Quick Product Review: Samsung Gear S3 Frontier Smartwatch (Bluetooth), SM-R760NDAAXAR

Very Quick

"UPDATE 10/2/18: I still love the watch for fitness BUT Fitbit really is on to something with their 250 steps an hour goal reminders per hour because while the move reminders are nice what with having onscreen choices for other activities besides walking, I REALLY wish it were more like the 250 steps an hour that Fitbit has going on their trackers."

"Unfortunately, though, this watch lacks support from the major msg-based apps you use on a daily basis, like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, likely owing (in part) to the fact that it is built on the Linux Tizen platform, as opposed to the Android platform developers are already writing for in the Google Play Store."

"SOS function Have to set this up on your phone app to activate on the watch Basically sends a SOS message with GPS loctation to a person on your emergency contact or 911 if you choose Good if you're ever in a hostage situation or stuck in a natural disaster for example To activate you have to do a quick triple tap on the home button, which then the screen promps a 5second countdown timer just in case you activate it by accident."

"So what else - there's some apps out there, you can get navigation, which sounds neat but the reality is, I'm over 40 and can't see up close that great when I'm wearing my contacts."

"It's very "Dick Tracy" feeling and I love it, but I cannot use it sadly as enabling the watch to receive and hold calls using the speaker ties up your phones Bluetooth connection and will not allow it to connect to your cars Bluetooth hands free or a Bluetooth headset to take calls without having to always disconnect the watch phone audio under Bluetooth settings prior to using the other devices each and every time."

"This watch face displays the following information, but you can find probably another 100 that do the same in zany and creative ways: Time, Date, Heartrate, Water Consumption, Coffee Consumption, Battery Level, Step Count, plus shortcuts to Music and Pictures, Samsung Health Daily Review, Alarms and Calendar."

Samsung Gear S3 Frontier Smartwatch (Bluetooth), SM-R760NDAAXAR – US Version with Warranty (Click to Compare Deals)

Quick

"Through trial and error, I have found getting away from your phone s GPS/Bluetooth connection forces your smartwatch GPS to get a signal and start tracking rather than piggybacking from your phone s GPS (Samsung, can I have an option to only use the watch GPS for a run?... Another death knell for the UA apps is there is no music functionality built in, so to change or check music mid run, you have to go out to the main menu and go to your selected music app (again, a very difficult proposition mid run)... I will also say that S-Health has updated a few times in the last couple months I have had the watch so you know Samsung is trying to constantly improve things."

"These bands have the same dimensions as the included silicon band, however, so if the original band doesn't fit properly, purchasing ANY replacement band from Samsung will only perpetuate your discomfort... You need to think of this watch as being DUMBER than a normal watch and SMARTER than a flip phone, but never knowing quite enough about watches or phones to do what you really want... Unfortunately, though, this watch lacks support from the major msg-based apps you use on a daily basis, like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, likely owing (in part) to the fact that it is built on the Linux Tizen platform, as opposed to the Android platform developers are already writing for in the Google Play Store."

"So what else - there's some apps out there, you can get navigation, which sounds neat but the reality is, I'm over 40 and can't see up close that great when I'm wearing my contacts... Nice, now all my settings are gone (note to myself and others - you CAN backup your settings so you don't lose them through the phone app!... Of course it was reset when I received it so I had to set everything up again, but while it was gone I discovered Samsung has a watch face designer where I was able to import a watch design I liked into the watch from a website."

"One of the common points I kept reading about this watch is it gets 4 solid days of battery life and I have yet to see that though with it being a new "toy" I have been playing with it a lot more than I otherwise likely will given more time... It's not very intuitive, there's really not any kind of walk through demo that shows you how to use everything, even the companion app does not locally store the guides and just loads a webpage FAQ which is pretty lacking and not very comprehensive or accessible in teaching someone who knows nothing about using the watch... It's very "Dick Tracy" feeling and I love it, but I cannot use it sadly as enabling the watch to receive and hold calls using the speaker ties up your phones Bluetooth connection and will not allow it to connect to your cars Bluetooth hands free or a Bluetooth headset to take calls without having to always disconnect the watch phone audio under Bluetooth settings prior to using the other devices each and every time."

