37 ms·

Open Source Smartwatch

701 points by sytelus 6y ago

SiliconSolder 6y ago
Can this be something good?
- tinus_hn 6y ago
  Looks to be only only $25 which makes it a nice plaything. I think the storage is rather limited at 4mb though.
  - warrenmiller 6y ago
    I thought it was a typo for GB maybe?!
    - wongarsu 6y ago
      4MB isn't that unusual in embedded devices. After all you aren't storing audio and video, at most a couple pictures for a 220x220px display.
- Hamuko 6y ago
  Doubt it considering how many of the current smartwatches are good. Some might even say that it fails right at the start at being a smart watch since it doesn't have an always-on display.
  - m-p-3 6y ago
    If it had a transflective display I'd get one right away. Sure, the colors aren't as good but I really care about battery time.
  - bdcravens 6y ago
    Apple only added that feature last year, and sells a current Apple Watch without the feature (SE).
- dariosalvi78 6y ago
  The main problem currently is the lack of a good open source firmware with complete hardware support, but the community is growing and soon we should see some interesting things: https://github.com/sethitow/awesome-pinetime https://github.com/sethitow/awesome-pinetime
- Scandiravian 6y ago
  Open-source is still maturing in the "smart" area. The phones are getting a lot better all the time and I think we'll see more watches in the next couple of years There's still a long way to go before it's viable for the average tech-geek to go for a fully open-source setup (phone, watch, tablet, etc), so if your question is if it's good now, then no If you're asking if this will turn into something good over time, then yes... A million times yes The open-source space will most likely always come with its own set of problems and I don't think we'll ever get an environment that has the same level of seamlessness as android or iOS. I'm hoping the next 2-3 years will get us to a point where open source can get a user 80% of the way out-of-the-box, at which point I'm definitely ready to ditch android and move everything to an environment, that's built to respect my privacy
Yaggo 6y ago
Promising specs! I'd rather have multi-day battery life than fancy graphics, maybe even an e-ink display.
- pedrogpimenta 6y ago
  Me too. It says "All-week 180 mAh battery" which I'm not sure what it means but I doubt a 180 mAh lasts an entire week.
  - appleflaxen 6y ago
    It's a milliamp-hour. The processor draws about 220uA [1] so you have about 818 hours (=34 days) of CPU time, but you need to take display current out of that budget too, and an easy source for that probably exists, but I can't find easily. [1] https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/f/nordic-q-a/7893/nrf52832-current-consumption https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/f/nordic-q-a/7893/nrf52832-cu...
  - naraic0o 6y ago
    it's running a low power nrf52. they can last a year on a coin cell battery, with adequate power optimisations. without an always on display, a week is possibly an underestimation. for example, see the amazfit bip, it has lasted me ~45 days which even has a (low power) always on display.
  - lukeschlather 6y ago
    There are plenty of smartwatches with heart rate monitoring that have a week of battery life and 180mAh is enough for 10 days on some of them. It's obviously not enough if you're playing music or video or something like that. But if you're primarily using the device to give you notifications, heart rate, and the time, it seems likely it does last all week.
  - donpdonp 6y ago
    Using the recent infinitime OS v0.9, I get 2 to 3 days of normal usage per charge.
- uncledave 6y ago
Doctor_Fegg 6y ago
Interesting. Shame there’s no GPS, though. As a cyclist I’d love a hackable GPS device that isn’t a (fragile, bulky) smartphone.
- dariosalvi78 6y ago
  Check BangleJS then
  - Doctor_Fegg 6y ago
    That looks really interesting - thank you!
- asutekku 6y ago
  Agree. GPS is primarily the reason why i got a smartwatch. It’s so much better now that i don’t have to carry my phone with me when i cycle or run.
  - vinay427 6y ago
    Bluetooth with onboard music (on some newer fitness watches) really sealed the deal for me. After going through a Pebble some years ago, I realized that I didn't actually care about the "smart" features as long as my next watch had excellent GPS performance, Spotify or some other music platform, and an always-on display to tell the time.
    - earthscienceman 6y ago
      Any recommendations? I would love a watch that was dumb as a brick but played music and had gps. Bonus points if it is extremely simple.
      - tguvot 6y ago
        a variety of garmin watches have gps, built-in maps and music
      - 6y ago
swebs 6y ago
Note that this is still under development. From the store page: >The 3-Pack sealed PineTime aimed solely for project deployment purpose only, this is not for end user who is looking for ready to wear Smart Watch.
- ekianjo 6y ago
  > Note that this is still under development just like the Pinephone.
TekMol 6y ago
I would totally buy it if I could order it locally in Europe. When I ordered a PinePhone from Hong Kong, it was just too much of a hassle for my liking. Waiting for an indefinite amount of time until it gets shipped and then deal with customs. I wonder how many customers there are per country. Would it make sense to have local distributors around the world? Or maybe at least one per continent?
- solarkraft 6y ago
  The PinePhone is a special beast that had or still has some supply issues AFAIK (also with the higher value customs issues are more likely). I personally had no issues ordering stuff from Pine64, albeit it did take long.
  - mbreese 6y ago
    It’s not a special beast. Everything I’ve ordered from there has some issues with shipping (maybe the rock boards are better). But honestly, that’s to be expected and they make no claims to the contrary. Hopefully the shift to a commercial store will make this better.
    - kaba0 6y ago
      Probably they just had covid-related issues. I’m sure some much larger companies also had issues due to it.
- commoner 6y ago
  Pine64 has announced that they will open online retail stores in certain regions, including Europe and North America, this year: https://www.pine64.org/2020/12/02/pine-store-community-pricing-online-retail-stores/ https://www.pine64.org/2020/12/02/pine-store-community-prici... These new stores will offer a higher standard of customer service, but the products will also be priced higher. The original community Pine Store will remain available in its current form.
- glenstein 6y ago
  >Waiting for an indefinite amount of time until it gets shipped and then deal with customs. I got my Pinebook from Hong Kong and was stunned at how quick it came. I was expecting a month or two, and if memory serves it was closer to a just a couple of weeks. I wonder why phones are more of a hassle to order from Hong Kong than laptops?
jbj 6y ago
After using a pebble time round since it came on the market, I really value the 4 physical buttons (back) on the left vs (up/select/down) on the right. I have never used a watch with a touch screen function, but I read oppinions of the watches made by fitbit after they aquired pebble, that it was a mix of touch screen and buttons. letting this have both technologies while being open source leaves a lot of room for developers I would imagine. But leaning onto what I read about those 3button fitbit watches I hope there will be a future version with 4 buttons.
- BlueTemplar 6y ago
  Weirdly enough, I prefer the more "toy-like" Pebble buttons to the more "solid-looking" Pebble Time ones : they are easier to find without looking, and easier to press.
  - ryukafalz 6y ago
    Having had both, the Pebble buttons got a bit gummy over time whereas the Pebble Time buttons are still very solid. The latter seem more well put-together, IMO.
    - BlueTemplar 6y ago
      Yeah, I guess that was one reason for the change…
    - jbj 6y ago
      Absolutely, I have used pebble time round since it came out, no button issues
    - Fnoord 6y ago
      The Pebble 2 SE buttons are known to fade off eventually. There's a hardware mod (3D printer) which requires orig. Pebble Classic buttons to fix it. Unfortunately, I broke my Pebble 2 SE in the process. Its very delicate hardware. I ended up buying a Fossil Hybrid HR instead. Its a decent watch, just a tad expensive.
sgt 6y ago
Has anyone thought about the potential of using these in embedded projects? It already has a powerful processor, and some outputs/inputs should be possible to reach by having a breakout board, and it comes with a screen so it would be useful for on-site configuration and diagnostics.
- pantalaimon 6y ago
  A nrf52840 dongle would be more useful for that
  - sgt 6y ago
    Yeah but does it come with a screen and buttons?
    - keepingscore 6y ago
      Looks like adafruit makes one https://www.adafruit.com/product/4500?gclid=Cj0KCQiA0MD_BRCTARIsADXoopaUhxTUus6K74WOG5Xw3LZL2U1IHONH-DxS2FWRE2bSgXSQURIpKSMaAu59EALw_wcB https://www.adafruit.com/product/4500?gclid=Cj0KCQiA0MD_BRCT...
- slim 6y ago
  I have a lilygo wristband it has ESP32 and comes with abreakout board for $20 https://www.tindie.com/products/ttgo/t-wristband-diy-programmable-smart-bracelet/ https://www.tindie.com/products/ttgo/t-wristband-diy-program...
TimJRobinson 6y ago
This is awesome! I've been looking for an open source alternative to my Fitbit since Google bought the company. I'm really just looking for something that can track my health data + sleep and has an api to get the data in a raw form for further analysis.
