Will you buy an Apple Watch?

[rockymtnhigh]

A really old question from Rockymtnhigh

Mike- you had asked about viewing in bright sunlight.

Both my SS with sapphire face and my wife's with the gorilla glass seam equally readable with default brightness settings. Viewing with high noon Florida sun on the face is very dark but not difficult to read the time. Reading email and other text messages is nearly impossible. Wearing polarized sun glasses just makes it darker yet. However, an easy trick is to just cast a shadow with your head over the watch and then even with sun glasses everything is easily readable.

As I type this on my iPad sitting under the awning wearing sun glasses, I had to turn up the brightness all the way on the ipad but I still have no problem viewing my watch, including reading the pull down email.

So, the trick is view the watch in a shadow under bright sun.

Thanks Don! What I figured. Polarized glasses complicate everything, but I wear them all the time. Not surprised about email and texts.

 

[mike123abc]

Watchers of Apple store reports watch shipments speeding up significantly. 38MM seems to be less popular (shorter lead times). I have a shipping date on mom's stainless steel one now in a couple weeks. Black stainless still says July, I hope it comes in by the end of June.

 

[TheForce]

Most of the 42mm SS began shipping on May 2, about a week earlier than estimated. I had ordered 2 SS 42mm and both came in a week later. One of those was the all SS with band. Some of the black have begun to ship. I'll bet yours will be in early.

I expect delivery of the Blood Pressure monitor later today. It works with the Apple watch and also detects Atrial Fibrillation and works in sync with Apple Health monitor App that logs your heart data, and can send it to your doctor for his files in a populated Excel SS. The reviews have been mixed so far but the bad reviews have been mostly from elderly who have trouble with technology anyway. I wonder how I will do with it.

 

[tigerfan33]

Don.
What is the name of the bp monitor and where did you buy?

 

[klang]

It works with the Apple watch and also detects Atrial Fibrillation and works in sync with Apple Health monitor App that logs your heart data, and can send it to your doctor for his files in a populated Excel SS.

What do you intend to use to get data out of the Health database? The Health app allows you to dump the contents of the database into a .zip file but it has all the data not just blood pressure for instance. I found an app called Access which allows you to pick and choose which data to export but I don't like the fact that when I summarize by day it creates a row for every day even if there is no data for a day.

 

[TheForce]

Don.
What is the name of the bp monitor and where did you buy?

What do you intend to use to get data out of the Health database?

Qardio ARM from Amazon. It arrived this morning so I will be setting it up for the first time later today. This app allows you to download an Excel spreadsheet of the data according to the specs. The full data is also uploaded to the cloud for you have to set up with an account. I think the doctor gets your permission to access the cloud data but I'll let you know. You can also authorize others like family member to access the data too.

The biggest negative reported was the BT pairing which is said to be a a little buggy, but we'll see and I'll let you know.

 

[klang]

Qardio ARM from Amazon. It arrived this morning so I will be setting it up for the first time later today. This app allows you to download an Excel spreadsheet of the data according to the specs. The full data is also uploaded to the cloud for you have to set up with an account. I think the doctor gets your permission to access the cloud data but I'll let you know. You can also authorize others like family member to access the data too.

The biggest negative reported was the BT pairing which is said to be a a little buggy, but we'll see and I'll let you know.

Please do let us know how you like it. I had been using a wireless from Withings but the thing failed to take a reading about half the time. Based on a Consumer Reports recommendation I replaced it with a iHealth BP3 dock. It uses the old Apple connector but does take a reading every time. Unfortunately the Withings app was much better for getting the data out.

 

[TheForce]

Comes with batteries already installed. I followed the setup instructions which are pretty simple. Put on the cuff on my upper left arm as instructed. Next you touch the iphone to the cuff case and in about 3 seconds a pairing question pops up and I answered yes to pair. Then I got the Start screen. Touched start and the cuff started right up pumping. everything was fully automatic. I took 3 readings and it lists each and logs an average on the calendar display for plotting. Location on maps is also logged. In the setup screen you register the app with name and e-mail and set a personal password. There are a set of questions regarding sharing with family and a place to put in your Doctor's name and email address. Also height, weight and DOB are input. You can also share the data with the Apple Heart app or Apple Health too.

The Apple watch display has two pages. One to run the cuff with a start button so you can just put the cuff on and operate it from your watch. Once again the watch allows for convenience over getting out the iphone. Just launch the cuff on the watch start button and then when done the readings show up on the watch, press OK and the watch will log the data on your iphone.