"It *would* be nice if there were apps from Pandora and Audible and CityMapper and Moovit and it supported Google Now, but it doesn't and that is actually a very workable scenario... With a tap, I can zoom in on the weather and agenda to get more information, and I can plot the route to an appointment, if I included location information in the calendar item (although you have to open the phone to see the route)... This watch face displays the following information, but you can find probably another 100 that do the same in zany and creative ways: Time, Date, Heartrate, Water Consumption, Coffee Consumption, Battery Level, Step Count, plus shortcuts to Music and Pictures, Samsung Health Daily Review, Alarms and Calendar."

Less Quick

"Generally I like S-Health, but it could be better and there aren t really any other good options for tracking a run... Through trial and error, I have found getting away from your phone s GPS/Bluetooth connection forces your smartwatch GPS to get a signal and start tracking rather than piggybacking from your phone s GPS (Samsung, can I have an option to only use the watch GPS for a run?... Another death knell for the UA apps is there is no music functionality built in, so to change or check music mid run, you have to go out to the main menu and go to your selected music app (again, a very difficult proposition mid run)... When I did my first run, my watch buzzed every 10 seconds to tell me to slow down which just made me want to run faster and then just annoyed me... This seems like a long list of things I don t like, but honestly none of them are deal breakers and I have generally enjoyed using the watch... I will also say that S-Health has updated a few times in the last couple months I have had the watch so you know Samsung is trying to constantly improve things... A quick text message, email, app notifications that I can see and dismiss without taking out my phone."

"I bought a Fitbit Blaze a year and a month ago and one silly little flimsy piece wore out (because of poor quality material used) and instead of letting me use my offered 50% discount towards a new model tracker that has addressed the admitted material issue, they told me I could either get a free replacement Blaze Pebble (the tracker without the straps) pay them for a new Blaze or pay them for a model that was inferior to my Blaze... I know some folks say the fun of this wears off quickly but because of the poor reception on my phone, it has been an absolute Godsend to be able to leave my phone in a good reception location and still make and receive phone calls and get notifications on my watch... I use the Gear store as well as the Facer app and while you can pay for your watchfaces, there are so MANY free ones that I can't see myself ever needing to shell out money for new watchfaces... The first time I tested it, of course the watch logged about 600 more steps than my fitbit blaze did, but I think that's because I had the watch on my dominant hand and so far as I can tell, there is no way to adjust that setting like you can on a Fitbit. So what I ended up doing is the next day, I wore the watch on my less dominant hand and the fitbit on my more dominant hand and this time the Fitbit was logging more steps, so I have come to the conclusion, that atleast when it comes to the Blaze and the Gear S3 Frontier, the step count is roughly the same and definitely more accurate if you wear it on your non-dominant hand... UPDATE 10/2/18: I still love the watch for fitness BUT Fitbit really is on to something with their 250 steps an hour goal reminders per hour because while the move reminders are nice what with having onscreen choices for other activities besides walking, I REALLY wish it were more like the 250 steps an hour that Fitbit has going on their trackers... If you receive a series of notifications from the same source, messaging, facebook messenger, etc, you only see the latest one that was sent to you so if you are asleep or somehow don't notice you've received a message, when you open your notifications on your watch, it will only show you the last response sent to you and none of the previous ones which is probably the silliest think ever."

"There are several optional features available in traditional watches and if this one's going to be SMARTER than average, I believe it should have MOST of these features straight out of the box... Sure, it's more expensive to produce, but considering the number of people who have experienced discomfort and scarring from wearing the silicon band, it's far better to begin with a proper steel band and allow customization afterward if desired... These bands have the same dimensions as the included silicon band, however, so if the original band doesn't fit properly, purchasing ANY replacement band from Samsung will only perpetuate your discomfort... You need to think of this watch as being DUMBER than a normal watch and SMARTER than a flip phone, but never knowing quite enough about watches or phones to do what you really want... These features seem to work fairly well, but you may experience some discomfort if you allow the watch to collect heart rate data throughout the day... And when I say "not for any reason", I literally mean that a person wearing this "watch" CANNOT CHECK THE TIME OR DATE, nor can they execute any other function during a call... Unfortunately, though, this watch lacks support from the major msg-based apps you use on a daily basis, like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, likely owing (in part) to the fact that it is built on the Linux Tizen platform, as opposed to the Android platform developers are already writing for in the Google Play Store."

