Sony SmartWatch

what's the time?

i have been looking for this smartwatch since they announced it. must have not been looking hard enough coz i never did find any shops selling it. the smart watch pretty much evolved from the liveview, but adds a bit more functionality and style to the whole package.

the smart watch, as the name imply is just that - a smartwatch. meant to be use solely as a companion to your smartphone, the smart watch provides access to important information on your phone without having to actually open your phone. there lies its apparent weakness as it is pretty much useless without a phone.

designed as a sony accessory, the smartwatch still plays nice with other android phones as well. i'm paring the watch with a samsung galaxy note. the only drawback that u have is in terms of incompatibility of some sony specific apps. but third party app pretty much make up for it.

different views

the watch has 3 main views. the watch face. widgets and apps selection. you need to install the liveware app on your smart phone before u can start using it. u also need to install the smartwatch app, where u can manage all the widgets and apps and other information that appears on the watch. there's a facebook, twitter and music control app. phone book and other stuff. if u use endomondo then the smart watch extension acts as a display to show your workout statistics.

there is a market for smart watches these days. some noted project like the pebble has been gaining momentum and will likely be a competitor to the sony smart watch.difference is display tech means that the pebble will have longer battery life and is also compatible with the iphone. personally for me, i just want something that can compliment my galaxy note. u don't need to whip out the phone all the time just to glance at some basic info.

old school vs new school

plus i just love gadgets. hehe.

Part 2: The ASUS Eee Pad Transformer

So my transformer does not come with 3G. I can use wifi but most of the time I use the built in tethering function on the desire HD for some internet love. Can't do that with the HTC Mozart. Thanks to my sister who swapped the phone she had with mine.

Wordprocessing.

The transformer is made for typing. Well, the keyboard dock at least. No longer do you need to fiddle around with the on screen keyboard, you have a full fledged chiclet style keyboard to type till you get callouses on your fingers... not that you would get callouses typing on the transformer keyboard dock though. The keyboard also have some specific keys to access functions on your tablet. You can adjust brightness settings, turn wifi or bluetooth on, take screenshots and play media. I'm digressing. on the software side, the transformer comes with polaris office. this full featured office suite enables you to view and edit office documents, spreadsheets and presentation. This app is preventing me from splashing out yet again on quickoffice or documents to go. It is fairly decent. I have the option to sync with google docs or box.net. Hence, you can save your documents in the clouds. Apart from that you can download various other wordprocessing or note taking apps so that you can type to your heart's content. Evernote is a must. It has a tablet enhanced beta that you should try.

Internet Browsing.

The built in browser is flash 10.3 compliant. That in itself is a win. No longer will you have the excuse of your browser not showing flash based pages. Videos played inline in the browser itself and the browser also scores well in some of the browser tests that I tried. There are also other browsers that you can try such as Opera Mobile, Dolphin HD, etc.

Social media.

There are a number of twitter clients which are compatible with honeycomb. My personal favourite at the moment is plume. Tweetcomb is also good where as the default twitter client for android is nothing like the twitter client for the iPad. It's not fully optimised to take advantage of the big screen. I keep going back to the iPad to compare. Facebook optimisation is also lacking. But I'm sure that as more and more developers start tweaking their apps for honeycomb you will see more support for the tablet.

I'm stumped for now.

Part 1: The ASUS Eee Pad Transformer - A Clever Invention.

looks like a laptop..

Autobots. Transform and roll out. You will definitely have a tendency to say that when ur using the transformer.

design wise it just works. in its netbook form it is indistinguishable from a normal laptop, well apart from the touchscreen that is. the transformer screams premium, something ASUS is slowly getting to grips with. having used an eee pc for the last two years, the eee pad can be described as a much more sexy looking long lost cousin. detaching it from the keyboard dock never fails to draw amazed looks from onlookers.

its a clever idea that just works.

old ipad vs new transformer..

stacking the two on top of each other..

comparing the dimensions with my old ipad, the transformer is thinner vertically but much wider horizontally. the two tablets weigh roughly the same in hand but i think i prefer the ipad. well maybe its because i have been using the ipad for a while. the slim widescreened form factor may need some getting used to.

(image credit: ASUS)

out of the box - the transformer comes in 2 options. with and without the keyboard dock. i say get the keyboard dock just because of the extra battery life it brings and also the added connectivity option. with the keyboard dock u get the tablet, dock, and usb cable cum charger.

hardware - the transformer comes with 16GB of built in storage. u have a micro sd slot on the tablet itself, an sd card and two USB slots on the dock. there's a 5MP camera on the back and a 1.2MP camera in front for video conferencing. it is powered by Nvidia Tegra2 SOC and comes with 1GB of RAM. u also have a mini HDMI port to connect the tablet to any supporting external displays. u can read more on the technical specs at ASUS website.

10 inches not enough..

mini hdmi cable came in handy..

operating system - the transformer is running android honeycomb version 3.1. the difference between honeycomb and gingerbread is fairly obvious but u would expect the two to merge once ice cream sandwhich pops up by end of the year. in any case, what this means is some of the core google apps are optimized for tablets and u can see from the email, calendar, youtube and other apps how this is to your advantage. for those interested, it is fairly easy to root the transformer, the instructions to which can easily be googled up. ASUS also customized the launcher on the transformer. i can't really tell having not use a stock honeycomb device before but overall the experience is okay. 5 home screen for u to put ur widgets and app shortcuts. u can probably customize it to ur own liking however way you want.

software - ASUS has bundled together some apps on the transformer. there's mylibrary for ebooks and stuff, myNet for DNLA playing thingamabobs, myCloud for your cloud based storage options, a file manager and a pc sync software. on top of that u have access to all the compatible apps available in the market. one weakness of the current market is its not segregated into fully tablet compatible apps and phone apps. unlike apple's appstore. you just have to try them all out la kan.

next i will be looking up real life user experience and what not.

in the meantime here are some pictures for your enjoyment.