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Samsung gears up again

Mark Lyndersay
Published: 
Tuesday, April 15, 2014
Bit Depth
The Samsung Gear Fit connects to a compatible Galaxy phone to transmit health information and Web notifications. Photo: Mark Lyndersay

So I’ve been wearing a watch. 

 

It’s been 40 years since I last closed the strap for a timepiece around my wrist, and it isn’t exactly accurate to call this device a watch.

 

The Samsung Gear Fit does tell the time, but that’s only where it starts as a lifestyle monitoring device.

 

The Gear Fit is one of Samsung’s second generation release of smartwatches, a category of hardware it entered last year with the Gear, a device that met with a lukewarm reception.

 

The challenge with all wearable tech is creating devices that customers will be comfortable using. Google’s Glass tries hard to be a pair of really nerdy spectacles, and the Gear series bundles their capabilities into the form factor of a traditional watch.

 

The original Gear was a bit clunky, though hardly the least attractive piece of wristwear ever made, and offered an impressive range of functions.

 

The Gear Fit narrows those capabilities even as it slims down the device itself, replacing the watchface of the original Gear with a sleek curved ellipsoid shape that hugs the wrist quite nicely.

 

It feels less like a watch than a piece of jewelry, albeit one that lights up to show you the time, the weather, notifications from your phone and a range of exercise monitoring and health-logging capabilities.

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