"* First of all, this will not replace a smart phone* even with LTE (vs bluetooth) as it doesn't have full compatibility/apps to support it as your phone can do everything this can do and more (minus maybe the SOS function)... SOS function Have to set this up on your phone app to activate on the watch Basically sends a SOS message with GPS loctation to a person on your emergency contact or 911 if you choose Good if you're ever in a hostage situation or stuck in a natural disaster for example To activate you have to do a quick triple tap on the home button, which then the screen promps a 5second countdown timer just in case you activate it by accident. It then dials the emergency contact where it automatically puts you on speaker phone on the lowest possible volume (have to hold up watch to your ear to hear them) just in case you're in a hostage situation and don't want anyone is close proximity to hear... If you have friends who also use the watch/app you can compare stats, which is a great fitness motivator App also gives you notifications if it notices you've been sedentary for a few hours and will prompt you to do simple stretching exercises... There are some decent apps such as a Basic Calculator, Discount Calculator, Weather app, youtube app, music player, flash light, calendar, to-do list, yelp, news headlines, etc For video apps it crops the videos, and drains tons of battery... Have to go through this e-mail verification process with your bank Setup takes no longer than 10mins for multiple cards In practice makes shopping a breeze as you don't have to take anything out from your pockets... Just note that it's a previous gen model and has less RAM If you wear long sleeve shirts, sweater, jacket, etc; it will snag at the cuff As thick as standard smart phone nowadays with thin case on."

"So what else - there's some apps out there, you can get navigation, which sounds neat but the reality is, I'm over 40 and can't see up close that great when I'm wearing my contacts... I'm able to text (though if you're a long-time user of Google Voice like I am, it will use your paired device's number to send/reply with and not your GV number... Keep in mind, this is not a Google or Android OS, it's Samsung's proprietary OS, they have their own apps for it, and the app store is somewhat lacking in my opinion. I wanted a simple stock ticker but apparently to do that, you have to have a constantly-on connection with your phone to receive updates as well as a separate app on your phone... Nice, now all my settings are gone (note to myself and others - you CAN backup your settings so you don't lose them through the phone app!... Update 6/22/2018 - I received the watch back, even though it was out of warranty they apparently opted to fix it for free since the update apparently caused the issue... Of course it was reset when I received it so I had to set everything up again, but while it was gone I discovered Samsung has a watch face designer where I was able to import a watch design I liked into the watch from a website."

"One of the common points I kept reading about this watch is it gets 4 solid days of battery life and I have yet to see that though with it being a new "toy" I have been playing with it a lot more than I otherwise likely will given more time... It provides useful stats about what specific items are consuming your watch battery and I was able to early on identify some specific on by default features that I did not actually care to use were large battery consumers... It's not very intuitive, there's really not any kind of walk through demo that shows you how to use everything, even the companion app does not locally store the guides and just loads a webpage FAQ which is pretty lacking and not very comprehensive or accessible in teaching someone who knows nothing about using the watch... I do wish there was a way to select something with a physical button though, but there is a bit of a solution you can enable in the settings that will select whatever you are stopped on for a few seconds... I wish the two side buttons were more dynamic though and one would become the select button when twisting the dial and go back to it's normal functions when inside of an app or menu or when at the name home screen/watch face... It's very "Dick Tracy" feeling and I love it, but I cannot use it sadly as enabling the watch to receive and hold calls using the speaker ties up your phones Bluetooth connection and will not allow it to connect to your cars Bluetooth hands free or a Bluetooth headset to take calls without having to always disconnect the watch phone audio under Bluetooth settings prior to using the other devices each and every time... I think Samsung's vision and solution to this is their new upcoming Galaxy S8 which is one of the first phones I've seen that does multipoint Bluetooth that will allow it to be connected to two different Bluetooth speakers/systems at the same time."

"Despite the small area of the physical face of the watch, and how very tiny the icons on it are, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was able to easily and without error interact with the small icons... After using it for a few days and acquainting myself with it's various idiosyncrasies, I began to realize that all I actually need for it are the Samsung apps. It *would* be nice if there were apps from Pandora and Audible and CityMapper and Moovit and it supported Google Now, but it doesn't and that is actually a very workable scenario... So while I'm on the bus, if I swipe down on the watch face and hit the music note icon, I can control all aspects of the playback on my phone from the watch... With a tap, I can zoom in on the weather and agenda to get more information, and I can plot the route to an appointment, if I included location information in the calendar item (although you have to open the phone to see the route)... This watch face displays the following information, but you can find probably another 100 that do the same in zany and creative ways: Time, Date, Heartrate, Water Consumption, Coffee Consumption, Battery Level, Step Count, plus shortcuts to Music and Pictures, Samsung Health Daily Review, Alarms and Calendar... They designed Knox in such a way that it makes your phone think it has been rooted, and they have no way to fix it if Knox is later disabled."