Caller ID Watches

kbielefe writes "On Thursday, Sony Ericsson and Fossil Inc. announced a line of bluetooth watches that vibrate when a call comes in on your cell phone, display the number of the caller, and allow you to press a button to send the call to voicemail. No more digging around in your pocket or purse before deciding if the call is important enough to interrupt a meeting."

Battery life

[dsmey]

I wonder what the battery life is like and how many calls you get before your watch goes dead.

landline as well

[WindBourne]

This sounds useful for the land line as well.

Re:Battery life

[madumas]

According to this [fossil.com]:
"Recharge through USB or universal AC adapter"

Sorry, I don't want to have to think about charging my watch. I expect to be able to keep it on my wrist a couple of months, at least.

Re:I'm torn between...

[fossa]

On a related note... what's with voice mail and answering machines kicking in at four rings? I can't seem to set mine to six. If I'm, say, at home washing dishes in the kitchen when the phone rings, I am not quick enough to rinse and dry my hands and sprint to the next room, even a mere dozen feet or so, and get the phone in time. I remember a time before the ubiquitous answering machine. My mother told me to not give up and hang up until eight rings had passed when calling someone. Now with cell phones, there have been times where just digging it out of my pocket ran close to the ring limit. If things weren't so frantic perhaps a watch with caller ID would be less interesting.

What would really be nifty is a cell phone that could sense body heat and adjust its ring volume accordingly, getting louder if far removed from the body.

Re:Battery life

[timeOday]

It would be cool if they could make this watch self-winding. (And by "winding" I mean something than charges a small battery).

Re:Battery life

[nickheart]

i dunno, i think the better idea would be to wind the spring for the vibe unit. then you don't have to worry about it's primary use, a clock, to run out of power, you just wont get a vibe when a phone call occurs if you forgot to wind it..... now just to solve the overhead for the bluetooth unit, cuz i'm sure it's gonna suck power too.

Am I unusual?

[a_nonamiss]

Does anyone else really see an odd paradox here in that all the watches have analog dials with digital displays for the caller ID and Bluetooth? Some of the most modern technology coupled with the most archaic. I don't know why, but it's very hard to find a decent watch that is digital only. (NOTE: My search automatically excludes anything made of plastic, anything non water-resistant or anything that has calculator buttons.) I don't think I'm odd (well, OVERLY odd...) but am I alone in thinking that it's peculiar that it's the 21st century and the majority of us are still reading watch dials that were invented 500 years ago? I understand the romanticism of wanting to know how it was done in the old days (similar to knowing how to shave with a straight razor, navigate by the stars or shoot a bow & arrow) but why is it that 98% of all non-plastic watches are still analog? Sure, I know how to read an analog watch, but why should I have to? It's extra work. I can glance at a digital watch, and I know instantly what time it is. No calculating, no trying to figure out which number the little hand is pointing at. No counting up by 5's. Just a 1/10 second glance tells me unambiguously what I'm looking for.

After an exhaustive search, I found this [pulsarwatches.com] and so far I like it, but is it possible that it's the only decent watch that's all digital? I found a couple more (Ammon, Quiksilver and RipCurl come to mind) that were designed as surfer watches, but I really don't need to know when the tide is coming in here in Ohio. So I put this question to other time geeks out there. Are there other decent watches that are digital only? I don't like the analog/digital combo watches. Lots of wasted space that I don't care about. Just a reasonably plain, waterproof, easy to read watch that tells me the time and date at a glance, with a stainless steel case and a mineral quartz face. Am I wanting too much?

Re:Am I unusual?

[a_nonamiss]

Very good point. The reason is that I am exceptionally hard on watches. Exceptionally hard. I don't know why, but I am clumsy and careless. In all seriousness, when I used to buy plastic watches, they lasted an average of one month, no kidding. I'm not being a snob about plastic watches or anything. Just being practical. Stainless steel or titanium watches with a mineral crystal (or even sapphire, but I haven't found one of those yet) will last much longer on my wrist. A plastic one will not.

Re:Am I unusual?

[scotch]

I'm pretty tough on watches, but mine usually last a year or so. Yeah, if you need a tougher material, plastic may not suite you. On the other hand, if the plastic watches are 10-100x less expensive than your metal rolex, then you can treat them as disposable.

Watch Sales

[Takumi2501]

In recent years, sales of watches have been down because people carry other devices which tell the time anyway. I wonder if this will do anything to help the watch manufacturers recover.

Time will tell, I suppose. (No pun intended.)