A brief look at the history of smartwatches

While there has always been this belief that smartwatches are more of a statement than useful products, the fact that they have been in existence for decades now suggests that the product category has managed to capture at least some of the public's attention. We thought it's a good time to take a brief look at the history of smartwatches to give you an idea about how the market has evolved with time. Samsung SPH-WP10 Launch way back in the year 1999, the SPH-WP10 was essentially a complete phone, worn on the wrist. The timepiece, if you call it, sported a monochrome LCD screen, and came with built in speaker and microphone. Weighing in at 50 grams and having a thickness of 2cm, it was claimed to offer a talk-time of around 90 minutes. Reference & Image source IBM Watchpad Launched in 2001, the Watchpad was jointly developed by IBM and Citizen Watch with an aim to "further explore a new type of personal information access devices for the pervasive computing era." Running Linux 2.4, it sported a QVGA (320 x 240 pixel) LCD, and came with 8MB RAM and 16MB flash memory. The intelligent watch featured calendar software, Bluetooth, and accelerometer. Reference & Image source Fossil Wrist PDA The Fossil Wrist PDA, which was launched in the year 2002, was powered by a 66MHz processor and sported a 160x160 touchscreen display. Running Palm OS 4.1.2, the timepiece had an infrared port and a virtual keyboard, and was able to exchange information with a PC. Reference | Image source Microsoft SPOT series First launched in the year 2004, the Smart Personal Objects Technology(SPOT) series of smartwatches that came in 2006 displayed information like stock quotes, news headlines, traffic, sports scores, and weather. However, they were large in size and the required users to shell out money for service subscriptions. Reference | Image source Sony-Ericsson MBW-150 The MBW-150 came in 2007 and allowed users to wirelessly control music on their Sony-Ericsson phones. The OLED display on the timepiece displayed information like caller ID/number and track details. It also allowed you to change tracks and adjust volume. The watch was not only water resistant, but also vibrated on incoming calls. Reference | Image source LG GD910 The GD910, which was launched in the beginning of 2009, was essentially a wrist-worn phone that sported 1.4-inch touch display and offered text-to-speech capabilities. It was also capable of making voice and video calls and came with a nice Bluetooth hands-free. Reference Samsung S9110 Also Launched in the year 2009 was the S9110, which was also a wristwatch phone that sported a 1.76-inch screen, and offered a built-in speakerphone, Bluetooth connectivity, and speech recognition features - there was, however, no support for video calls. Reference iPod Nano While the iPod Nano, which debuted in 2010, was a great little media player, it could also be worn as a wristwatch when attached to band. Sporting a 1.5-inch 240 x 240 multitouch display, the device, however, didn't provide any typical smartwatch features, but the potential was certainly there. Reference | Image source WIMM watch Launched in the year 2011, the Wimm was an Android-powered smartwatch that sported an LCD display. It offered connectivity over Bluetooth as well as Wi-Fi. When paired with your smartphone, it vibrated and displayed caller ID data related to the incoming call. The device's downside was that it was a little too bulky. Reference & Image source Motorola's MotoACTV Also launched in 2011 was the Moto ACTV, which was powered by a 600MHz processor, and packed in GPS, Bluetooth, and FM radio. It was capable of tracking your running, walking and cycling, and treadmill stats, as well as measuring heart-rate. The watch was also a smart music player - it could learn which songs made you perform better. Reference | Image source Metawatch Strata The Strata was the second generation Metawatch smartwatch that was launched towards the end of 2012. Sporting a 1.35-inch 96x96 pixel LCD and running FreeRTOS, the feature-rich timepiece offered Bluetooth connectivity and displayed notifications from your smartphone. It also featured modular watch faces loaded with several useful widgets. Reference | Image...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/a_brief_look_at_the_history_of_smartwatches-news-14198.php

