Published in Mobiles

Apple announces its Apple Watch

by on09 September 2014

Coming early next year for US $349

Apple has finally unveiled its eagerly awaited smartwatch and surprisingly it has dropped the "i" from the brand, calling it simply the Apple Watch. With a rectangular design in 38mm and 42mm cases, the watch comes in three versions, the standard one, Watch Sport and Watch Edition with 18kt gold casing, the Apple Watch is expected to be available early next year with a starting price of US $349.

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Calling it the most personal device they have ever created, Tim Cook described the new Watch as an extremely precise and customizable timepiece, an intimate way to connect and communicate and a comprehensive health and fitness companion.

The design of the Apple Watch is everything but new, but it does bring a couple of novelties including a "digital crown", a dial on the side that lets you preform certain actions without touching the actual screen, like zooming.

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While it did not talk about the actual specifications of the Watch, Apple did gave a couple of hints including that the Sapphire screen, which is actually pressure sensitive as well, as well as a whole new S1 custom SoC. Unfortuantely, we still do not have any ideas regarding the performance of this SoC or the actual battery life that can be expected from the Apple Watch, other than it will be enough for "all day wear", so we guess that you will have to charge it every night. It will use a Magsafe wireless adapter for charging.

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Apple is definitely aiming at fitness and health wearable devices with the new Apple Watch. It will monitor the hear-rate, have other sensors for fitness purposes, but will need an iPhone for GPS. It will also have an NFC chip that will allow it to use Apple Pay. Of course, the Apple Watch will have Siri built into it which will allow users to dictate messages, even recognize questions and offer responses, take commands and everything else that you might expect it to do.

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Apple has also launched the WatchKit which will allow developers to extend their current apps to the Apple Watch.

As noted earlier, Apple Watch will be avialable in three versions Apple Watch, Apple Watch Sport and Apple Watch Edition as well as with six different wrist bands for it available at launch.

The bad thing, for Apple at least, is that the Watch does not come until early next year and it will cost US $349, most likely for the base version. It will also need an iPhone to work properly and only the iPhone 5 and later models will qualify.

 

Last modified on 09 September 2014
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