"Ideally, a smartwatch is supposed to free you from the shackles of smartphone over-reliance, all without leaving you disconnected from the digital world,"
Wired's Christina Bonnington wrote, echoing Savov's complaint. "For now, that promise remains unfulfilled.
Bonnington called the Gear a "$300 smartphone accessory."
NOTIFICATIONS COME UP SHORTThe team at
T3 wasn't taken with the Gear's notifications, writing
"[t]he Samsung Galaxy Gear never made us feel like we needed it, in fact the more we used it the more useless it became. The notifications - its primary use - are basic, the apps are few and far between and the voice smarts are disappointing."
Gizmodo's Brent Rose was particularly unimpressed with what is supposed to be the Gear's strong point - notifications - since he found that "there's nothing this watch can do that your phone can't do better."
"You get the first few sentences of emails, which are actually very easy to read on the watch's sharp screen," said Rose. "However, this only works for emails sent/received through Samsung's generic email app. We suspect that the vast majority of Android users have Gmail accounts, and thus find the Gmail app better and more convenient. Tough luck for now."
NOT ENOUGH APPS, AND THE APPS IT HAS AREN'T THAT GOODRose continued: "Take S Voice, for example. In theory, it's capable of doing almost everything that Android's voice assistant can. Except that it's excruciatingly slow and far less accurate.
"The real problem is that the Gear just doesn't do much yet, and what it does, it doesn't do very well."Samsung's Galaxy Gear was launched with
more than 70 apps, but many, like Evernote, require that the related Android app be installed on your connected Galaxy smartphone and merely function in collaboration with the full app. In other cases, apps just aren't available yet, and there's no real assurance that companies will develop for the Galaxy Gear unless it proves successful.
BATTERY IS A BUMMERAlthough Samsung has taken measures to make the Gear power efficient, having to plug your watch in to charge in every evening didn't impress many reviewers.
The company said the Gear's 315 mAh battery should get you
"about a day" of use, and many reviewers judged this to be exactly true -- for better or for worse. "There’s no question about it folks, it requires nightly charges,"
wrote John V. of Phone Arena.Those familiar with the smartphone connected Pebble watch, requiring only a weekly charge, will likely lament over having to charge the Gear about as often as their smartphone. Though Pebble doesn't offer a color screen or camera, it does feature battery life that most agree is far more desirable in a watch. Some users would likely trade features to eliminate daily charging.
A BATTERY CADDY?And though the method of charging is a seemingly convenient wireless station, it can be an awkward setup to carry around with you in the event you'll be out for a full day or longer.
"...You will need to carry the caddy with you if you're going away from home for more than a couple of days,"
explained CNET's Andrew Hoyle. "With heavy use, you'll get just a day out of the watch, so leave the caddy behind and you'll find it quickly goes from being an exciting new gadget to a lump of useless metal and rubber strapped to your arm."
THE NEXT BIG THING IS...COMING SOON?So the consensus on the Galaxy Gear is that it's a nice idea, but wake us up when the next one comes out. And we'd have to say that, with Samsung saying that flexible screen technology will be for
"future devices," and the recent reports that the
Galaxy Gear 2 is already in development, there may be reason for optimism looking forward.
Chris Burns with SlashGear basically wrapped up with this sentiment, saying he's looking forward to Samsung's future line of wearables.
"At the moment, with a market limited to those looking to purchase the Galaxy Note 3, the Galaxy Gear is more of an exercise in paving the way for future devices," Burns said. "Samsung has already done a fine job with the software and the hardware this device comes packed with – now the way is made more than ready for a beastly follow-up."
So, the bad news is that the Galaxy Gear may not be the smartwatch we've all been waiting for. The good news, well, at least Samsung's news commercials for the device are really cool.