Counterclockwise: The second screen

LG's announcement of the V10 was pretty exciting and the second screen seemed clever. Of course, phone historians know the second screen is something that has been tried many times in the past, it just never caught on. Just note that we're not talking about flip phones here, which obviously have a second screen on the inside. No, we'll delve into the most unusual screens to grace a phone. Samsung Continuum Here's one phone from late 2010 that had a second screen - a 1.8" line display at the bottom to show additional info below the 3.4" main screen. Like the LG V10, this one actually had just one screen, a 4" Super AMOLED, it was just divided into three: 3.4" main screen, Android keys, 1.8" secondary screen. Motorola Wilder Here's one that actually had a second display unit. The Motorola Wilder boasted a 2.8" 240 x 320px LCD (it was an entry-level phone) and a 0.7" 96 x 16px secondary display. It showed missed notifications, song info, signal and battery strength. It was not constantly on though, the 910mAh battery just wasn't enough. LG Doubleplay LG isn't new to this game either. In 2011 it showed the LG Doubleplay - a slider with a QWERTY keyboard that is split by a secondary 2" 480 x 320px display. This display showed various handy shortcuts (mostly for apps that will benefit from the hardware keyboard). Some apps also show additional controls, e.g. tabs or bookmarks in the browsers. It also aided in multitasking. Samsung Galaxy Beam The secondary screen doesn't have to be on the phone. In 2010 Samsung experimented with installing a pico-projector on the Galaxy Beam. It put out 15 lumens of brightness for a screen up to 50" big with 800 x 480px resolution. It found some success, getting two successors, the last of which came out last year. Kyocera Echo and Sony Tablet P I said "no flip phones," but those technically aren't, not in the usual sense at least. In 2011 Kyocera showed off a dual-screen phone that combined two 3.5" 480 x 800px screens into one 4.7" display... with a pretty huge gap down its middle. The following year fellow Japan company Sony tried something similar with the Tablet P. It put together two 5.5" 1,024 x 480px screens with a marginally smaller dead space between them, but it wasn't much better. Samsung has patented an assembly based on a bendable screen that will use a single screen and eliminate the be mid bezel. This is hardly a new concept though, in 2008 Polymer Vision announced a phone (never released) that had a 5" display that folds closed. It only managed 16 grey levels, no colors. YotaPhone Another greyscale screen would prove more practical six years later. The YotaPhone put an e-Ink display - the stuff found on Kindle, B&N, Kobo and other e-book readers - on the back of the phone. This always-on screen would display notifications and other info while drawing basically no power. It had great sunlight legibility too. YotaPhone has produced several versions, though the company is struggling a bit to enter western market. Samsung Galaxy Note Edge While Samsung is yet to produce a consumer-ready screen that can be folded in half, its bendy screens allowed it to create the Galaxy Note Edge. One screen was divided into two - 5.6" QHD main display and a strip on the side that can be on for most of the day. It would display notifications and other info while the screen is off and multitasking and other controls when the screen is on. Some clever app-specific uses involved putting a virtual shutter key that felt almost like it's on the right side of the phone (not quite, it was at an angle). LG AKA We'll finish off this with something unusual, but it could prove the most interesting of the all. It technically does not have a second screen, but its case leaves the top of the screen uncovered. The phone uses that to draw eyes - yes, eyes. The AKA comes with several different personalities and in a Tamagotchi-like fashion it needs attention from its owner. Why is this interesting? Well, digital assistants are a dime a dozen these days, but even the best of them sound kind of robotic. Yes, Siri can pull off a few rehearsed jokes, but the LG AKA is the first phone to bring emotions into the mix. People spend enough time talking to their phones as it is, AKA-like phones in the...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/counterclockwise_the_second_screen-news-14271.php

Weekly poll: Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P vie for your affections

Google unveiled its 2015 vision for the perfect Android phone - the compact, affordable Nexus 5X and the big, premium Nexus 6P. Ignoring the silly price premium that Europeans will have to pay, both phones caused a lot of excitement. The Nexus 6P is the first Nexus phone with a metal unibody. It features a last-gen Samsung display - 5.7" Super AMOLED, just like the Note5 - and an impressive camera with large pixels for surprisingly good image quality. We saw a 240fps slo-mo video from the camera and it looked great. So, Huawei Nexus 6P - thumbs up or down? We feel this is an easy enough to answer, in the US the new flagship is a killer deal. The Nexus 5X was LG's chance to improve on the highly popular 2013 model. It features a slightly bigger screen, 5.2" 1080p, but there are a great deal of compromises. For one, the chipset is not fast enough for 240fps videos, it comes with 2GB of RAM too (like the Nexus 4 back in 2012), it doesn't have stereo speakers either. For still images and videos the camera is still great, plus the Nexus 5X adds the fingerprint reader and USB Type-C goodies like the 6P. Still, this vote might end up...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/weekly_poll_nexus_5x_and_nexus_6p_vie_for_your_affections-news-14275.php

