Matrix’s PowerWatch 2 needs no charger, uses body heat and solar power

[8ball]

Fucking thank you!
Apology incoming, I doubt!!!

Oh, come on.

 

[8ball]

From their FAQ it seems the internal battery has around a year built in so no surprise the reviewers haven't had issues on that front.

"In conditions where PowerWatch is unable to charge, it will work for up to one year."

They also "recommend limiting Bluetooth activity to one sync event per day while wearing the PowerWatch" which seems to reduce the potential functionality quite a lot if using the phone for heavy lifting.

They are very vague about how much actual energy is harvested though

Cheers for the info.

So, plausibly, they could tweak figures to spoof charge/recharge rate and could lie by some margin and you still wouldn’t necessarily work it out for half a decade.

 

[8ball]

From their FAQ it seems the internal battery has around a year built in so no surprise the reviewers haven't had issues on that front.

"In conditions where PowerWatch is unable to charge, it will work for up to one year."

They also "recommend limiting Bluetooth activity to one sync event per day while wearing the PowerWatch" which seems to reduce the potential functionality quite a lot if using the phone for heavy lifting.

They are very vague about how much actual energy is harvested though

Oh, one important point, from what I’ve seen, it says if you keep it in a drawer, *your settings* should be saved for a year or more, which puts a pretty different slant on it, power-consumption wise.

The thing is just going into hibernation mode.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Oh, come on.

I don't know if you're laughing at the thought of editor backing down or laughing at something else, but surely the above information casts doubt on the tech? It's quite obviously using the same screen tech as the paperwhite kindle, which uses zero power until the screen refreshes/changes, but it's quite obvious that if the battery lasts a year, then editor 's assertion that I don't know my arse from a hole in the ground is unfounded.

 

[Saul Goodman]

So, editor . Given this new information, are you prepared to admit that I may have a valid point?

 

[8ball]

I don't know if you're laughing at the thought of editor backing down or laughing at something else, but surely the above information casts doubt on the tech? It's quite obviously using the same screen tech as the paperwhite kindle, which uses zero power until the screen refreshes/changes, but it's quite obvious that if the battery lasts a year, then editor 's assertion that I don't know my arse from a hole in the ground is unfounded.

Yeah, see my post above. We could argue that they are being naughty with the software, but they seem to be talking about just retaining settings.

Theoretically, being doubtful may be warranted but it’s a suicidal business plan for the people involved if they are lying about the tech. Looks to
me like the first-gen doesn’t have solar from the pics, either.

As for the Bluetooth “once a day” thing, I would have assumed it wouldn’t manage wireless connection at all, so that’s pretty impressive.

It does seem to imply that if you have a decent charge, taking a few GPS bearings might be plausible. No transmission involved.

 

[8ball]

I also think maybe you and editor need to accept each other’s quirks and bury the hatchet.

I had some bad exchanges with editor too recently. I had a nasty bout of the swine flu and was being arsey, but apologies nevertheless.

We’re just talking about new toys, after all.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Yeah, see my post above. We could argue that they are being naughty with the software, but they seem to be talking about just retaining settings.

Theoretically, being doubtful may be warranted but it’s a suicidal business plan for the people involved if they are lying about the tech. Looks to
me like the first-gen doesn’t have solar from the pics, either.

As for the Bluetooth “once a day” thing, I would have assumed it wouldn’t manage wireless connection at all, so that’s pretty impressive.

It does seem to imply that if you have a decent charge, taking a few GPS bearings might be plausible. No transmission involved.

You assume wrongly. A single connection to GPS would probably use more power than this could generate in a year.

 

[8ball]

You assume wrongly. A single connection to GPS would probably use more power than this could generate in a year.

Fair enough. Why is that? Obviously there’s no transmissions involved, so is it down to the distances in play, and amplifying signals?

 

[Saul Goodman]

I also think maybe you and editor need to accept each other’s quirks and bury the hatchet.

I had some bad exchanges with editor too recently. I had a nasty bout of the swine flu and was being arsey, but apologies nevertheless.

We’re just talking about new toys, after all.

I have no hatchet to bury. Granted I may be very vocal but imo his 'warnings' today we're out of order.

 

[8ball]

I have no hatchet to bury. Granted I may be very vocal but imo his 'warnings' today we're out of order.

“Very vocal”.

Yeah, you could say that.

 

[8ball]

Few of them had a touchscreen, GPS or were able to SSH into my server, mind

I don’t think this one does those things, having looked at it further.

Though that would be way cool.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Fair enough. Why is that? Obviously there’s no transmissions involved, so is it down to the distances in play, and amplifying signals?

One of my areas is GPS. For the past five years I've been developing a low power GPS tracking device for motorcycles. Unfortunately, where GPS is concerned, low power is an oxymoron.
Modern phones contain the best ' low power ' GPS receivers available. Turn on the GPS on your phone and see how much extra power is needed to run it.

 

[8ball]

Also, apols to editor who pointed out the first version of this watch in the first couple of posts. Missed that.

 

[8ball]

One of my areas is GPS. For the past five years I've been developing a low power GPS tracking device for motorcycles. Unfortunately, where GPS is concerned, low power is an oxymoron.
Modern phones contain the best ' low power ' GPS receivers available. Turn on the GPS on your phone and see how much extra power is needed to run it.

I don’t doubt any of that, was just wondering why it has the comparatively high power requirements seeing how
it’s just receiving radio signals.

Is it the radio element or the triangulation calculations?

Edit: no worries if you don’t fancy talking about work - I’m a bugger for picking people’s brains when they know something that interests me

 

[Saul Goodman]

I don’t doubt any of that, was just wondering why it has the comparatively high power requirements seeing how
it’s just receiving radio signals.

