We considered this but decided not to for several reasons:
You’d probably lose the charger before the battery runs out!
Adding charge circuitry and including a charger would make the product larger and more expensive.
You send it back to us to recycle.
Wait, it’s single use?
Yes. We know this sounds a bit odd, but in this particular circumstance we believe it’s the best solution to the given set of constraints. Other smart rings like Oura cost $250+ and need to be charged every few days. We didn’t want to build a device like that. Before the battery runs out, the Pebble app notifies and asks if you’d like to order another ring."
Uhhh... Huh... Ok. Welp, that's a nope from me then.
Not sure how I feel about it being a throwaway device for $100. I get they say you can send it back to be recycled, but this feels like you’re just proactively creating e-waste.
Not even an attempt to make a replaceable or chargeable battery?
Also they point out oura rings need to be charged every few days, but that’s because they’re constantly chewing through battery monitoring your health stats. I’m willing to bet if they were in a constant state of deep sleep and only woken up to record short audio clips they’d also last for months at a time.
I know folks around here love pebble, but this feels like a miss to me.
Their Oura comparison really didn't sit well with me because of that. The device clearly uses a fraction of the power that the Oura is using. If it had a rechargeable battery you would not have to charge it that frequently.
> Here’s the best part: the battery lasts for years
I wonder how many years?
> The battery lasts for up to years of average use.
...how many?
> a battery that lasts for years
How many years does the battery last?
> That’s up to 2 years of usage.
Ah.
I guess "2" is the absolute minimum that you could describe as "years".
It's a shame because it does look like an interesting proposition. It might be more compelling if it was "send your ring back to us for recycling - and we'll send you a new one". I doubt the economics would work at this price point though.
Wow I was just looking for finding like this, but.. can't be recharged? It would be one thing if it had like 500 hours of recording, but this has 12-15.
Original title: Meet Pebble Index 01 - External Memory For Your Brain
It's a memo recorder in ring form. Neat idea that seems really obvious but somehow I haven't seen it before
Edit: ah. "No charging: The battery lasts for up to years of average use. After the end of its life, send your ring back to us for recycling." Planned obsolescence
just got my RePebble 2 Duo yesterday, wearing it right now :) was looking forward to the new device, but a voice-memo ring really isn't something i care about. oh well!
I mean, I'll probably ditch the LLM - after all, it's open source so I can just build my own app to receive the messages - but it seems like a neat bit of kit.
Any know if there are plans to make a new pebble watch that includes both Barometer/Compass plus Heart Rate Monitor in one device? This looks like a useful UI mode, but I'm holding out for a Pebble that doesn't require choosing between two basic (these days) watch sensors.
My first concern is that this looks very difficult to remove if the battery begins to swell, as silver-oxide batteries are wont to do. Perhaps that's less likely with single use batteries.
12-15 hours of recording is maybe 2 weeks usage for heavy users. It would've been perfect if it could connect to computers and had a rechargeable battery. Oh well, hope someone else takes inspiration and makes the same thing but can recharge.
Even if the battery lasts "years", it still seems wildly irresponsible to make this a single use device. I suspect this thing will get very few sales because it's single use.
You can buy a rechargeable e-ring with several sensors and even a tiny screen for like 20$ on AliExpress. 75$ for a non-rechargeable, e-waste ring with just a button and a mic is insane.
could this be a used a bluetooth microphone, so I could use it with a laptop as a quick voice dictation/input for various uses? I'm thinking like a simple microphone for an localy hosted app like Hex: https://github.com/kitlangton/Hex
what safety measures does this have to avoid some incident (held down button, software bug, etc) draining the entire battery within a few hours, thus bricking the device?
It has a hard cutoff built into the firmware at two minutes so after that point the recording stops and the ring turns off until the next button press.
Can I use something like syncthing to easily backup the recordings and transcripts off my phone?
Google's Recorder app makes this a big PITA if I don't want to enable upload to cloud storage, there is a very tedious manual way to export recordings.
I really just want plain old data and to be able to copy or delete files via the filesystem. And not be required to use some cloud service.
