The original Movado Connect launched a couple of years ago now, but the company is back with a new Wear OS smartwatch – the Movado Connect 2.0. This isn’t going to be a cheap smartwatch though, with US retail prices expected to start at $495 (or well over $700 in the local currency).
For that increased price, you get a brand-new smartwatch with 1GB of RAM, the “latest” Snapdragon Wear 3100 processor, and some new hardware not found in the earlier model. There’s an on-board heart rate sensor, rotating power button for UI control and two customisable buttons to launch whatever you like. There’s also NFC for Google Pay.
However, a Snapdragon Wear 3100 watch in 2019 is a bit of a tough sell – absent some power-saving smarts, this is a very old chipset in technology terms, and Wear OS is far from the optimised experience it needs to be to succeed.
For my mind, a watch costing north of $700 needs to have a number of features to make it worthwhile, including LTE / eSIM, software that’s fast and responsive, and – perhaps – something just a bit unique.
By contrast, Movado’s Connect 2.0 doesn’t seem – on paper, at least – to offer any of that, except perhaps the unique proposition of being very expensive for what it is.
My advice remains the same on Wear OS: until Google does something to fix the sluggish nature of Wear OS, and until Qualcomm (or another vendor) does something about the fairly ordinary state of wearable processors, Wear OS devices are worth avoiding.
The price should be lower at about $400. I can’t imagine them selling too many of them at that recommended retail price.
“However, a Snapdragon Wear 3100 watch in 2019 is a bit of a tough sell”
Isn’t that the latest Wear Chipset?