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Not sure he researched his options well enough. The Garmin watches that use a MIP display only require a charge about once a month, probably even less if you t

Not sure he researched his options well enough. The Garmin watches that use a MIP display only require a charge about once a month, probably even less if you turn off the Bluetooth, which gives him the other thing he wants, no distracting messages relayed from the phone. Battery life is potentially even longer for the models with solar charging. I also find the reasoning in "Why track your sleep at all? If you’ve had a crap night, you’ll wake up tired." weird. That's the equivalent of saying "Why track your blood pressure at all? If you've had a problem with high blood pressure, you'll wake up with a stroke." Not that the sleep tracking on smartwatches seems to be worth much but I just don't agree with the logic.

deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
jcul 7mo ago
I love digital watches and have a few Casios, including a protrek like the G-Shock he mentions at the end, that syncs to a radio signal and has solar charging. I switched to a Garmin with oled screen for running, sleep, and Garmin pay. I liked the functionality but hated having to charge it every few days. Especially coming from Casios that you never need to take off your wrist. And I hated having to choose between being able to always see the time at a glance and needing to charge it every day due to always on display. I recently caved and bought a solar powered instinct 3, with MIP display and I love it. I can go over a month without charging, and without turning off features, and I can always see the screen outdoors, when cycling or doing some activity. So yeah, the first one was probably just not the right watch for me.
- Melatonic 7mo ago
  You might really like the solar or non solar ones with MIP and full topo maps - still have insane battery life with the right settings. Then again I still love my dumb watches for lightweight or style
plhk 7mo ago
So whats the point of wearing a garmin if you disable bluetooth? It doesn't seem like he needs GPS tracking or maps.
- closetohome 7mo ago
  Every time I read one of these articles it sounds like the author was forced to adopt a smartwatch at gunpoint.
watwut 7mo ago
My cheap dumb watch requires battery change once in 4 years and counting. > also find the reasoning in "Why track your sleep at all? If you’ve had a crap night, you’ll wake up tired." weird. That's the equivalent of saying "Why track your blood pressure at all? If you've had a problem with high blood pressure, you'll wake up with a stroke These are not nearly comparable. If you have issue, regular blood pressure measurements mean you get more drugs if it is persistently up. It is not like being tired at all.
- throw0101c 7mo ago
  Casio has just released W-221H watches that talk about 10 year battery life: * https://www.casio.com/intl/watches/casio/product.W-221H-1AV/ https://www.casio.com/intl/watches/casio/product.W-221H-1AV/ If you're willing to spend a bit more, there are solar powered watches (digital and analog faces).
  - jazzyjackson 7mo ago
    Casio’s classic F91W often lasts more than 10 years, I guess they just didn’t want to advertise it til they could stand behind it. I really like my new F91W modded by CW&T, embedded in a brick of resin so there’s no buttons, no way to change the time, no changing the battery, just a watch that will tick for 10ish years and then die. https://cwandt.com/products/solid-state-watch https://cwandt.com/products/solid-state-watch Might as well use this comment to also share somebody stuffed an ARM processor into an F91W https://www.crowdsupply.com/oddly-specific-objects/sensor-watch https://www.crowdsupply.com/oddly-specific-objects/sensor-wa...
- hnkgnn 7mo ago
  True but these examples illustrates how fitness watches' underlying value prop, their pitch, is to convince users to make it a daily lifestyle. There's a spectrum of practicality though: there's less reason to monitor blood pressure on a minute-by-minute basis, with graphs and trends and metrics, but an initial novelty wears off after a few weeks of monitoring sleep that way. It's cool and interesting at first, but hard to justify it as a constant lifestyle. Maybe insulin / glucose is interesting from a data-heavy perspective, but diabetics eventually gain an instinct for what meals spoke what and when, and start to lay off the data and metrics. The novelty wears off.
spiralcoaster 7mo ago
> I also find the reasoning in "Why track your sleep at all? If you’ve had a crap night, you’ll wake up tired." weird. That's the equivalent of saying "Why track your blood pressure at all? If you've had a problem with high blood pressure, you'll wake up with a stroke." Not that the sleep tracking on smartwatches seems to be worth much but I just don't agree with the logic. Equating tracking sleep to tracking a diagnosed and dangerous medical condition seems ridiculous. Not even remotely equivalent. There are lots of things in life that aren't worth the effort of tracking. There was a recent post here about a guy who spent years meticulously tracking every aspect of his life so he could crunch all the data and learn something interesting about himself. He learned in the end that he learned nothing new worth knowing. "Why track your tumor at all? If the tumor becomes malignant, you'll wake up dead". That must be equivalent too right?
- abnercoimbre 7mo ago
  > He learned in the end that he learned nothing new worth knowing. A valuable data point for me though!
- oldestofsports 7mo ago
  The reason to track things is simply to make cool graphs, and that is certainly a very valid reason!
bubblethink 7mo ago
Because there isn't much that is actionable with sleep tracking. You can lose weight if you have sleep apnea, and anecdotally people claim that not drinking helps, but you don't need a watch to tell you that. With blood pressure, you get on losartan and see the results immediately.
- mingus88 7mo ago
  I don’t see how there is nothing actionable from sleep tracking. If I have a week of bad sleep scores I don’t go for a long run on the weekend. I don’t indulge in things I would otherwise do, and I make an effort to get off a screen and to bed earlier until I get a solid 8 hours of sleep
  - adammarples 7mo ago
    But the sleep score tells you nothing. I wake up and I always know roughly what it will be because I already feel it. If my feelings and the watch disagree, the feelings are correct. I get both pieces of information at the same time. The only reason I track it at all is as a kind of memory of how I've been doing, but I could equally well make a note of my feelings.
weezing 7mo ago
I turned off all tracking on my Garmin besides real time heart rate. It only drained battery overnight and the tracking wasn't even that good as it even counted time I was reading or playing on Switch as sleeping.