Is it the radio element or the triangulation calculations?

It's all of the above. It's the power required to receive the data from the satellites, and the power required to translate that into coordinates. This isn't a one-off calculation. It's happening constantly, and requires a lot of power, and certainly more than could be provided by a peltier device that would fit into this device and be powered by body heat, especially so when the heat differential would be so minimal that it's all but negligible.

 

[8ball]

It's all of the above. It's the power required to receive the data from the satellites, and the power required to translate that into coordinates. This isn't a one-off calculation. It's happening constantly, and requires a lot of power, and certainly more than could be provided by a peltier device that would fit into this device and be powered by body heat, especially so when the heat differential would be so minimal that it's all but negligible.

Well, it doesn’t do it anyway, so it’s kind of an academic point.

How would taking a quick position check compare to a Bluetooth data transfer, power-wise (for plausible transfers of the kind this device could be doing).

 

[Saul Goodman]

Well, it doesn’t do it anyway, so it’s kind of an academic point.

How would taking a quick position check compare to a Bluetooth data transfer, power-wise (for plausible transfers of the kind this device could be doing).

GPS coordinates are all but useless unless they're constantly updated. Assuming the device relies solely on Bluetooth to receive its GPS data from a phone, this would actually use as much, or possibly more power than if the device was using a built in GPS chip. Bluetooth actually requires a lot of power. Not so substantial when you compare it to the power stored in a phone's battery, but compared to the battery in this device, it's a massive consumption, hence their ' do not use bluetooth more than once a day' statement.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Apologies for any and all typos. I'm typing this in bed on a kindle, and it is the worst device I've ever used to input text. It constantly corrects everything I type with non existent words

 

[8ball]

GPS coordinates are all but useless unless they're constantly updated. Assuming the device relies solely on Bluetooth to receive its GPS data from a phone, this would actually use as much, or possibly more power than if the device was using a built in GPS chip. Bluetooth actually requires a lot of power. Not so substantial when you compare it to the power stored in a phone's battery, but compared to the battery in this device, it's a massive consumption, hence their ' do not use bluetooth more than once a day' statement.

Well, it’s pretty handy finding out where you are. If you’re pretty confident outdoors, just figuring out position and direction is pretty useful.

I was personally quite surprised it handles Bluetooth at all - I figured you might have to plug it in to transfer any data.

 

[8ball]

Apologies for any and all typos. I'm typing this in bed on a kindle, and it is the worst device I've ever used to input text. It constantly corrects everything I type with non existent words

Pickman’s Model is not on this thread, so I think you’ll get away with it.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Well, it’s pretty handy finding out where you are. If you’re pretty confident outdoors, just figuring out position and direction is pretty useful.

I was personally quite surprised it handles Bluetooth at all - I figured you might have to plug it in to transfer any data.

But if you have a phone with GPS (don't they all, now?) Then why would you want to view that information on a device that will run flat if you use it to view the GPS data? Surely you would just view it on the phone?

 

[8ball]

But if you have a phone with GPS (don't they all, now?) Then why would you want to view that information on a device that will run flat if you use it to view the GPS data? Surely you would just view it on the phone?

Yeah, if you’ve got a phone with charge this makes sense.

I kind of got the idea that this thing is meant to work mainly away from
a phone. The feature set is a bit “Bear Grylls”.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Yeah, if you’ve got a phone with charge this makes sense.

I kind of got the idea that this thing is meant to work mainly away from
a phone. The feature set is a bit “Bear Grylls”.

What's the point of bluetooth, if not to connect to another device?

 

[editor]

Here's a quick hands-on prototype video that a blogger posted up. I don't believe he was given the unit to review so there's no chance of him being yet another of those 'paid shills.'



First Look: Body Heat and Solar Powered Matrix PowerWatch 2 GPS

 

[editor]

And this seems a fair summary

The Matrix PowerWatch X was a mixed bag for me. While I was very impressed with its thermoelectric generator technology, which generates energy to power the watch’s battery through harvesting the heat transferred between cool ambient air and the wearer’s warmer skin, that was about the extent of what I was impressed with. Its actual functions are very basic, and almost not worthy to be called a “smart” watch. While I think Matrix has the start of something really great here with a bodyheat-powered watch that never needs charging (and looks way cool), I think they have a bit of ways to go with the watch’s functionality, which I think they can likely continue to improve with further watch firmware and app updates. For a retail price of $279.00, to me it may be a bit overpriced, but it is still really unique and cool gadget and worth a look.

Matrix PowerWatch X review – The Gadgeteer

 

[8ball]

And this seems a fair summary


Matrix PowerWatch X review – The Gadgeteer

Yeah, must say that while what it does do is impressive, calling it a “smart” watch is a bit of a stretch.

I’m more interested in the potential of the underlying tech.

 

[8ball]

What's the point of bluetooth, if not to connect to another device?

I mean that if it’s just an occasional synch, you may as well plug the thing in and make the device smaller.

Maybe that’s a middle-aged man’s view of things, but the feature set has an “off grid rugged adventurey” vibe.

 

[Saul Goodman]

And this seems a fair summary


Matrix PowerWatch X review – The Gadgeteer

So basically it's a useless piece of shit, which may or may not charge its own battery.
Thanks for clearing that up.

 

[Saul Goodman]

I mean that if it’s just an occasional synch, you may as well plug the thing in and make the device smaller.

Maybe that’s a middle-aged man’s view of things, but the feature set has an “off grid rugged adventurey” vibe.

The 'feature set' has a "just buy a fucking 3 quid watch off ebay and its battery will last longer" vibe.