Samsung Galaxy gear full review

  SAMSUNG GALAXY GEAR
         FULL        REVIEW

Samsung isn’t the first company to build a smartwatch, but there’s no question that the Galaxy Gear is the most highly-anticipated entrant into the category to date. Now that it’s here, does the Galaxy Gear live up to the hype? Reviewers across the web have had some time to evaluate Samsung’s Android-powered watch. What do they think of it? Unsurprisingly, it’s a mixed bag — though there is some consensus on a few points. Take the Galaxy Gear’s price tag, for example. Everyone from PCmag to Wired to Engadget to Fox News agrees that it’s a hard to recommend at $300. The Gear been praised as a well-built device with a premium feel, but limited compatibility (it only works with the Galaxy Note 3 for now) is a huge turn-off. If you look past the price tag, there are plenty of positives. The Galaxy Gear’s battery life is generally considered “better than expected.” It was noted that after a day of average use that the battery was still about 65% charged. On more active days, it still had about 30% remaining. Fox and ZDnet had similar experiences, with the former calling it “surprisingly decent.” AnandTech attempted to come up with an actual runtime. With the screen’s brightness set to 4 out of 5, they managed to squeeze out just over five hours of continuous use. That’s pretty impressive, considering how many individual interactions it should take to reach that total. Then again, it falls well short of the e-Ink Pebble — which only needs to be charged about once a week. That’s the price you pay for a bright, full-color OLED display, of course. That, and slight difficulty reading when you’re outside. Gizmodo notes that the Galaxy Gear can be tricky to use in direct sunlight, though it’s nice and readable in other conditions. The watch gets dinged again for its outside performance because it’s not waterproof. Yes, it can handle a little bit of forearm perspiration. No, you shouldn’t leave it on your wrist while you wash your hands or if you’re jogging out in the drizzle. At $300 the Gear ought to be waterproof — particularly when tech-heads are going to compare it to the waterproof, $149 Pebble. How about those voice commands? With no on-screen keyboard, S-Voice handles basic interactions with aplomb. Stuff like checking the weather, dictating text messages, and dialing a call is no problem for the Galaxy Gear. It can, however, be frustratingly slow –Wired says that it was often faster to pull the Note 3 out, unlock it, and send a message from there instead.
On a more positive note, the Galaxy Gear got several thumbs up for its humble 1.9-megapixel camera. It won’t capture any prize-winning photos for you, but it’ll do in a pinch. It also works nicely with Samsung’s S-Note app and with Evernote — which can handle stills and video as well as up to two minutes of audio from the Gear’s microphone.
All told, the Galaxy Gear is a decent effort from Samsung. For all but the most cutting-edge gadget lovers, however, the majority of reviewers say to wait for version 2.0… or at least to hold off until there are more apps and Samsung offers support for more phones.