- scrps 6y ago
  Might want to look at an Amazfit bip paired with Gadgetbridge. Gadgetbridge can export sleep, heartrate, and exercise data. It exports as a db though I have yet to fool around with it or with my raw data.
vuciv1 6y ago
Ah, I don't see sleep tracking. Gimme sleep tracking and I'm in!
- pantalaimon 6y ago
  well it's all open source, so you can add it yourself
- snvzz 6y ago
  This isn't some app store based device, where you install apps. What's flashed into the device is the whole system image, and it's up to you (that's the whole point!) to decide what this image does. Anything sample code they provide is to be seen as a sample only.
Waterluvian 6y ago
This is really cool. $25 is quite impressive too. A GPS would be killer though. But doesn't quite scratch the itch that I've got for a higher level open source wearable or tablet (think IP67 Raspberry Pi tablet or watch) The key is that like this watch, the hardware is done and "consumer" ready.
- willis936 6y ago
  Even the Pi Zero uses an order of magnitude more power than you want in a watch. A Pi tablet would be a very fun toy. I’d be surprised if there wasn’t something available for that now but may be bulky.
  - Waterluvian 6y ago
    Good point about the watch!
  - bluGill 6y ago
    The pine tab is a table available from the same site. I'm looking at it, but it isn't ready for someone with my limited hacking time - yet (I expect this to change in a few months)
    - Waterluvian 6y ago
      I've got my eye on that one if it returns to stock. Thanks! A slightly alarming statement on the page: "Small numbers (1-3) of stuck or dead pixels are a characteristic of LCD screens. These are normal and should not be considered a defect." I've bought dozens of screens in my life (phones tablets monitors TV's) and have never had a stuck pixel. Is it actually normal?
      - wongarsu 6y ago
        That depends on where you buy. If you buy a Dell UltraSharp you can expect that there will be no dead pixels. But that's not because Dell has technology that completely prevents them, it's because Dell has good QC. If you buy a cheap screen from a manufacturer that does less QC you might seldomly have stuck pixels. And of course there are the bottom-of-the-barrel suppliers that buy whatever other suppliers discard because of QC defects. There's always someone who will buy a screen with a couple dead pixels if it's half the price. I don't know where pine falls, I would guess they buy straight from the factory without extensive QC and might seldomly have stuck pixels.
sdwolfz 6y ago
Is it just me or is the screen not vertically centered on this device? Also the wake up button is on the left instead of the right, probably gets woken up a lot by hitting the sleeve of a coat or buttoned shirt... These might be nitpicks but just because it's open source doesn't excuse it from poor design critique. Tech wise looks really good for the price.
- MHordecki 6y ago
  > Is it just me or is the screen not vertically centered on this device? It's a 3D render. The actual display seems to be more or less centered[0]. > Also the wake up button is on the left instead of the right One could presumably flip the device and the rotate the screen rendering by 180 degrees. This is how Apple Watch handles right wrist use. [0]: https://pine64.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/PineTive-DevKit-1-1.jpg https://pine64.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/PineTive-DevKi...
  - sdwolfz 6y ago
    I'm watching this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuk9Nmr3Jo8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuk9Nmr3Jo8 and I see the same thing, the bottom is about twice the size as the top. Good call on the screen rotation, is this something any of the OSes support or needs to be requested to be added in?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
ctz 6y ago
Does this mean there's a free and open-source version of the Nordic softdevice?
- swetland 6y ago
  I'm not aware of anybody reproducing the exact softdevice design, but there are open source BLE stacks out there that run on the nRF528xx family, for example: https://github.com/apache/mynewt-nimble https://github.com/apache/mynewt-nimble
- elgfare 6y ago
  Zephyr has a BLE stack maintained by Nordic.
solarkraft 6y ago
Fun background info: The PineTime is based on a watch called Colmi P8: https://twitter.com/beriberikix/status/1344752102799798273 https://twitter.com/beriberikix/status/1344752102799798273
looperhacks 6y ago
Funny, I actually have an open Pinetime in front of me right now. I use it for my masters thesis and it's a really nice project. If you want to try out some embedded development (that you can actually show to friends who don't aren't developers), I think this is the perfect project.
- wongarsu 6y ago
  You might have just convinced me to buy the devkit. What do you use it for in your masters thesis?
  - looperhacks 6y ago
    Sadly I'm not sure what I'm allowed to make public just yet because I write the thesis for my company :(
    - thebetatester 6y ago
      Definitely post that thesis here when you're done. We'd all like a read!
    - rawland 6y ago
      +1 interested in this theis. Maybe you update your HN about page a bit. (:
    - loxias 6y ago
      Another +1 for you to post your thesis once you can!
numpad0 6y ago
I’m not so sure if this is significant other than for the fact that it’s being distributed by PINE64. There are plenty other junk reprogrammable “smartwatch kit” that reuse Huami/Xiaomi-brand smartwatch enclosures while genuine Huami goes on to collect data more strategically at a larger scale. Recently I got a Mi Band 5 and learned they transfer BLE pairing over platforms - they make devices generate new MAC when unpaired, which is tied to Huami account upon pairing. Gives me different chills than the fact that its sole purpose is to take my health data anyway.
- alisonkisk 6y ago
  Are the Huami ones open source or hackable?
  - vanous 6y ago
    > Are the Huami ones open source or hackable? The Amazfit Bip has an unofficial BipOs, which is a very cleverly created reverse engineered SDK allowing to uploaded custom compiled programs.
  - julianlam 6y ago
    Not really, no. Sort of. I have a Mi Band 5, and wanted to use GadgetBridge instead of the official Mi Fit or Amazfit/Zepp app. I was surprised to learn this was not easy to do. I needed to retrieve the Bluetooth MAC from the proprietary app via rooted app, or by logging in via script, which no layman would do. The watch is now paired with GadgetBridge, but the steps are hard enough to dissuade anyone from trying it.
    - vanous 6y ago
      > Not really, no. Sort of. > I have a Mi Band 5, and wanted to use GadgetBridge instead of the official Mi Fit or Amazfit/Zepp app. > I was surprised to learn this was not easy to do. I needed to retrieve the Bluetooth MAC from the proprietary app via rooted app, or by logging in via script, which no layman would do. > The watch is now paired with GadgetBridge, but the steps are hard enough to dissuade anyone from trying it. There is now also an android app to fetch the key and gps almanac, very simple to do, no root or python required. Note: I kivy wrapped and apk packaged the above mentioned script.
pjmlp 6y ago
> Any open-source operating systems built on top of numerous RTOSes What does this even mean. Already fragmented apps before it even starts, what else to expect.
- wongarsu 6y ago
  Are you complaining about the lack of a walled garden on a post titled "open source smart watch"? Yes, open source leads to experimentation and individualization which leads to fragmentation. It's a trade-off, but and there are already plenty of other smart watches going for a less fragmented but less open ecosystem
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    I am complaining that they don't provide one single OS experience. I didn't mention anything about walled gardens.
    - snvzz 6y ago
      Why do you expect them to restrict what you can put on it (i.e. enforce a single OS), when the point seems to be for people to do whatever they want with it?
      - pjmlp 6y ago
        Because without a standard OS stack it is going to be the "Year of FOSS Watch"™.
        snvzz 6y ago
        You don't seem to get it. This isn't an end user device. This is for developers, i.e. hackers and makers. It doesn't work by installing "apps", but rather, the whole system image is built from _your_ code. Which makes sense on a device that has 64KB RAM. Any code samples they provide are just that: Samples. If what you're looking for is a general public oriented device, this is not it. There's plenty in the market to pick from.
aryamaan 6y ago
I'll buy one in a heartbeat which tracks Sp02 throughout and viberates/beeps when it goes below a threshold.
- dariosalvi78 6y ago
  Withings has one certified as medical device (the only one I know of that got such certification)
donpdonp 6y ago
I have a pinetime and the form factor is great (until I lost the back plate, next one will be sealed). All the opensource activity around the watch is also great. The biggest drawback to me is only 64k of ram. Thats a Commodore64's worth of ram. The 240x240 screen is 57kbytes, it must have its own display ram. Also NordicSemi never seemed to be particularly opensource friendly. I'm hoping for a future RISCV edition of this watch with more ram.
- listic 6y ago
