• go $fsck yourself@lemmy.world
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    30 days ago

    I’m convinced Pine64 has no idea how to make an actual usable product.

    I wasted my money on a PineTime watch. And it’s basically only useful for telling time, because as soon as you try to use any smartwatch features, the battery life basically disappears. Firmware updates are horrendously slow. The device has like 5kb of storage and 4kb is used by the base firmware, so when I thought I could program my own features for it because it’s open source, it was severely mistaken. Not to mention that if I’m not particularly amazing at programming for this device I either destroy the battery life or brick it.

    • sunstoned@lemmus.org
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      28 days ago

      On the watch front I opted for the Bangle.JS 2. The abstraction to everything being JavaScript can be annoying, but takes away some foot guns for tinkerers who don’t want to optimize lower level code.

      • go $fsck yourself@lemmy.world
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        29 days ago

        Yeah. I didn’t mind the idea of learning C for the PineTime, but the development process for it was just not functional for someone new to that kind of development.

        I use JavaScript every day for my job, so that seems much better for my purposes.

        • sunstoned@lemmus.org
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          29 days ago

          Of course! I’ve loved mine. The community and integration with Gadgetbridge are both awesome. You’re in for a treat if you go this route.

    • XTL@sopuli.xyz
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      30 days ago

      Pinecil is a brilliant product, though, and not just a development tool.

      Well, ok, it’s a development tool but not just pinecil development. It works as a tool ootb.

    • tetris11@lemmy.ml
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      30 days ago

      It is difficult to have a smart watch though. Think about it: you have a small chip with a wifi stack, bluetooth, even a camera slot, it consumes ~5mA when awake even when down clocked, but can at least save power by consuming ~1microA when asleep but it can never use its sleep states because it’s primary function is to display and update the time at all times.

      All because of a little boy, who won’t let me sleep!

      • go $fsck yourself@lemmy.world
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        29 days ago

        You’re describing a ton of features that a smart watch does not need. It doesn’t need wifi or a camera, for example.

        The thing is, there’s TONS of off-brand smart watches that can do constant heart rate monitoring, notifications, sleep tracking, and those more basic smart features very well. The problem is that they require proprietary apps and a cloud account you have no control over.

        • tetris11@lemmy.ml
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          29 days ago

          You’re describing a ton of features that a smart watch does not need. It doesn’t need wifi or a camera, for example.

          I agree, I was just demonstrating that you could have a tiny chip packed full of features as well as optimized sleep states to really save on power, and it still runs out of power on the same scale as a smartphone, due to the sole reason that it’s not actually allowed to go to sleep and still function as a watch.

          Most get around this by not displaying the time unless you shake the watch awake (which I find hilarious), or running at extremely low clock-rates in which case the latency in user-interaction suffers.

          The problem is that they require proprietary apps and a cloud account you have no control over.

          Agreed. SQFMI’s Watchy powered by the fantastic ESP32 seemed promising, but despite having a full bluetooth/wifi stack is very limited in other features.

    • thejevans@lemmy.ml
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      30 days ago

      I’ve had good luck with the Bangle.js 2. I get 3-4 weeks of battery life using it for time, weather, notifications, alarms, and as a heart rate monitor every once in a while.

    • Orygin@sh.itjust.works
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      29 days ago

      Dang, I see this as I’m waiting for my pinetime to arrive. On paper it seemed okay, and the latest versions seem to have improved the battery life. Will see once I receive it

    • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.works
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      30 days ago

      I don’t think creating, or even working towards, usable end products is their goal. I’m not actually sure what’s up with Pine64, they made the most sense to me when I first heard of them as an also ran to Raspberry Pi. There’s lots of those and they all make an equal amount of sense.

    • Chais@sh.itjust.works
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      28 days ago

      Yes updates are slow, but keep in mind that the developers are all volunteers.
      Currently the PineTime is a glorified step counter, but with the next update (should be 1.15, I hope) we’ll get background heart rate monitoring. The PR is shaping up and will hopefully be merged before the next release.