Hasta La Gadget!

Pebble’s slowly been expanding the places you can buy its e-paper smartwatch, but today it’s landed at the biggest retailer of them all. Ahead of the Thankgiving celebrations, the company took to Twitter to announce the availability of the Pebble at Amazon, where you’ll now be able to buy black and red models (rocking the new software update) for $148.99. While you’ll still find them at Best Buy stores and sold by AT&T, Amazon’s promise of free next-day Prime delivery might sway you if you’re on a post-turkey impulse buying binge.

Filed under: Wearables, Mobile, Amazon

Comments

Via: Pebble (Twitter)

Source: Amazon

When we reviewed the Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch, we were concerned about the lack of third-party notification support. If we received a notification from any app that wasn’t officially made by Samsung, we wouldn’t actually get to read it on the watch; instead, we’d get alerted to the fact that something was waiting on the phone for us, and we’d be given the option to press a button and have that app open up on the phone itself. Fortunately, Samsung has heard our feedback and will be pushing out an update sometime this week that now allows third-party app notifications to show up in full; you’ll now be able to read your incoming Gmail messages, Facebook Messenger pings, Twitter mentions and Google Hangout messages, to name a few.

Samsung is also adding a couple more enhancements to the new update as well: it’s confirmed that the Gear will also receive enhanced Smart Relay functionality which it says will help users “perform actions seamlessly” from their Gear to their phone, as well as an improvement to the lift-and-pause gesture that activates the clock. We imagine there will probably be a few random bug fixes thrown in there as well. Overall, this is a pleasant update to some of the most frustrating aspects of the Gear.

Update: This firmware update has already been available in Europe, and it appears that this new update is for US versions of the device.

Filed under: Wearables, Mobile, Samsung, Google

Comments

The other day we reported that Qualcomm was planning on releasing its Toq smartwatch on the 2^nd of December where it would be priced at $350. At that time there was no word when you could pre-order the device, but the good news is that if the Toq smartwatch caught your attention, you will be pleased to learn that the smartwatch can now be pre-ordered via Qualcomm’s website.

The Toq was designed by Qualcomm as a reference design which will feature a 1.55” Mirasol display with Bluetooth 3.0 connectivity and will play nicely with Android devices that run Android 4.0.3 or later, although Qualcomm does recommend Jelly Bean or later for better performance. It also comes with a 240mAh battery which will apparently last for days without charging.

Smartwatches are definitely the “in” thing these days as we have seen recent efforts from the likes of Samsung with the Galaxy Gear and ZTE with their own smartwatch, and we have also heard rumors of how Google and Apple plan on entering the smartwatch market as well. So, which company’s smartwatch are you most looking forward to?

Qualcomm Toq Smartwatch Now Up For Pre-Order original content from Ubergizmo.

The Qualcomm smartwatch by the name “Toq” has appeared ready for pre-order this week, showing just a few months after its initial reveal this September. This watch works with a Qualcomm Mirasol display and works with several Qualcomm bits and pieces inside, the entire package acting as something of a full demonstration of the powers […]

Though smartwatches may or may not be selling well, such market conditions aren’t stopping newcomers like Qualcomm and others from entering the game. Now, China’s ZTE has told the WSJ that it’ll launch its own model in the second quarter of 2014 with features similar to Samsung’s Galaxy Gear, but at a lower price. Before you get too excited, the yet-unnamed device will just launch in China at first, and it’ll only be compatible with the company’s own smartphones — like the Nubia Z5 shown above. However, ZTE said it may roll out in Europe and the US later and might also launch future smartwatches that work with any Android device. Though the market for wrist-borne wearables in China is tiny compared to the smartphone segment, ZTE’s mobile marketing chief Lu Qianhao said that launching such a product may give his company’s smartphones a competitive advantage. That may be an unusual marketing ploy, but it could get stranger — the company’s also considering smart glasses and yes, smart shoes.

Filed under: Cellphones, Wearables

Comments

Source: WSJ