  Do you state that it has its own display RAM or doesn't it? 240x240 is ~56.25 kB at 8 bpp. the screen is RGB 65K colors, that is, 16 bpp; so the framebuffer size should be twice larger. I assume that the display controller has its own memory. True, you would need another 112,5 kB for double-buffering, but maybe you can do without it.
  - deadw3ight 6y ago
    Color displays are great, but they should have had an option for a (color or black and white) e-paper display. More efficient for these purposes imo.
    - lambda_obrien 6y ago
      I would pay so much for a hackable watch like this with a 3 or 4 color epaper display, I'd almost pay as much as an apple watch if it was high quality hardware and had a great open API and toolchain.
      - rch 6y ago
        I'd pay more than for mass produced consumer gear, from any manufacturer.
      - deadw3ight 6y ago
        Go on ebay and purchase a Pebble Time. Color epaper display, fully hackable even after being discontinued thanks to the dev community who continues to update it with "Rebble" the open source version of the OS it ran on.
dirtyid 6y ago
Casio F-91W for cyberpunk IED makers. I wish smartwatch templates adopt more multiple programmable buttons. Nice to have a functional media remote during winter with gloves on. Pepple got so much right.
krzyk 6y ago
Lack of NFC :( But probably even if it had it it wouldn't work with Google/Apple Pay, for me payments using my watch would be the best application of "smart" together with notifications.
- agilob 6y ago
  >But probably even if it had it it wouldn't work with Google/Apple Pay Defy not with 4MB of storage.
  - dfox 6y ago
    The card-side implementation of NFC payments is surprisingly resource hungry for parasitic powered NFC chip, but utterly negligible for a device with own battery, 64MHz ARM core and 4MB of storage. On the other hand good luck with getting such a device accepted by anyone in the financial industry. (On the other hand you probably could build something that proxies to your real physical card)
- ryukafalz 6y ago
  This is the frustrating thing about integrating with payment systems, it's far out of reach for a FOSS project like this. Cryptocurrencies are better in that regard but few businesses accept cryptocurrencies, GNU Taler would also be better but I think that requires banks to be on board with it which they're also unlikely to do.
- sq_ 6y ago
  NFC would've been great for "my watch is also my keycard" type stuff. Hopefully some future version will include it!
tannerbrockwell 6y ago
See also the TTGO T-Watch-2020 which is based on an ESP32 processor. [1]: https://www.tindie.com/products/ttgo/lilygor-ttgo-t-watch-2020/ https://www.tindie.com/products/ttgo/lilygor-ttgo-t-watch-20... [2]: https://github.com/Xinyuan-LilyGO/TTGO_TWatch_Library https://github.com/Xinyuan-LilyGO/TTGO_TWatch_Library
- goda90 6y ago
  This might be more up my alley because of WiFi. The only reason I'd want a wearable is to be able to put down my phone but still get notifications(and maybe reply to messages) and Bluetooth's range limits that. But honestly, I hate wearing watches.
- jmiskovic 6y ago
  Does it the watch have support for Lua? It's popular language around ESP32 but it's not mentioned on any product materials. Is the size some standard? I would prefer some other belt but don't know how to search for it?
  - StavrosK 6y ago
    I've been using ESP8266es and ESP32s for years and Lua isn't really that popular. The original NodeMCU did come with Lua, but I've never used it (I just flashed something else as soon as I got them) and I don't know of many people using it either. I'd say that MicroPython is more popular than Lua at this point.
- StavrosK 6y ago
  That looks great, does anyone have one of them? What's the battery life like? The ESP32 isn't very battery-friendly.
  - sokoloff 6y ago
    ESP32 in deep sleep modes is reasonably battery friendly (all depending on your frame of reference, of course.) 5uA in RTC-only and 10+ uA in RTC+ULP sleep.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
kken 6y ago
Ok, just to make sure I understand this correctly. - This is basically a commercial smartwach (the Colmi P8) that is based on a well documented SOC, the nordic nRF52832 - The open source version comes with an enclosure that is not glued shut, so that it is easy to access testpoints on the pcb. - Development is done by accessing the nRF51 SWD interface with pogo pins or similar. The programming interface can be a standard SWD interface such as an STLink clone Ok, sounds easy enough. It should be possible to just buy one of those smartwatches and crack them open? But OTOH the developer version is not much more expensive. The main question is now: What software to run on it, that goes beyond a few experiments? Is there any kind of open source smartwatch OS that would run on this? Edit: Corrected typo, of course I meant SWD interface, not SWM. (SWM or rather SWIM is for STM8)
- jarnix 6y ago
  :) not sure it's up to anybody to do it. To me "nRF51 SWM interface with pogo pins" means absolutely nothing, same for nRF52832 or STLink.
  - pantalaimon 6y ago
    I think GP means the SWD interface, which is a standard ARM programming/debugging connector. I would advise against the ST-Links though as they expose a more high level protocol and don't always work with non-STM chips. FT232H dongles make for a more versatile programmer.
- amar-laksh 6y ago
  There ya go: https://github.com/daniel-thompson/wasp-os https://github.com/daniel-thompson/wasp-os
  - kken 6y ago
    Nice!
  - wongarsu 6y ago
    There is also https://github.com/endian-albin/pinetime-hypnos https://github.com/endian-albin/pinetime-hypnos and the default https://github.com/JF002/Pinetime https://github.com/JF002/Pinetime My guess would be that Wasp-OS will become the beginner-friendly fully-featured option while Pinetime will be the more battery friendly option.
EamonnMR 6y ago
The cost is crazy low. Any insight on if this will function as a standard smartwatch (ie buzz for alerts) out of the box, or do I need to write my own bluetooth driver for this to be useful?
- opan 6y ago
  I've heard it's already usable with Gadgetbridge on Android.
purplecats 6y ago
won't apple just murder this? its like a jackel trying to steal meat from a bear's meal
- kccqzy 6y ago
  Apple would just laugh at this because it's not a serious competitor.
Donckele 6y ago
I highly recommend the compatible Colmi P8 smartwatch with waspos https://github.com/daniel-thompson/wasp-os https://github.com/daniel-thompson/wasp-os which enables you to write micropython with access to all device features. You can overwrite the stock firmware using bluetooth without having to open and solder wires.
- bartvk 6y ago
  Does it support notifications?
  - Donckele 6y ago
    If you mean sending a message from an external device to the watch and running some python code with it then yes.
    - bartvk 6y ago
      That is cool. I don't see iPhone there, does it mean notifications aren't supported there?
      - Donckele 6y ago
        I dont know what the notification features are with the stock firmware and TBH it is a hit and miss affair with all devices and you have to do plenty of research before buying. The device I quoted is ripe for hacking and currently the waspos firmware is a blank slate for anyone to create custom watch software.
dmitrygr 6y ago
This is what we (early people in the android wear team) wanted android wear to be, until word from the top came down that "it shall run android, or it shall not exist". The rest is history....
- wsgeorge 6y ago
  I'm not really familiar with this space, but what did you think it should run? I can't imagine a team building a smartwatch at Google at that time expecting anything other than Android.
  - sq_ 6y ago
    I would assume something like one of the RTOSes like what's listed for the PineTime? Seems like it'd be easier to get power consumption low and keep the watch speedy that way, then just interface with a phone, etc., over bluetooth or something.
    - dmitrygr 6y ago
      Yup. This. That was the desired direction till the word came down
economusty 6y ago
Need to add O2 sensor and ECG to compete.
suyash 6y ago
Tizen would make a good OS for this, it's also an open source OS.
- dev-il 6y ago
  Not really. Tizen wouldn't work on a small low-power and low-RAM bluetooth SoC like the NRF52 this watch has. Tizen requires iirc a minimum of 512MB or 256 MB for "Tizen light". So: different focus, much bigger SoC and RAM, much shorter battery time.
noman-land 6y ago
Speaking of which, I recently discovered a javascript based open source smart watch. https://banglejs.com https://banglejs.com It's a little bulky but seems like it could be a fun device to hack around on. I got one recently from Adafruit.
- kilroy123 6y ago
  Thanks I've never heard of this watch. To me this looks far more interested.
tomjen3 6y ago
Does it actually have a decent battery? The Apple Watch can't even go 24 hours of use without having to be charged.
IvanSologub 6y ago
Why should products be either beautiful (like an apple) or functional (like Linux)?
kungito 6y ago
I so want to move to a standalone smartwatch and not have to carry a phone. I need nfc payment with a bank supporting the whatever (Google Pay or something), GPS with a maps app, LTE with support for whatsapp and calls + sms and bluetooth for wireless buds for calls. Don't even need music. Maybe I could even skip NFC payment by having a slot to insert a cut contactless credit card although I like the extra security of having to unlock the device to use Google Pay. I only wish Android smartwatches supported whatsapp voice message sending and weren't so slow to the point of being unusable