As you framed the device as an extension of memory, I'm wondering whether you can query your notes/memory with voice. I'd like to ask questions to the ring, e.g.: "What was that book that Jerry recommended?"
Is that an existing feature, or is that something possibly planned for future?
This seems like one of those devices that seems like "meh" at a glance but grows on you once you used it. In fact just the Bluetooth button feature alone is warranted a second take let alone a mic embedded in to the ring with a crazy battery life. If there's a way to hack the device and pipe the mic features to other apps I think i might get this thing. edit: never mind i just noticed 15 hours recording time with no recharging. yeah bud that's a no go.
I imagine a partial rebate for the returned device to lessen the burden but this does feel like a $5 subscription just for the device.
I generally like the idea. I use my Apple Watch for Siri and needing the other hand to hold Siri is not ideal. I do use “hey siri” a lot but it doesn’t always work, though pretty reliable.
I am SO close to switch to Android to buy and properly use a Pebble watch. I love the hacker attitude, the retro tech, the quirkyness.
Seeing them introducing One More Thing on the other side of the spectrum, deep in big-corp, locked down, consumerist throwaway territory makes me reevaluate that.
I guess they might overestimate the fanboyness of their clientele. I hope enough people find this as laughable as I do and ignore this.
172 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 120 ms ] threadIndex 01 uses silver-oxide batteries.
Why can’t it be recharged?
We considered this but decided not to for several reasons:
You’d probably lose the charger before the battery runs out! Adding charge circuitry and including a charger would make the product larger and more expensive. You send it back to us to recycle. Wait, it’s single use?
Yes. We know this sounds a bit odd, but in this particular circumstance we believe it’s the best solution to the given set of constraints. Other smart rings like Oura cost $250+ and need to be charged every few days. We didn’t want to build a device like that. Before the battery runs out, the Pebble app notifies and asks if you’d like to order another ring."
Uhhh... Huh... Ok. Welp, that's a nope from me then.
Not even an attempt to make a replaceable or chargeable battery?
Also they point out oura rings need to be charged every few days, but that’s because they’re constantly chewing through battery monitoring your health stats. I’m willing to bet if they were in a constant state of deep sleep and only woken up to record short audio clips they’d also last for months at a time.
I know folks around here love pebble, but this feels like a miss to me.
Water resistant, like how water resistant? Wearing in the shower OK? That's where I have all my best ideas!
Isn't my watch always with me? Why not use that instead of have some new device?
I wonder how many years?
> The battery lasts for up to years of average use.
...how many?
> a battery that lasts for years
How many years does the battery last?
> That’s up to 2 years of usage.
Ah.
I guess "2" is the absolute minimum that you could describe as "years".
It's a shame because it does look like an interesting proposition. It might be more compelling if it was "send your ring back to us for recycling - and we'll send you a new one". I doubt the economics would work at this price point though.
It's a memo recorder in ring form. Neat idea that seems really obvious but somehow I haven't seen it before
Edit: ah. "No charging: The battery lasts for up to years of average use. After the end of its life, send your ring back to us for recycling." Planned obsolescence
Apple hire this man.
This seems like a gadget just for the sake of having another gadget...
Unless you specifically are after a barometer, in which case I don't think the PT2 has that.
Take the phone, open app, done.
Happy to answer any questions you have!
Google's Recorder app makes this a big PITA if I don't want to enable upload to cloud storage, there is a very tedious manual way to export recordings.
I really just want plain old data and to be able to copy or delete files via the filesystem. And not be required to use some cloud service.
Is that an existing feature, or is that something possibly planned for future?
Best of luck with your project, Eric.
I generally like the idea. I use my Apple Watch for Siri and needing the other hand to hold Siri is not ideal. I do use “hey siri” a lot but it doesn’t always work, though pretty reliable.
Seeing them introducing One More Thing on the other side of the spectrum, deep in big-corp, locked down, consumerist throwaway territory makes me reevaluate that.
I guess they might overestimate the fanboyness of their clientele. I hope enough people find this as laughable as I do and ignore this.