"Blocks" Modular Smart Watch - A Wonderful Implementation

[Trik'Stari]

-snip

Well damn. Didn't realize it was that complex. What about a plug solar charger?

[zanduh]

Well damn. Didn't realize it was that complex. What about a plug solar charger?

 

They exist but in the price range of around $160

Though they always come with tons of bells and whistles

 

If you wanted to do all the circuitry yourself it would cost a lot less

[KenixKill96]

If this is gonna  be good im gonna get it

[Tonylu1595]

How's it better than phone blocks? Phone blocks is still just PCBs being slapped together and is nowhere near being finished. How can you compare that with this watch?

Man so many stupid comments on this forum, I need to take a break before I have a brain aneurysm.

I was saying that this watch is better. Thats why i said that this is better than phone blocks.

[mallenwho]

My concern is how well they will stay in place. It doesn't look like they would be very secure if you move around a lot.

 

 

I'm just worried those connectors would fall apart under stress of walking around with it on your wrist all day.

 

3.5mm jacks can be very tough when new - especially when not used much. My ipod when new i had a hard time getting the headphones out. It loosens over time but that's how it starts. Even when 'loose' it still requires deliberate action to pull it out. It won't accidentally fall off. 

 

For a device where each block is only plugged or unplugged a few dozen times in its life if that, the connection will be plenty strong. 

and they could always get Google's eletropermenance magnets.

[mallenwho]

Yeah I mean the problem I see wth this is them selling you a basic £100 smart watch and then being like "oh gps? thats £50 more" "bluetooth? yep £50, wifi? £50, oh bigget battery? £50"

 

I mean, if they can already fit all of the hardware into the watch, why bother with the blocks, smartwatches already have wifi bluetooth 3g, GPS, browsers etc etc etc

 

The only thing I think I like is using the strap as a battery (not tiny links though)

 

I thing a company should make a smart watch where the band is a battery that lasts days and days - its space that could easily be used to provide power to teh watch and not just a useless strap

 

 

How's it better than phone blocks? Phone blocks is still just PCBs being slapped together and is nowhere near being finished. How can you compare that with this watch?

Man so many stupid comments on this forum, I need to take a break before I have a brain aneurysm.

 

 

Still waiting for someone to get their head out of someone elses ass and make a modular "tablet"

 

 

it's called a fucking DATAPAD GODDAMNIT

 

I think there is a huge bunch of misunderstanding about phonebloks and project ara (different to this watch) which i will help to clear up.

Phonebloks was an idea by one guy, which Google saw the success of and announced Project Ara, which had been in the works for the past half year.

 

Therefore project ara is real and phonebloks is not.

They use the same idea though - modular components on a solid chassis.

Given that you're IN this forum, please don't play the card that 'they'll make you pay an extra $50 for every module'. That is the entire point of the custom desktop PC. If you want basic you get basic and don't ask questions. If you want advanced and powerful it may not be worth your money but you spend it anyway, don't you? The desktop PC keeps down the monopolization by making it an open market with just some self-established guidelines and standards for components (I/O shield, PCI express, etc).

 

Now what happens when you make a phone (or a tablet or a watch) with those same principle? Why would anyone on a forum that praises the custom desktop PC get upset with that! A device that is merely open standards for a market to be established to make and sell things under their own market devices. They can be as competitive or non-competitive as they want but at the end of the day it is the consumers' choice how much they want to spend, and on what features they deem valuable. 

 

Again, lets compare to the desktop PC: why do you have it rather than a complete system from a nearby tech store or (heaven forbid) a mac?? 

a ) you like to put it together and enjoy tinkering with it

b ) you like the personalisation that you can achieve with it over complete systems from other places.

c ) you're fed up with the lack of performance in commercial computers and would rather spend inproportionally more money to receive that performance.

d ) you have the money to buy a commercial pc (barely) but would rather you choose the components you need based on your workload (no GPU but an SSD boot drive. No optical drive but a better cpu. etc)

e ) you like to save the money/resources in upgrading outmoded parts than turfing the whole computer, saving a production cycle and saving you the consumer a lot of money (especially if they re-sell the parts) while maintaining tech relevancy.

 

Now please tell me which one of those does not directly apply to modular consumer electronics.

 

A modular watch or phone's base model is cheap, but you can make it as powerful as you want. $100 for a basic smartwatch is great deal for most people. If you want a beefed up one buy the extra parts and pay $500. Still cheaper than many on the market (COUGH apple). but then you end up with a smarphone-powerful smartwatch which someone would have if they didn't have a smartphone.

In project ara's case. the stock model will be $50. don't think of that as a phone for the plebs. Remove all the stock bloks and build a $900 phone like you would buy an HTC or iphone. Then in the next gen you only spend another $300 on new processor or when you had broken it, $50 for a new screen. Again, look at the comparison to the desktop PC market and ask yourself why you would have anything against it!

 

To the topic of 'why don't they make a modular tablet':

short answer: they will.

long answer: it doesn't matter. 