- bb123 6y ago
  Doesn’t the 4G Apple Watch support all of your requirements? I suppose if you had to a buy an iPhone to set it up that could be a substantial investment but an iPhone 6S would do the job.
  - krzyk 6y ago
    But switching OS environment is a bigger issue than the price. If you e.g. depend on more "hackability" like Tasker app you would be in a big surprise on iOS.
- ShakataGaNai 6y ago
  The crux of the issue will probably continue to be battery technology, for a while. The latest Apple Watches have basically everything you already want, including GPS & Cellular. They're not designed to be master devices though, since the watch formfactor is really hard to get much done on without some sort of master device for login, etc. Longer and more intensive use (more mapping, more calls) would probably kill the battery in nothing flat. While they're really good smart watches, they already struggle to keep up with the cpu/power/battery tradeoffs that are required for even a reasonable 1-day life. Some basic things you wouldn't expect, like crypto for HTTPS, take a LOT of work on a tiny wrist-mounted CPU.
deadw3ight 6y ago
After reading what others have said and feedback on PineTime and what a good hackable watch should have, it seems like Pebble should resurrect from the grave as a hackable watch. I mean the pebble time had 128kb ram (this only has 64k ram), an color epaper display, 150mAh battery (over a week battery life), heart rate sensors, etc. Heck its even being supported by the open source community AFTER it was discontinued. Maybe Fitbit can be petitioned to make the Pebble's hardware fully open source too.
- GekkePrutser 6y ago
  Pebble's over, sadly. I assume fitbit will want to do something with the assets, why else would they have bought it? (PS: I always wondered what was in it for them actually) I really hope the PineTime will pick up where it left off! But it's only in dev kit stage now.
  - emiliosic 6y ago
    I had the 1st two generation Pebbles, and now I'm using a Versa Lite. I do find a lot of resemblance on Pebble. Granted it's not open at all and their 'store' is, to me, much less inviting. Yeah not open source at all. However, I also recall that Pebble was looking into Android with their 'Pebble Core'. I do miss their e-ink screen
    - GekkePrutser 6y ago
      It wasn't eink! But low-power transmissive LCD. Best of both worlds IMO, faster refresh rate and still super low power. I was a backer of the original pebble too.. It's a shame things didn't work out. I think they just grew too quickly and got caught up in too much investment money wanting too quick returns.
- neilparikh 6y ago
  Fitbit only bought the software IP, not hardware: https://investor.fitbit.com/press/press-releases/press-release-details/2016/Fitbit-Inc-Acquires-Assets-from-Pebble https://investor.fitbit.com/press/press-releases/press-relea...
f430 6y ago
Does anybody actively use smartwatch? I remember I bought the first Google pay smartwatch Mobvi Ticwatch Pro. Used it once to pay for dinner and jogging a few times and found it to be not useful as I keep going back to my smartphone which I am not keen to carry while exercising. I'm hoping that Smartglasses won't be a flop but can't help but feel we are no in a plateau of really incremental innovations moving the screen from desktop to our pockets now to our wrists, our glasses and perhaps if Elon gets his way our brains in the future. Still would want one tho as it appears it is very light unlike many major brand ones that seem so bulky and large on my tiny wrists
- SamReidHughes 6y ago
  I know somebody who got constant text messages from his pregnant wife, and the Apple Watch made it easy to read them and dismiss them. I've also seen a DMV worker use the Apple Watch to distract himself with information every spare second he had in his interaction with me.
- smitty1e 6y ago
  I like my Samsung unit. I see SMS notifications and can even give a monosyllable response while the phone is stowed. That's a close to the Full Dick Tracy as I get.
- rootusrootus 6y ago
  > Does anybody actively use smartwatch? All the time. I use it to read texts (a lot of time they don't require a reply, they're just informational). Set timers. Check the weather before I head out. Track my workouts. Listen to music. Log meals. And I don't carry my phone with me when I'm working out, so sometimes I take calls on it.
- ogre_codes 6y ago
  > Does anybody actively use smartwatch? Lots of Apple Watches and a decent number of Garmin watches. Don't see a lot of anything else. I suspect the fact most of them are bulky and have shitty CPU options is a big part of it. Garmin users are willing to accept the bulk for the functionality. Apple Watches aren't that bulky. I use mine for workouts, taking calls so I don't have to pull out my phone, sending text & receiving text messages, and controlling music. For my light mobile phone use, it's nearly suitable as a replacement for my phone.
EvRev 6y ago
I have been using a Amaze Bipfit with Gadget bridge for the past few months. It helped me get my sleep back on track and my fitness levels back to a baseline. Previously I had a Basis and I really miss the galvanic skin response sensor and the temperature sensor. There are not any devices that work with Gadgetbridge, let alone anything on the market I trust using that has these two additional sensors, which allows be to see triggers in stress beyond the heart rate. Hats off to the Pine folks for having a smartwatch, but for God's sake if they are going to develop their own devices from the ground up please include a temp sensor at the least.
chrsw 6y ago
Cool project. I'm starting to become a fan of dual core BLE SoCs though. One small M0 to handle the BLE stack (which typically has to be high priority) and one M4 for the application.
- elgfare 6y ago
  The nrf53 is dual core with a dedicated network cpu.
  - chrsw 6y ago
    Yeah that's a good one. Maybe the next gen of this watch will have that.
blacklight 6y ago
I'd be the perfect target for the products of a company like Pine. A long-time geek who uses open-source software on nearly all of his devices, a tinkerer who doesn't mind recompiling a kernel or picking a solderer to make things work, and someone who seeks for absolute flexibility from his devices with zero corporate compromises. Unfortunately, the mediocre hardware used in their devices keeps holding me back. First came a phone with a 9-year-old A53 Cortex chipset. Then a tablet with the same outdated chipset. Then a laptop that ships with a Rockchip RK3399 with 4GB of RAM, in an era when 4GB barely suffice to run a browser with a few tabs. And now they are releasing a smartwatch with a 64 MHz core and 64 KB of RAM - some specs you would have expected from a very cheap smartwatch released 7-8 years ago. Why should I use a device whose hardware is almost a decade old at the time of purchase? And how do they even expect anyone to actually use these devices as their primary daily drivers, and not as proofs of concept, nice toys to tinker on every now and then or show off to friends? I understand that Pine wants to use 100% open hardware, and that comes with heavy compromises, but are these compromises worth it? If you ask even the geekest user out there whether they prefer a device whose source code is 100% pure and doesn't contain any binary blobs, or a device that doesn't start freezing/lagging after a couple of minutes of normal usage, I bet that anyone would opt for the latter.
- ohazi 6y ago
  The best ARM SoC you can currently buy on the open market (without a backroom deal) is a combo A72/A53, which is what Pine64 sells. If you want to change this, you'd need to either start a semiconductor company, or engineer some sort of coup at one or more of the "most unpleasant to deal with" Silicon vendors (Broadcom, Qualcomm, etc.).
  - blacklight 6y ago
    Well, that's exactly my point when I speak of compromises. If you want to be nude and pure then you go for the A72/A53, well aware that you're selling hardware that is almost a decade old and can't be used as a daily driver today. Otherwise, as unpleasant as it can be, you have to make a deal with Broadcom/Qualcomm, or get some other vendors to license their ARM chipset to you. The latter doesn't seem like the end of the world to me TBH. Of course I'd love an ideal world where open architectures like RISC V have taken over and are actually usable, but until we get there usability remains more important than purity - unless you're RMS of course - even if it involves a small "deal with the devil". I believe that most of the geeks out there love open-source products not much because they work daily with kernels and drivers (if that's the case then the argument for a pure open hardware without hex bloats makes sense), but because of the flexibility that they offer. Because they can install anything that they want on them and aren't prone to abandonware/planned deprecation like many products powered by Google or Apple. But if you don't give them products that they can use as main daily drivers, you'll rarely get enough momentum outside of the small tinker-and-show-off circles.
bapo 6y ago
Reminds me of the old Pebble, my first and favourite smartwatch. https://www.theverge.com/2014/1/28/5354016/pebble-steel-review https://www.theverge.com/2014/1/28/5354016/pebble-steel-revi... Sadly moved to an Apple Watch, since the Pebble ecosystem started to die.
Triv888 6y ago
Looks a bit less of a toy then Apple watch

