to trust a wearable notification system so let's wrap this up where's that leave us with the Scoggin connected I'm really glad I took this gadget out for a spin and it'll easily take over the duties as my dress-up watch where my pebble was a jeans and a t-shirt daily driver a digital plastics watch watch which fit in perfectly with a hoodie the Scoggin will now compliment dress shoes and an ironed button-up shirt evenings where I'm dressed up like that are usually social and my awareness for every little online interaction is usually a lower priority Plus this comes with the benefit of blending in wonderfully it's just a nice looking watch and even if some of these issues aren't ever properly addressed I still get to wear an attractive timepiece in a world where vinyl is out selling digital downloads this Scoggin is elegantly analog but I still don't feel like I found my daily driver all in one master of notifications and background health tracking so the search continues as always thanks so much for watching be sure to subscribe to this channel for more wearable coverage like this and help us out with some social media sharing for pocket now I'm Juan Carlos bag now so I'm gadget guy on Twitter and Instagram and I will catch you all on the next review