Week 40 in review: Nexus duo, camera battles and Lumia 950 XL leaks

Another week flew by and the new Nexus duo seems to be on everybody's mind. Both the Huawei- made Nexus 6P phablet and the LG Nexus 5X have flooded the news section, as the industry was eager to learn everything there is to know about the latest and greatest Google smartphones. Besides the obvious first look and specs run down at the unveiling event, we already have a clear idea of what the handsets will cost. The EU pricing seems to be particularly hard to swallow, but hopefully, it will be reconsidered shortly. LG also excited users with another phone announcement - the peculiar LG V10. It has at least a couple of oddities going for it, like a small second screen above the main display and a dual front-facing camera setup. Other noteworthy announcements from the past few days include the powerful Pixel C tablet and the flagship-grade HTC Butterfly 3. Another big topic this week seems to be camera performance. A few devices paid a visit to DxOMark with truly impressive results, like the Xperia Z5, which is now officially the king of the turf. The Nexus 6P and 5X also did well. Last, but definitely not least, if you are still waiting on the next Lumia flagship device, you will be pleased to hear that it is getting ever closer to a release. The Lumia 950 XL keeps popping up in rumors and renders all over the place, so it shouldn't be long now. For this and more, check out this quick run-down of our most popular articles below. .news-item .n-left { float: left; width: 28%; text-align: center; } .news-item .n-right { float: left; width: 70%; } .news-item a { padding-bottom: 0; padding-left: 0; } .news-item .n-right h2, .reviews-item .n-right h2 { clear: both; padding: 0 0 3px 0px !important; font: 400 19px Google-Oswald, Arial; margin-top: -4px; } .n-right p { line-height: 155%; } .news-item { padding-top: 10px; padding-bottom: 0px; border-top: 1px solid #ccc; } .news-item p { margin-left: 0; } .n-right h2 a { text-decoration: none; color: #000; } LG V10 goes official with secondary display and a duo of front-facing cameras The Korean manufacturer's latest flagship phablet will hit the shelves in Korea this month in five different color schemes. Huawei Nexus 6P is all-metal, starts at $500 The phablet packs a 5.7" AMOLED QHD screen, Snapdragon 810 chipset and runs Android 6.0 Lollipop. LG Nexus 5X launches with a Snapdragon 808 and 1080p display The phone will be available for pre-order from today starting at $379.99 for the 16GB model. Google unveils Pixel C flagship Android tablet The exciting new device comes with a detachable keyboard and a USB Type-C interface. YU teases Yutopia, says it's the most powerful in the world We are yet to learn hardware specific, but Yu is already making huge promises for a flagship phone "without compromises". Sony Xperia Z5 has the best mobile camera ever tested by DxOMark Just yesterday DxOMark added the Huawei Nexus 6P and its camera to its charts, and the new Google phone had some pretty impressive results. It climbed to the No.2 spot in the charts, behind only Samsu... These HTC smartphones are confirmed to get Android 6.0 Marshmallow HTC will begin rolling out the new firmware to its flagship smartphones before the end of this year. HTC Butterfly 3 is now official with Snapdragon 810 and 20MP Duo camera A rebadged version of the J Butterfly, launched in Japan in May, makes a global appearance. Microsoft Lumia 950 XL measures revealed in leaked factory render The Redmond giant's next-generation flagship smartphone will debut in a little over a week, on October 6 in New York City. Nexus 5X and 6P India pricing revealed The 5X starts at around $485 and the 6P around $608. Analyst predicts December launch time-frame for Xiaomi Mi 5 This comes just weeks after a leaked teaser image of the device surfaced online, revealing that it could possibly pack in a fingerprint...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/week_40_in_review_nexus_duo_camera_battles_and_lumia_950_xl_leaks-news-14270.php

Weekly poll results: iPhone 6s just edges out iPhone 6s Plus

The numbers have spoken - the iPhone 6s Plus is catching up with its little bro in customer demand. The company that insisted no phone should be larger than 4 inches has managed to convince its user base that big screens are the way to go in a matter of two product generations. You would have thought that the reception of an even heavier phablet won't be all that warm, but voters don't seem upset by the 192 grams of heft. Perhaps the proportional weight gain of the regular-sized iPhone 6s might be just enough to push some to finally make the move to the Plus. After all, a 142g phone isn't all that easy on your pocket anymore, and once you have that thought planted in the back of your head, it's a matter of time before you start making other rationalizations to justify the larger diagonal. It would also seem that the optically stabilized camera and better battery endurance are worth the $100/€100 difference between the two models. All that being said, the 4.7-inch iPhone 6s still manages to nose out the Plus by about a hundred votes. However with numbers split 51% to 49% it could go either way when detailed sales reports start coming...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/weekly_poll_results_iphone_6s_just_edges_out_iphone_6s_plus-news-14277.php

Huawei P9 might feature a dual camera on its back

The yet to be announced Huawei P9 flagship might feature a dual camera on its back. Alleged images showcasing the handset's main camera stipe made the rounds on Twitter. In addition to the dual sensor and LED flash openings, the photo reveals an additional slot that might be home to a sensor for laser autofocus. As you probably know by now, laser autofocus is becoming an increasingly popular smartphone feature lately. Furthermore, it appears that the Huawei P9 might be available in two different variants - LTE and Delux. We are yet to find out what these designations stand for. The successor of Huawei P8 is expected to debut at some point next year. Its rumored specs include Kirin 950 SoC and fingerprint sensor. Source...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/huawei_p9_might_feature_a_dual_camera_on_its_back-news-14294.php