701 points by sytelus 6y ago

SiliconSolder 6y ago

Can this be something good?

tinus_hn 6y ago
Looks to be only only $25 which makes it a nice plaything. I think the storage is rather limited at 4mb though.
- warrenmiller 6y ago
  I thought it was a typo for GB maybe?!
  - wongarsu 6y ago
    4MB isn't that unusual in embedded devices. After all you aren't storing audio and video, at most a couple pictures for a 220x220px display.
Hamuko 6y ago
Doubt it considering how many of the current smartwatches are good. Some might even say that it fails right at the start at being a smart watch since it doesn't have an always-on display.
- m-p-3 6y ago
  If it had a transflective display I'd get one right away. Sure, the colors aren't as good but I really care about battery time.
- bdcravens 6y ago
  Apple only added that feature last year, and sells a current Apple Watch without the feature (SE).
dariosalvi78 6y ago
The main problem currently is the lack of a good open source firmware with complete hardware support, but the community is growing and soon we should see some interesting things: https://github.com/sethitow/awesome-pinetime https://github.com/sethitow/awesome-pinetime
Scandiravian 6y ago
Open-source is still maturing in the "smart" area. The phones are getting a lot better all the time and I think we'll see more watches in the next couple of years There's still a long way to go before it's viable for the average tech-geek to go for a fully open-source setup (phone, watch, tablet, etc), so if your question is if it's good now, then no If you're asking if this will turn into something good over time, then yes... A million times yes The open-source space will most likely always come with its own set of problems and I don't think we'll ever get an environment that has the same level of seamlessness as android or iOS. I'm hoping the next 2-3 years will get us to a point where open source can get a user 80% of the way out-of-the-box, at which point I'm definitely ready to ditch android and move everything to an environment, that's built to respect my privacy

Yaggo 6y ago

Promising specs! I'd rather have multi-day battery life than fancy graphics, maybe even an e-ink display.

pedrogpimenta 6y ago
Me too. It says "All-week 180 mAh battery" which I'm not sure what it means but I doubt a 180 mAh lasts an entire week.
- appleflaxen 6y ago
  It's a milliamp-hour. The processor draws about 220uA [1] so you have about 818 hours (=34 days) of CPU time, but you need to take display current out of that budget too, and an easy source for that probably exists, but I can't find easily. [1] https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/f/nordic-q-a/7893/nrf52832-current-consumption https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/f/nordic-q-a/7893/nrf52832-cu...
- naraic0o 6y ago
  it's running a low power nrf52. they can last a year on a coin cell battery, with adequate power optimisations. without an always on display, a week is possibly an underestimation. for example, see the amazfit bip, it has lasted me ~45 days which even has a (low power) always on display.
- lukeschlather 6y ago
  There are plenty of smartwatches with heart rate monitoring that have a week of battery life and 180mAh is enough for 10 days on some of them. It's obviously not enough if you're playing music or video or something like that. But if you're primarily using the device to give you notifications, heart rate, and the time, it seems likely it does last all week.
- donpdonp 6y ago
  Using the recent infinitime OS v0.9, I get 2 to 3 days of normal usage per charge.
uncledave 6y ago

Doctor_Fegg 6y ago

Interesting. Shame there’s no GPS, though. As a cyclist I’d love a hackable GPS device that isn’t a (fragile, bulky) smartphone.

dariosalvi78 6y ago
Check BangleJS then
- Doctor_Fegg 6y ago
  That looks really interesting - thank you!
asutekku 6y ago
Agree. GPS is primarily the reason why i got a smartwatch. It’s so much better now that i don’t have to carry my phone with me when i cycle or run.
- vinay427 6y ago
  Bluetooth with onboard music (on some newer fitness watches) really sealed the deal for me. After going through a Pebble some years ago, I realized that I didn't actually care about the "smart" features as long as my next watch had excellent GPS performance, Spotify or some other music platform, and an always-on display to tell the time.
  - earthscienceman 6y ago
    Any recommendations? I would love a watch that was dumb as a brick but played music and had gps. Bonus points if it is extremely simple.
    - tguvot 6y ago
      a variety of garmin watches have gps, built-in maps and music
    - 6y ago

swebs 6y ago

Note that this is still under development. From the store page: >The 3-Pack sealed PineTime aimed solely for project deployment purpose only, this is not for end user who is looking for ready to wear Smart Watch.

ekianjo 6y ago
> Note that this is still under development just like the Pinephone.

TekMol 6y ago

I would totally buy it if I could order it locally in Europe. When I ordered a PinePhone from Hong Kong, it was just too much of a hassle for my liking. Waiting for an indefinite amount of time until it gets shipped and then deal with customs. I wonder how many customers there are per country. Would it make sense to have local distributors around the world? Or maybe at least one per continent?

solarkraft 6y ago
The PinePhone is a special beast that had or still has some supply issues AFAIK (also with the higher value customs issues are more likely). I personally had no issues ordering stuff from Pine64, albeit it did take long.
- mbreese 6y ago
  It’s not a special beast. Everything I’ve ordered from there has some issues with shipping (maybe the rock boards are better). But honestly, that’s to be expected and they make no claims to the contrary. Hopefully the shift to a commercial store will make this better.
  - kaba0 6y ago
    Probably they just had covid-related issues. I’m sure some much larger companies also had issues due to it.
commoner 6y ago
Pine64 has announced that they will open online retail stores in certain regions, including Europe and North America, this year: https://www.pine64.org/2020/12/02/pine-store-community-pricing-online-retail-stores/ https://www.pine64.org/2020/12/02/pine-store-community-prici... These new stores will offer a higher standard of customer service, but the products will also be priced higher. The original community Pine Store will remain available in its current form.
glenstein 6y ago
>Waiting for an indefinite amount of time until it gets shipped and then deal with customs. I got my Pinebook from Hong Kong and was stunned at how quick it came. I was expecting a month or two, and if memory serves it was closer to a just a couple of weeks. I wonder why phones are more of a hassle to order from Hong Kong than laptops?

jbj 6y ago

After using a pebble time round since it came on the market, I really value the 4 physical buttons (back) on the left vs (up/select/down) on the right. I have never used a watch with a touch screen function, but I read oppinions of the watches made by fitbit after they aquired pebble, that it was a mix of touch screen and buttons. letting this have both technologies while being open source leaves a lot of room for developers I would imagine. But leaning onto what I read about those 3button fitbit watches I hope there will be a future version with 4 buttons.

BlueTemplar 6y ago
Weirdly enough, I prefer the more "toy-like" Pebble buttons to the more "solid-looking" Pebble Time ones : they are easier to find without looking, and easier to press.
- ryukafalz 6y ago
  Having had both, the Pebble buttons got a bit gummy over time whereas the Pebble Time buttons are still very solid. The latter seem more well put-together, IMO.
  - BlueTemplar 6y ago
    Yeah, I guess that was one reason for the change…
  - jbj 6y ago
    Absolutely, I have used pebble time round since it came out, no button issues
  - Fnoord 6y ago
    The Pebble 2 SE buttons are known to fade off eventually. There's a hardware mod (3D printer) which requires orig. Pebble Classic buttons to fix it. Unfortunately, I broke my Pebble 2 SE in the process. Its very delicate hardware. I ended up buying a Fossil Hybrid HR instead. Its a decent watch, just a tad expensive.

sgt 6y ago

Has anyone thought about the potential of using these in embedded projects? It already has a powerful processor, and some outputs/inputs should be possible to reach by having a breakout board, and it comes with a screen so it would be useful for on-site configuration and diagnostics.

pantalaimon 6y ago
A nrf52840 dongle would be more useful for that
- sgt 6y ago
  Yeah but does it come with a screen and buttons?
  - keepingscore 6y ago
    Looks like adafruit makes one https://www.adafruit.com/product/4500?gclid=Cj0KCQiA0MD_BRCTARIsADXoopaUhxTUus6K74WOG5Xw3LZL2U1IHONH-DxS2FWRE2bSgXSQURIpKSMaAu59EALw_wcB https://www.adafruit.com/product/4500?gclid=Cj0KCQiA0MD_BRCT...
slim 6y ago
I have a lilygo wristband it has ESP32 and comes with abreakout board for $20 https://www.tindie.com/products/ttgo/t-wristband-diy-programmable-smart-bracelet/ https://www.tindie.com/products/ttgo/t-wristband-diy-program...

