LG's $449 Watch W7 combines a smartwatch with traditional mechanical hands
Best of both worlds?
By Rob Thubron,
In brief: LG finally unveiled its latest flagship smartphone, the V40
ThinQ, yesterday. But just as interesting as the five-camera handset was
its new Android Wear device, the Watch W7, which combines a smartwatch
with the mechanical hands of a traditional timepiece.
The Watch W7 isn’t the first wearable to go down this route. The
MyKronoz ZeTime, which I tried out last year, is also a smartwatch
hybrid that features mechanical hands over the top of a touchscreen
display, but it’s not a Wear OS device like LG's model.
Like the ZeTime, the Watch W7’s full smartphone mode lasts about as long
as its rivals—around two days—but the hands will keep moving for 100
days when in watch-only mode. Another feature also seen in the ZeTime is
the way the hands can be moved to a different position for a better
view of the display. If you still can’t see things properly when the
hands are at 9.15, you can move the whole screen upwards.
As is the case with so many smartwatches, the Watch W7 is fairly large
(44.5 x 45 x 12.7 mm) and will likely look overpowering on slender
wrists, yet it’s still smaller than the LG Watch Sport. The 1.2-inch
touchscreen runs Wear OS 2.1, though it is powered by the Snapdragon
Wear 2100 processor, which was unveiled in 2016, rather than the 3100
platform Qualcomm unveiled last month. The first devices sporting the
latest chip aren’t expected until later this year.
The Watch W7 also comes with 4GB of storage for music and apps, along
with a slew of sensors such as a barometer, altimeter, magnetic,
pressure, and gyro. It’s IP68 rated, meaning it can be submerged in
freshwater for 30 minutes at depths of up to 1.5 meters.
The Watch W7 is expensive. When it launches on October 14, it’ll cost
$449. It's still $100 cheaper than Casio’s Pro Trek WSD-F30, though that
smartwatch is aimed at a specific type of user. We’ll have to wait and
see if LG's wearable is worth the asking price.
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