 

the project ara modules will be intercompatible with each other across any activity, so so long as you have a chassis that can hold them they'll work. A modular tablet is just a larger chassis to put blocks into. Google stated that they want to establish the phone first, starting with a medium phone, then releasing a phablet chassis and mini ipod-nano-6th-gen sized phone chassis, THEN releasing a tablet and who knows an SLR chassis. A drone chassis. a fridge chassis. Something with the same standards that the same block can plug into and work together.

 

So you will have a phone chassis and a tablet chassis and a fridge with a compatible chassis. You keep batteries in each and you take out the storage from one to the other perhaps. or the camera onto the device you want to take the nice pictures with that day. or if you're frugal the nice processor block you swap between devices to save on doubling up buying the stuff. When in the fridge perhaps the storage block gets metadata from the frisge, which when plugged back into the phone alerts health apps and so on.

 

But at the end of the day it doesn't matter whether its a phone or a tablet or a fridge. Physically the difference is screen size but therefore chassis size. All it takes is Google to see Ara's success and release ONE product to support it and WHAM - done.

 

I hope this clears up a bunch of misunderstand that a lot of people (including and especially linus) seem to have.

[NateGSR117]

Nice! I will bookmark there site see how things are going.

[martinrox1568]

How's it better than phone blocks? Phone blocks is still just PCBs being slapped together and is nowhere near being finished. How can you compare that with this watch?

Man so many stupid comments on this forum, I need to take a break before I have a brain aneurysm.

What do you think this is? You think that an actual modular watch is in existence right now connected with a bunch of what seems to be 3.5mm jacks? So please go and have your aneurysm so you can leave this forum

[ShadowCaptain]

I hope this clears up a bunch of misunderstand that a lot of people (including and especially linus) seem to have.

 

Oh its not misunderstanding, its scepticism

 

- it depends on manufacturer support

- it relies on the modular system to retain the same standards and not bring out a mk2, mk3 forcing you to upgrade

- it relies on the chassis and connectors to stay the same, - if they bring out a new chassis it might have new connectors

- it runs android so only gives  the choice of one OS anyway

- since parts will be sold in lower numbers, the price of each block will be inflated

- due to the blocks all needing connectors, and there is a chassis, the amount of space for components in the phone is reduced, this means the phone is either bigger/thicker/heavier than and integrated design or will lose out on performance, battery life and other features

 

I do like the idea dont get me wrong, but I think we are a long way off this being a mainstream thing

[mallenwho]

Oh its not misunderstanding, its scepticism

 

- it depends on manufacturer support

- it relies on the modular system to retain the same standards and not bring out a mk2, mk3 forcing you to upgrade

- it relies on the chassis and connectors to stay the same, - if they bring out a new chassis it might have new connectors

- it runs android so only gives  the choice of one OS anyway

- since parts will be sold in lower numbers, the price of each block will be inflated

- due to the blocks all needing connectors, and there is a chassis, the amount of space for components in the phone is reduced, this means the phone is either bigger/thicker/heavier than and integrated design or will lose out on performance, battery life and other features

 

I do like the idea dont get me wrong, but I think we are a long way off this being a mainstream thing

 

- It depends on manufacturer support as much as anything else. From day one there was a proven willing market of 73 million people - plenty to sell to. And with Sennheiser already on the train i garuntee others will follow.

- the chassis and connectors i can almost garuntee will be the same for the next 10 years or so. their socket is 8 pins that can transfer power or data at 10Gb/s EACH. The larger blocks have 2 sockets (so processor can have double the bandwidth). easily outstripping the immediate future of mobile bandwidth, perhaps even the next decade.

- Android is not an issue for most people. The biggest problem i hear from tinkerers about iOS is that its too limited. For tinkerers who care about tinkering therefore this platform they will expect nothing less than android. iOS is too limited and windows phone is out of the question.

- practically speaking yes it will be less efficient in space but with a solid aluminium chassis it will be a LOT stronger and tougher. only the top of the blocks will have any structure anyway. the bottom borders the chassis so that doesn't need protection. all modern phones do have internal structure and deviders anyway and the space lost by the breaks is easily gained by the modularity of blocks so space isn't as important. Many people have commented they would rather a heavier/thicker phone if it meant more stuff in it rather than the way the industry is going.

 

So not really skepticism. Just misunderstanding

[ShadowCaptain]

So not really skepticism. Just misunderstanding

 

I would not call it "misunderstanding" you have told me nothing that I did not already know

[ItsComrade]

3.5mm jacks can be very tough when new - especially when not used much. My ipod when new i had a hard time getting the headphones out. It loosens over time but that's how it starts. Even when 'loose' it still requires deliberate action to pull it out. It won't accidentally fall off. 

 

For a device where each block is only plugged or unplugged a few dozen times in its life if that, the connection will be plenty strong. 

and they could always get Google's eletropermenance magnets.

 

If they're trying to make a watch that will be modular, it had better be reliable enough  to not have to avoid swapping modules to keep the connectors working.