TimJRobinson 6y ago

This is awesome! I've been looking for an open source alternative to my Fitbit since Google bought the company. I'm really just looking for something that can track my health data + sleep and has an api to get the data in a raw form for further analysis.

scrps 6y ago
Might want to look at an Amazfit bip paired with Gadgetbridge. Gadgetbridge can export sleep, heartrate, and exercise data. It exports as a db though I have yet to fool around with it or with my raw data.

vuciv1 6y ago

Ah, I don't see sleep tracking. Gimme sleep tracking and I'm in!

pantalaimon 6y ago
well it's all open source, so you can add it yourself
snvzz 6y ago
This isn't some app store based device, where you install apps. What's flashed into the device is the whole system image, and it's up to you (that's the whole point!) to decide what this image does. Anything sample code they provide is to be seen as a sample only.

Waterluvian 6y ago

This is really cool. $25 is quite impressive too. A GPS would be killer though. But doesn't quite scratch the itch that I've got for a higher level open source wearable or tablet (think IP67 Raspberry Pi tablet or watch) The key is that like this watch, the hardware is done and "consumer" ready.

willis936 6y ago
Even the Pi Zero uses an order of magnitude more power than you want in a watch. A Pi tablet would be a very fun toy. I’d be surprised if there wasn’t something available for that now but may be bulky.
- Waterluvian 6y ago
  Good point about the watch!
- bluGill 6y ago
  The pine tab is a table available from the same site. I'm looking at it, but it isn't ready for someone with my limited hacking time - yet (I expect this to change in a few months)
  - Waterluvian 6y ago
    I've got my eye on that one if it returns to stock. Thanks! A slightly alarming statement on the page: "Small numbers (1-3) of stuck or dead pixels are a characteristic of LCD screens. These are normal and should not be considered a defect." I've bought dozens of screens in my life (phones tablets monitors TV's) and have never had a stuck pixel. Is it actually normal?
    - wongarsu 6y ago
      That depends on where you buy. If you buy a Dell UltraSharp you can expect that there will be no dead pixels. But that's not because Dell has technology that completely prevents them, it's because Dell has good QC. If you buy a cheap screen from a manufacturer that does less QC you might seldomly have stuck pixels. And of course there are the bottom-of-the-barrel suppliers that buy whatever other suppliers discard because of QC defects. There's always someone who will buy a screen with a couple dead pixels if it's half the price. I don't know where pine falls, I would guess they buy straight from the factory without extensive QC and might seldomly have stuck pixels.

sdwolfz 6y ago

Is it just me or is the screen not vertically centered on this device? Also the wake up button is on the left instead of the right, probably gets woken up a lot by hitting the sleeve of a coat or buttoned shirt... These might be nitpicks but just because it's open source doesn't excuse it from poor design critique. Tech wise looks really good for the price.

MHordecki 6y ago
> Is it just me or is the screen not vertically centered on this device? It's a 3D render. The actual display seems to be more or less centered[0]. > Also the wake up button is on the left instead of the right One could presumably flip the device and the rotate the screen rendering by 180 degrees. This is how Apple Watch handles right wrist use. [0]: https://pine64.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/PineTive-DevKit-1-1.jpg https://pine64.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/PineTive-DevKi...
- sdwolfz 6y ago
  I'm watching this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuk9Nmr3Jo8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuk9Nmr3Jo8 and I see the same thing, the bottom is about twice the size as the top. Good call on the screen rotation, is this something any of the OSes support or needs to be requested to be added in?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

ctz 6y ago

Does this mean there's a free and open-source version of the Nordic softdevice?

swetland 6y ago
I'm not aware of anybody reproducing the exact softdevice design, but there are open source BLE stacks out there that run on the nRF528xx family, for example: https://github.com/apache/mynewt-nimble https://github.com/apache/mynewt-nimble
elgfare 6y ago
Zephyr has a BLE stack maintained by Nordic.

solarkraft 6y ago

Fun background info: The PineTime is based on a watch called Colmi P8: https://twitter.com/beriberikix/status/1344752102799798273 https://twitter.com/beriberikix/status/1344752102799798273

looperhacks 6y ago

Funny, I actually have an open Pinetime in front of me right now. I use it for my masters thesis and it's a really nice project. If you want to try out some embedded development (that you can actually show to friends who don't aren't developers), I think this is the perfect project.

wongarsu 6y ago
You might have just convinced me to buy the devkit. What do you use it for in your masters thesis?
- looperhacks 6y ago
  Sadly I'm not sure what I'm allowed to make public just yet because I write the thesis for my company :(
  - thebetatester 6y ago
    Definitely post that thesis here when you're done. We'd all like a read!
  - rawland 6y ago
    +1 interested in this theis. Maybe you update your HN about page a bit. (:
  - loxias 6y ago
    Another +1 for you to post your thesis once you can!

numpad0 6y ago

I’m not so sure if this is significant other than for the fact that it’s being distributed by PINE64. There are plenty other junk reprogrammable “smartwatch kit” that reuse Huami/Xiaomi-brand smartwatch enclosures while genuine Huami goes on to collect data more strategically at a larger scale. Recently I got a Mi Band 5 and learned they transfer BLE pairing over platforms - they make devices generate new MAC when unpaired, which is tied to Huami account upon pairing. Gives me different chills than the fact that its sole purpose is to take my health data anyway.

alisonkisk 6y ago
Are the Huami ones open source or hackable?
- vanous 6y ago
  > Are the Huami ones open source or hackable? The Amazfit Bip has an unofficial BipOs, which is a very cleverly created reverse engineered SDK allowing to uploaded custom compiled programs.
- julianlam 6y ago
  Not really, no. Sort of. I have a Mi Band 5, and wanted to use GadgetBridge instead of the official Mi Fit or Amazfit/Zepp app. I was surprised to learn this was not easy to do. I needed to retrieve the Bluetooth MAC from the proprietary app via rooted app, or by logging in via script, which no layman would do. The watch is now paired with GadgetBridge, but the steps are hard enough to dissuade anyone from trying it.
  - vanous 6y ago
    > Not really, no. Sort of. > I have a Mi Band 5, and wanted to use GadgetBridge instead of the official Mi Fit or Amazfit/Zepp app. > I was surprised to learn this was not easy to do. I needed to retrieve the Bluetooth MAC from the proprietary app via rooted app, or by logging in via script, which no layman would do. > The watch is now paired with GadgetBridge, but the steps are hard enough to dissuade anyone from trying it. There is now also an android app to fetch the key and gps almanac, very simple to do, no root or python required. Note: I kivy wrapped and apk packaged the above mentioned script.

pjmlp 6y ago

> Any open-source operating systems built on top of numerous RTOSes What does this even mean. Already fragmented apps before it even starts, what else to expect.

wongarsu 6y ago
Are you complaining about the lack of a walled garden on a post titled "open source smart watch"? Yes, open source leads to experimentation and individualization which leads to fragmentation. It's a trade-off, but and there are already plenty of other smart watches going for a less fragmented but less open ecosystem
- pjmlp 6y ago
  I am complaining that they don't provide one single OS experience. I didn't mention anything about walled gardens.
  - snvzz 6y ago
    Why do you expect them to restrict what you can put on it (i.e. enforce a single OS), when the point seems to be for people to do whatever they want with it?
    - pjmlp 6y ago
      Because without a standard OS stack it is going to be the "Year of FOSS Watch"™.
      - snvzz 6y ago
        You don't seem to get it. This isn't an end user device. This is for developers, i.e. hackers and makers. It doesn't work by installing "apps", but rather, the whole system image is built from _your_ code. Which makes sense on a device that has 64KB RAM. Any code samples they provide are just that: Samples. If what you're looking for is a general public oriented device, this is not it. There's plenty in the market to pick from.

aryamaan 6y ago

I'll buy one in a heartbeat which tracks Sp02 throughout and viberates/beeps when it goes below a threshold.

dariosalvi78 6y ago
Withings has one certified as medical device (the only one I know of that got such certification)

donpdonp 6y ago

I have a pinetime and the form factor is great (until I lost the back plate, next one will be sealed). All the opensource activity around the watch is also great. The biggest drawback to me is only 64k of ram. Thats a Commodore64's worth of ram. The 240x240 screen is 57kbytes, it must have its own display ram. Also NordicSemi never seemed to be particularly opensource friendly. I'm hoping for a future RISCV edition of this watch with more ram.