Next- to determine how to use one Quardio Arm for more than one person.

 

[tigerfan33]

Anyone update to software 1.0.1 noticing erratic heart rate readings while in activity mode?
Since updating I'll go 3-5 hours without a reading. When I'm still which is rarely throughout the day it may or may not read. Suppose to read every 10 min.
Several articles have been written about a bug in the software that could be causing this issue.
Talked to Apple today for about an hour and sent them several readings before and after the update. Being elevated to engineers and suppose to call back tomorrow.

 

[navychop]

Good luck with that. Ver 1.0.

 

[TheForce]

I turned on the health monitor over the weekend since getting the Quardio BP device. Heart rate's been working very well with the heart rate data. Being on a PM my heart rate is very constant, within a range. The Apple watch seems very accurate.

The only change I saw was battery life which now runs only 32 hours from 100% down to 10%. Before turning on the constant heart monitoring, I would go almost 2 days! ( 45 hours ). The health monitor with constant heart rate is taking it's hit on the battery for sure.

I'm still on ver 1.0 and show 14 apps active. I will hold off on updating.

 

[klang]

I checked my status the other day and it said shipping June 1-10. Received an email just now that it should be delivered tomorrow. I hate that Apple ships everything Signature Required, I'm flying out of town tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully UPS gets here in the morning.

 

[StevenD]

I checked my status the other day and it said shipping June 1-10. Received an email just now that it should be delivered tomorrow. I hate that Apple ships everything Signature Required, I'm flying out of town tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully UPS gets here in the morning.

With USP My Choice, you can opt to have it left at a local UPS office or UPS Store.

 

[klang]

With USP My Choice, you can opt to have it left at a local UPS office or UPS Store.

I do use UPS My Choice, there is also the option to have them hold it for a later delivery date. I think they charge a few bucks for that. I'll wait and see how it goes tomorrow.

 

[TheForce]

I recall there is an option on Apple's order site to opt out of signature too. I did that for the band but considering the risk, I made sure I was home for the watches when scheduled. Which model did you order and when?

 

[klang]

I recall there is an option on Apple's order site to opt out of signature too. I did that for the band but considering the risk, I made sure I was home for the watches when scheduled. Which model did you order and when?

38mm Space Gray Aluminum with black sport band on May 1.

I normally prefer to have stuff I order shipped to the local Apple store so delivery isn't an issue but that wasn't an option for watches yet.

 

[TheForce]

If anyone is interested in getting colored bands cheap for fashion wear, be forewarned that Amazon has some 3rd party bands for cheap but while they are advertised as Apple watch compatible, they do not fit the watch. They are designed to fit on conventional spring pin bands, not the Apple push button design. I ordered three of these for my wife's watch but we shipped them right back. The true Apple watch bands are about 3 times the price of these knockoff's.
Beware of bands sold by this company:
Amazon product ASIN B00XKIURGG
They now show a closeup of the band that clearly is not compatible with the Apple watch. When I bought them they offered several colors and only one photo which was a copy from the Apple watch page. At least Amazon has a good return policy.

 

[TheForce]

38mm Space Gray Aluminum with black sport band on May 1.

I normally prefer to have stuff I order shipped to the local Apple store so delivery isn't an issue but that wasn't an option for watches yet.

I believe it has been since April 10th. But I know there were some glitches in the order page on April 10th like for several hours, I couldn't buy Apple Care at the time of the order. after 5 hours that button went hot so maybe you got stuck with another coincidental Apple store web page glitch. Default on the watch was signature required to your address and the other options were to accept with digital signature and also deliver to Apple store near you.

Anyway, you'll soon have it. Just put it on charge before you do anything for at least 45 minutes. Make sure your iphone is up to ver 8.3 too. Have fun!

 

[tigerfan33]

I used the UPS Choice app and changed my shipping to UPS facility like another poster.
UPS runs 6-7 pm to my house and there is a pickup window 8:30-9:30 am to pickup packages at my facility. UPS will also hold packages to be picked up for 5 days I believe. Both options at no charge.
Thanks for the heads up on the watch bands Don!
I nearly pulled a trigger on one two weeks ago.

 

[mike123abc]

Checked Apple store online and ship dates have moved up... 42mm stainless is now by next week, 42mm black stainless is now first week of July, hope they move it up again.