Three years ago, when the kickstarter project came out for the Pepple Watch, I wanted one. But I wasn’t going to fork out the kind of cash (I think $200) for it.
Well a month ago I bought a used Pepple watch, model 301WH, for ~$25. Here is my review of it.
First, my requirements for the watch where this:
- Its cheap. I won’t spend over $50 for a watch.
- It could tell time. No point it wearing a watch if it could not do the basics of telling time.
- It could last a couple days on one charge. The new “smartwatches” are lucky to get thru the day on one charge. I have issues charging my phone every day, I don’t want to have to deal with that with a watch too.
- It would alert me of notifications on my phone. This was the real reason I wanted a smartwatch, so if I get a notification on my phone, I didn’t have to pull it out to see it, or know I got one.
- Optional, it could track my walking around. Basically I wanted to start keeping tabs on my health activities. Nothing acturate, just something that would give me an idea of what I was doing for activity.
I got the watch, a white one, from cowboom on one of their sales. It was in “fair” condition according to the site. When I got it it looked in pretty good shape to me, it was clean, only had a few scratches, and didn’t seem to have any issues overall.
I charged it up, installed the Pepple app on my phone, and was up and running in no time. Since then I have had a few weeks to play around with the watch. Here is my pro/con list.
Pros:
- The battery runs forever. For a used watch, I am still getting fantastic battery usage. I went 7 days between charges. And I might have been able to push another day. This is great since I can plan to only charge it on Saturdays and keep it on during the week.
- I can see the watch outside. I can’t say the same thing about my phone. But the sun does not affect the viewing of the watch face.
- It definitely alerts you. When an alert (phone call, text, etc) comes in on your phone, you know it since when the watch buzzes, it can wake you right up.
- The “band” is a standard size. This is nice so if it breaks, or I want to replace it, I can just get a replacement band anywhere. Instead of being tied to the watchmaker itself.
- I can customize the “watch” part. Way too many different watch faces out there.
- The buttons are easy to use. Nice big buttons. Positioned so I don’t accidentally hit them too.
- It worked right off the bat with my watch. I just installed the Pepple app, and was up and running.
- It can take a beating. OK I have dropped it, banged into things with it, and slid in the dirt with it. And its still on my wrist. One of my co-workers dropped his moto 360 and the screen shattered (the band failed and fell off his wrist).
- Its still smaller than most other “smartwatches” I have seen. Or at least it seems that way. The new moto360 may change that. Oh and some of the fitness bands are smaller, but they don’t have a display unless you are buying the expensive ones.
Cons:
- Its White, I wanted black but I am cheap, so it seems white doesn’t sell as well, and was cheaper ($5-10) than black. This is my biggest issue with the watch.
- It hiccups every so often. I think its a bug in the software, but the display gets messed up every so often and I have to refresh it. Not a biggy of a problem, but it is annoying.
- Its not very accurate at tracking my steps. Not sure if this is the app, misfit, or a limit on the hardware. But its OK for ballpark, but it misses a lot of activity (one night of running for example).
- Its a bit bigger/bulkier than I would like. I don’t care for the shape of it and I wish the band connections where less bulky.
- It doesn’t play with Google’s wear initiative. Since Pepple came out before Android/Google set standards for this type of stuff. It isn’t a seamless integration into Android. Which means many apps are not compatible with it if they support wear.
Wishes:
- I wish this integrated in with my alarm clock on my phone. I use Timely and it would be nice if it would “buzz” the watch to wake me up first. There maybe an option somewhere to do this, I haven’t found it yet. I know “Android wear” based devices will do this automatically with the app.
- Replacement for Google media play remote to use other apps. I have a pod catcher I use on my phone, and there is no integration for it with Pepple, but Pepple will work with Google’s music player, would be nice if the two could be integrated…not sure if that would be Android work or Pepple. Or the app adds in support for Pepple.
- It was black. I hate the white color. It sticks out way to much for my liking. I so wish I had spent the extra $5 for black.
- There was a bit more protection on the screen. Like a small buffer on the edges to keep it from getting scratched.
- It was smaller and round. I believe the new Pepple Time is smaller. But at $200 its a bit out of my price range.
One other thing that isn’t a pro or con, the charge cable for the Pepple is a custom job and a bit odd. So you cannot use standard USB like cables to charge it, but the custom cable is nice since it connects to the people via a magnet and its a connection that will not be easy to break off inside the watch (like micro USB could).
Overall, it was worth getting and I would do it again (except get a black one). For $25 used, it still preforms well, does what I need it to do. The battery lasting a week is a HUGE plus for me with this watch and would be one of the bigger selling points for me. My 2 cents, Pepple should update this watch (instead of the Pepple Time at $200) and sell that for under $50. Since the higher priced watch market is getting crowded with some of the bigger players out there. Being a cheaper variant with a name for itself already could be a good selling point for them. Most other “cheap” wear watches I have seen can’t hold a candle to this old, used Pepple. That or perhaps one of the old watchmaker companies should buy out Pepple and do it. Oh you can buy the original pepple for …$100. Me, I would stick to used. The $100 price puts it close to other higher end watches.