listic 6y ago
Do you state that it has its own display RAM or doesn't it? 240x240 is ~56.25 kB at 8 bpp. the screen is RGB 65K colors, that is, 16 bpp; so the framebuffer size should be twice larger. I assume that the display controller has its own memory. True, you would need another 112,5 kB for double-buffering, but maybe you can do without it.
- deadw3ight 6y ago
  Color displays are great, but they should have had an option for a (color or black and white) e-paper display. More efficient for these purposes imo.
  - lambda_obrien 6y ago
    I would pay so much for a hackable watch like this with a 3 or 4 color epaper display, I'd almost pay as much as an apple watch if it was high quality hardware and had a great open API and toolchain.
    - rch 6y ago
      I'd pay more than for mass produced consumer gear, from any manufacturer.
    - deadw3ight 6y ago
      Go on ebay and purchase a Pebble Time. Color epaper display, fully hackable even after being discontinued thanks to the dev community who continues to update it with "Rebble" the open source version of the OS it ran on.

dirtyid 6y ago

Casio F-91W for cyberpunk IED makers. I wish smartwatch templates adopt more multiple programmable buttons. Nice to have a functional media remote during winter with gloves on. Pepple got so much right.

krzyk 6y ago

Lack of NFC :( But probably even if it had it it wouldn't work with Google/Apple Pay, for me payments using my watch would be the best application of "smart" together with notifications.

agilob 6y ago
>But probably even if it had it it wouldn't work with Google/Apple Pay Defy not with 4MB of storage.
- dfox 6y ago
  The card-side implementation of NFC payments is surprisingly resource hungry for parasitic powered NFC chip, but utterly negligible for a device with own battery, 64MHz ARM core and 4MB of storage. On the other hand good luck with getting such a device accepted by anyone in the financial industry. (On the other hand you probably could build something that proxies to your real physical card)
ryukafalz 6y ago
This is the frustrating thing about integrating with payment systems, it's far out of reach for a FOSS project like this. Cryptocurrencies are better in that regard but few businesses accept cryptocurrencies, GNU Taler would also be better but I think that requires banks to be on board with it which they're also unlikely to do.
sq_ 6y ago
NFC would've been great for "my watch is also my keycard" type stuff. Hopefully some future version will include it!

tannerbrockwell 6y ago

See also the TTGO T-Watch-2020 which is based on an ESP32 processor. [1]: https://www.tindie.com/products/ttgo/lilygor-ttgo-t-watch-2020/ https://www.tindie.com/products/ttgo/lilygor-ttgo-t-watch-20... [2]: https://github.com/Xinyuan-LilyGO/TTGO_TWatch_Library https://github.com/Xinyuan-LilyGO/TTGO_TWatch_Library

goda90 6y ago
This might be more up my alley because of WiFi. The only reason I'd want a wearable is to be able to put down my phone but still get notifications(and maybe reply to messages) and Bluetooth's range limits that. But honestly, I hate wearing watches.
jmiskovic 6y ago
Does it the watch have support for Lua? It's popular language around ESP32 but it's not mentioned on any product materials. Is the size some standard? I would prefer some other belt but don't know how to search for it?
- StavrosK 6y ago
  I've been using ESP8266es and ESP32s for years and Lua isn't really that popular. The original NodeMCU did come with Lua, but I've never used it (I just flashed something else as soon as I got them) and I don't know of many people using it either. I'd say that MicroPython is more popular than Lua at this point.
StavrosK 6y ago
That looks great, does anyone have one of them? What's the battery life like? The ESP32 isn't very battery-friendly.
- sokoloff 6y ago
  ESP32 in deep sleep modes is reasonably battery friendly (all depending on your frame of reference, of course.) 5uA in RTC-only and 10+ uA in RTC+ULP sleep.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

kken 6y ago

Ok, just to make sure I understand this correctly. - This is basically a commercial smartwach (the Colmi P8) that is based on a well documented SOC, the nordic nRF52832 - The open source version comes with an enclosure that is not glued shut, so that it is easy to access testpoints on the pcb. - Development is done by accessing the nRF51 SWD interface with pogo pins or similar. The programming interface can be a standard SWD interface such as an STLink clone Ok, sounds easy enough. It should be possible to just buy one of those smartwatches and crack them open? But OTOH the developer version is not much more expensive. The main question is now: What software to run on it, that goes beyond a few experiments? Is there any kind of open source smartwatch OS that would run on this? Edit: Corrected typo, of course I meant SWD interface, not SWM. (SWM or rather SWIM is for STM8)

jarnix 6y ago
:) not sure it's up to anybody to do it. To me "nRF51 SWM interface with pogo pins" means absolutely nothing, same for nRF52832 or STLink.
- pantalaimon 6y ago
  I think GP means the SWD interface, which is a standard ARM programming/debugging connector. I would advise against the ST-Links though as they expose a more high level protocol and don't always work with non-STM chips. FT232H dongles make for a more versatile programmer.
amar-laksh 6y ago
There ya go: https://github.com/daniel-thompson/wasp-os https://github.com/daniel-thompson/wasp-os
- kken 6y ago
  Nice!
- wongarsu 6y ago
  There is also https://github.com/endian-albin/pinetime-hypnos https://github.com/endian-albin/pinetime-hypnos and the default https://github.com/JF002/Pinetime https://github.com/JF002/Pinetime My guess would be that Wasp-OS will become the beginner-friendly fully-featured option while Pinetime will be the more battery friendly option.

EamonnMR 6y ago

The cost is crazy low. Any insight on if this will function as a standard smartwatch (ie buzz for alerts) out of the box, or do I need to write my own bluetooth driver for this to be useful?

opan 6y ago
I've heard it's already usable with Gadgetbridge on Android.

purplecats 6y ago

won't apple just murder this? its like a jackel trying to steal meat from a bear's meal

kccqzy 6y ago
Apple would just laugh at this because it's not a serious competitor.

Donckele 6y ago

I highly recommend the compatible Colmi P8 smartwatch with waspos https://github.com/daniel-thompson/wasp-os https://github.com/daniel-thompson/wasp-os which enables you to write micropython with access to all device features. You can overwrite the stock firmware using bluetooth without having to open and solder wires.

bartvk 6y ago
Does it support notifications?
- Donckele 6y ago
  If you mean sending a message from an external device to the watch and running some python code with it then yes.
  - bartvk 6y ago
    That is cool. I don't see iPhone there, does it mean notifications aren't supported there?
    - Donckele 6y ago
      I dont know what the notification features are with the stock firmware and TBH it is a hit and miss affair with all devices and you have to do plenty of research before buying. The device I quoted is ripe for hacking and currently the waspos firmware is a blank slate for anyone to create custom watch software.

dmitrygr 6y ago

This is what we (early people in the android wear team) wanted android wear to be, until word from the top came down that "it shall run android, or it shall not exist". The rest is history....

wsgeorge 6y ago
I'm not really familiar with this space, but what did you think it should run? I can't imagine a team building a smartwatch at Google at that time expecting anything other than Android.
- sq_ 6y ago
  I would assume something like one of the RTOSes like what's listed for the PineTime? Seems like it'd be easier to get power consumption low and keep the watch speedy that way, then just interface with a phone, etc., over bluetooth or something.
  - dmitrygr 6y ago
    Yup. This. That was the desired direction till the word came down

economusty 6y ago

Need to add O2 sensor and ECG to compete.

suyash 6y ago

Tizen would make a good OS for this, it's also an open source OS.

dev-il 6y ago
Not really. Tizen wouldn't work on a small low-power and low-RAM bluetooth SoC like the NRF52 this watch has. Tizen requires iirc a minimum of 512MB or 256 MB for "Tizen light". So: different focus, much bigger SoC and RAM, much shorter battery time.

noman-land 6y ago

Speaking of which, I recently discovered a javascript based open source smart watch. https://banglejs.com https://banglejs.com It's a little bulky but seems like it could be a fun device to hack around on. I got one recently from Adafruit.

kilroy123 6y ago
Thanks I've never heard of this watch. To me this looks far more interested.

tomjen3 6y ago

Does it actually have a decent battery? The Apple Watch can't even go 24 hours of use without having to be charged.