deleted 7mo ago

[deleted]

jcul 7mo ago

I love digital watches and have a few Casios, including a protrek like the G-Shock he mentions at the end, that syncs to a radio signal and has solar charging. I switched to a Garmin with oled screen for running, sleep, and Garmin pay. I liked the functionality but hated having to charge it every few days. Especially coming from Casios that you never need to take off your wrist. And I hated having to choose between being able to always see the time at a glance and needing to charge it every day due to always on display. I recently caved and bought a solar powered instinct 3, with MIP display and I love it. I can go over a month without charging, and without turning off features, and I can always see the screen outdoors, when cycling or doing some activity. So yeah, the first one was probably just not the right watch for me.

Melatonic 7mo ago
You might really like the solar or non solar ones with MIP and full topo maps - still have insane battery life with the right settings. Then again I still love my dumb watches for lightweight or style

plhk 7mo ago

So whats the point of wearing a garmin if you disable bluetooth? It doesn't seem like he needs GPS tracking or maps.

closetohome 7mo ago
Every time I read one of these articles it sounds like the author was forced to adopt a smartwatch at gunpoint.

watwut 7mo ago

My cheap dumb watch requires battery change once in 4 years and counting. > also find the reasoning in "Why track your sleep at all? If you’ve had a crap night, you’ll wake up tired." weird. That's the equivalent of saying "Why track your blood pressure at all? If you've had a problem with high blood pressure, you'll wake up with a stroke These are not nearly comparable. If you have issue, regular blood pressure measurements mean you get more drugs if it is persistently up. It is not like being tired at all.

throw0101c 7mo ago
Casio has just released W-221H watches that talk about 10 year battery life: * https://www.casio.com/intl/watches/casio/product.W-221H-1AV/ https://www.casio.com/intl/watches/casio/product.W-221H-1AV/ If you're willing to spend a bit more, there are solar powered watches (digital and analog faces).
- jazzyjackson 7mo ago
  Casio’s classic F91W often lasts more than 10 years, I guess they just didn’t want to advertise it til they could stand behind it. I really like my new F91W modded by CW&T, embedded in a brick of resin so there’s no buttons, no way to change the time, no changing the battery, just a watch that will tick for 10ish years and then die. https://cwandt.com/products/solid-state-watch https://cwandt.com/products/solid-state-watch Might as well use this comment to also share somebody stuffed an ARM processor into an F91W https://www.crowdsupply.com/oddly-specific-objects/sensor-watch https://www.crowdsupply.com/oddly-specific-objects/sensor-wa...
hnkgnn 7mo ago
True but these examples illustrates how fitness watches' underlying value prop, their pitch, is to convince users to make it a daily lifestyle. There's a spectrum of practicality though: there's less reason to monitor blood pressure on a minute-by-minute basis, with graphs and trends and metrics, but an initial novelty wears off after a few weeks of monitoring sleep that way. It's cool and interesting at first, but hard to justify it as a constant lifestyle. Maybe insulin / glucose is interesting from a data-heavy perspective, but diabetics eventually gain an instinct for what meals spoke what and when, and start to lay off the data and metrics. The novelty wears off.

spiralcoaster 7mo ago

> I also find the reasoning in "Why track your sleep at all? If you’ve had a crap night, you’ll wake up tired." weird. That's the equivalent of saying "Why track your blood pressure at all? If you've had a problem with high blood pressure, you'll wake up with a stroke." Not that the sleep tracking on smartwatches seems to be worth much but I just don't agree with the logic. Equating tracking sleep to tracking a diagnosed and dangerous medical condition seems ridiculous. Not even remotely equivalent. There are lots of things in life that aren't worth the effort of tracking. There was a recent post here about a guy who spent years meticulously tracking every aspect of his life so he could crunch all the data and learn something interesting about himself. He learned in the end that he learned nothing new worth knowing. "Why track your tumor at all? If the tumor becomes malignant, you'll wake up dead". That must be equivalent too right?

abnercoimbre 7mo ago
> He learned in the end that he learned nothing new worth knowing. A valuable data point for me though!
oldestofsports 7mo ago
The reason to track things is simply to make cool graphs, and that is certainly a very valid reason!

bubblethink 7mo ago

Because there isn't much that is actionable with sleep tracking. You can lose weight if you have sleep apnea, and anecdotally people claim that not drinking helps, but you don't need a watch to tell you that. With blood pressure, you get on losartan and see the results immediately.

mingus88 7mo ago
I don’t see how there is nothing actionable from sleep tracking. If I have a week of bad sleep scores I don’t go for a long run on the weekend. I don’t indulge in things I would otherwise do, and I make an effort to get off a screen and to bed earlier until I get a solid 8 hours of sleep
- adammarples 7mo ago
  But the sleep score tells you nothing. I wake up and I always know roughly what it will be because I already feel it. If my feelings and the watch disagree, the feelings are correct. I get both pieces of information at the same time. The only reason I track it at all is as a kind of memory of how I've been doing, but I could equally well make a note of my feelings.

weezing 7mo ago

I turned off all tracking on my Garmin besides real time heart rate. It only drained battery overnight and the tracking wasn't even that good as it even counted time I was reading or playing on Switch as sleeping.