IvanSologub 6y ago

Why should products be either beautiful (like an apple) or functional (like Linux)?

kungito 6y ago

I so want to move to a standalone smartwatch and not have to carry a phone. I need nfc payment with a bank supporting the whatever (Google Pay or something), GPS with a maps app, LTE with support for whatsapp and calls + sms and bluetooth for wireless buds for calls. Don't even need music. Maybe I could even skip NFC payment by having a slot to insert a cut contactless credit card although I like the extra security of having to unlock the device to use Google Pay. I only wish Android smartwatches supported whatsapp voice message sending and weren't so slow to the point of being unusable

bb123 6y ago
Doesn’t the 4G Apple Watch support all of your requirements? I suppose if you had to a buy an iPhone to set it up that could be a substantial investment but an iPhone 6S would do the job.
- krzyk 6y ago
  But switching OS environment is a bigger issue than the price. If you e.g. depend on more "hackability" like Tasker app you would be in a big surprise on iOS.
ShakataGaNai 6y ago
The crux of the issue will probably continue to be battery technology, for a while. The latest Apple Watches have basically everything you already want, including GPS & Cellular. They're not designed to be master devices though, since the watch formfactor is really hard to get much done on without some sort of master device for login, etc. Longer and more intensive use (more mapping, more calls) would probably kill the battery in nothing flat. While they're really good smart watches, they already struggle to keep up with the cpu/power/battery tradeoffs that are required for even a reasonable 1-day life. Some basic things you wouldn't expect, like crypto for HTTPS, take a LOT of work on a tiny wrist-mounted CPU.

deadw3ight 6y ago

After reading what others have said and feedback on PineTime and what a good hackable watch should have, it seems like Pebble should resurrect from the grave as a hackable watch. I mean the pebble time had 128kb ram (this only has 64k ram), an color epaper display, 150mAh battery (over a week battery life), heart rate sensors, etc. Heck its even being supported by the open source community AFTER it was discontinued. Maybe Fitbit can be petitioned to make the Pebble's hardware fully open source too.

GekkePrutser 6y ago
Pebble's over, sadly. I assume fitbit will want to do something with the assets, why else would they have bought it? (PS: I always wondered what was in it for them actually) I really hope the PineTime will pick up where it left off! But it's only in dev kit stage now.
- emiliosic 6y ago
  I had the 1st two generation Pebbles, and now I'm using a Versa Lite. I do find a lot of resemblance on Pebble. Granted it's not open at all and their 'store' is, to me, much less inviting. Yeah not open source at all. However, I also recall that Pebble was looking into Android with their 'Pebble Core'. I do miss their e-ink screen
  - GekkePrutser 6y ago
    It wasn't eink! But low-power transmissive LCD. Best of both worlds IMO, faster refresh rate and still super low power. I was a backer of the original pebble too.. It's a shame things didn't work out. I think they just grew too quickly and got caught up in too much investment money wanting too quick returns.
neilparikh 6y ago
Fitbit only bought the software IP, not hardware: https://investor.fitbit.com/press/press-releases/press-release-details/2016/Fitbit-Inc-Acquires-Assets-from-Pebble https://investor.fitbit.com/press/press-releases/press-relea...

f430 6y ago

Does anybody actively use smartwatch? I remember I bought the first Google pay smartwatch Mobvi Ticwatch Pro. Used it once to pay for dinner and jogging a few times and found it to be not useful as I keep going back to my smartphone which I am not keen to carry while exercising. I'm hoping that Smartglasses won't be a flop but can't help but feel we are no in a plateau of really incremental innovations moving the screen from desktop to our pockets now to our wrists, our glasses and perhaps if Elon gets his way our brains in the future. Still would want one tho as it appears it is very light unlike many major brand ones that seem so bulky and large on my tiny wrists

SamReidHughes 6y ago
I know somebody who got constant text messages from his pregnant wife, and the Apple Watch made it easy to read them and dismiss them. I've also seen a DMV worker use the Apple Watch to distract himself with information every spare second he had in his interaction with me.
smitty1e 6y ago
I like my Samsung unit. I see SMS notifications and can even give a monosyllable response while the phone is stowed. That's a close to the Full Dick Tracy as I get.
rootusrootus 6y ago
> Does anybody actively use smartwatch? All the time. I use it to read texts (a lot of time they don't require a reply, they're just informational). Set timers. Check the weather before I head out. Track my workouts. Listen to music. Log meals. And I don't carry my phone with me when I'm working out, so sometimes I take calls on it.
ogre_codes 6y ago
> Does anybody actively use smartwatch? Lots of Apple Watches and a decent number of Garmin watches. Don't see a lot of anything else. I suspect the fact most of them are bulky and have shitty CPU options is a big part of it. Garmin users are willing to accept the bulk for the functionality. Apple Watches aren't that bulky. I use mine for workouts, taking calls so I don't have to pull out my phone, sending text & receiving text messages, and controlling music. For my light mobile phone use, it's nearly suitable as a replacement for my phone.

EvRev 6y ago

I have been using a Amaze Bipfit with Gadget bridge for the past few months. It helped me get my sleep back on track and my fitness levels back to a baseline. Previously I had a Basis and I really miss the galvanic skin response sensor and the temperature sensor. There are not any devices that work with Gadgetbridge, let alone anything on the market I trust using that has these two additional sensors, which allows be to see triggers in stress beyond the heart rate. Hats off to the Pine folks for having a smartwatch, but for God's sake if they are going to develop their own devices from the ground up please include a temp sensor at the least.

chrsw 6y ago

Cool project. I'm starting to become a fan of dual core BLE SoCs though. One small M0 to handle the BLE stack (which typically has to be high priority) and one M4 for the application.

elgfare 6y ago
The nrf53 is dual core with a dedicated network cpu.
- chrsw 6y ago
  Yeah that's a good one. Maybe the next gen of this watch will have that.

blacklight 6y ago

I'd be the perfect target for the products of a company like Pine. A long-time geek who uses open-source software on nearly all of his devices, a tinkerer who doesn't mind recompiling a kernel or picking a solderer to make things work, and someone who seeks for absolute flexibility from his devices with zero corporate compromises. Unfortunately, the mediocre hardware used in their devices keeps holding me back. First came a phone with a 9-year-old A53 Cortex chipset. Then a tablet with the same outdated chipset. Then a laptop that ships with a Rockchip RK3399 with 4GB of RAM, in an era when 4GB barely suffice to run a browser with a few tabs. And now they are releasing a smartwatch with a 64 MHz core and 64 KB of RAM - some specs you would have expected from a very cheap smartwatch released 7-8 years ago. Why should I use a device whose hardware is almost a decade old at the time of purchase? And how do they even expect anyone to actually use these devices as their primary daily drivers, and not as proofs of concept, nice toys to tinker on every now and then or show off to friends? I understand that Pine wants to use 100% open hardware, and that comes with heavy compromises, but are these compromises worth it? If you ask even the geekest user out there whether they prefer a device whose source code is 100% pure and doesn't contain any binary blobs, or a device that doesn't start freezing/lagging after a couple of minutes of normal usage, I bet that anyone would opt for the latter.

ohazi 6y ago
The best ARM SoC you can currently buy on the open market (without a backroom deal) is a combo A72/A53, which is what Pine64 sells. If you want to change this, you'd need to either start a semiconductor company, or engineer some sort of coup at one or more of the "most unpleasant to deal with" Silicon vendors (Broadcom, Qualcomm, etc.).
- blacklight 6y ago
  Well, that's exactly my point when I speak of compromises. If you want to be nude and pure then you go for the A72/A53, well aware that you're selling hardware that is almost a decade old and can't be used as a daily driver today. Otherwise, as unpleasant as it can be, you have to make a deal with Broadcom/Qualcomm, or get some other vendors to license their ARM chipset to you. The latter doesn't seem like the end of the world to me TBH. Of course I'd love an ideal world where open architectures like RISC V have taken over and are actually usable, but until we get there usability remains more important than purity - unless you're RMS of course - even if it involves a small "deal with the devil". I believe that most of the geeks out there love open-source products not much because they work daily with kernels and drivers (if that's the case then the argument for a pure open hardware without hex bloats makes sense), but because of the flexibility that they offer. Because they can install anything that they want on them and aren't prone to abandonware/planned deprecation like many products powered by Google or Apple. But if you don't give them products that they can use as main daily drivers, you'll rarely get enough momentum outside of the small tinker-and-show-off circles.

bapo 6y ago

Reminds me of the old Pebble, my first and favourite smartwatch. https://www.theverge.com/2014/1/28/5354016/pebble-steel-review https://www.theverge.com/2014/1/28/5354016/pebble-steel-revi... Sadly moved to an Apple Watch, since the Pebble ecosystem started to die.

Triv888 6y ago

Looks a bit less of a toy then Apple watch