Samsung Gear S2 Smartwatch - Classic

I've had this watch for a week now and I'm really loving it. I went with the Classic rather than the Dark Gray because of all the horror stories of the rubber bands breaking with pieces of them getting stuck in the watch and little to no support on the part of Samsung to rectify the issue. I've got the Classic paired with a Samsung S7 Edge.Initial setup was very easy. It synced with my phone quickly, and then there was an immediate update; it sat on an updating screen for what seemed like an alarmingly long time and I was beginning to worry it had crashed, but it eventually finished and then gave me a little tutorial on the watch on how to navigate the interface.Cons:- The leather band looked nice, but didn't fit my wrist very well. My wrist size seems to be right in between two of the holes in the band, so I either had to cinch it down a little too tight, or leave it a bit loose. Leaving it loose resulted in the watch inevitably sliding to the outside of my wrist and putting a fair amount of pressure on the wrist bone, which was at times actually somewhat painful. Perhaps this would have gotten better over time as the band broke in, or perhaps it just doesn't work well with my wrist size. At any rate, I quickly ordered a rubber band from V-Moro and I really like it. Their rubber band is far more comfortable for my wrist than the leather band, and the rubber seems to keep the watch in place without having to cinch it down; it doesn't slide to the outer edge of my wrist and cause discomfort like what I was experiencing with the stock leather band. It also uses standard watch band pins, so no fear of band breakage leaving irretrievable pieces embedded in the watch itself. I highly recommend the V-Moro band if you want a rubber band for your Classic. I'm not going to dock points for this because I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who are getting by with the leather band just fine, but the leather band didn't work out for me, which is fine because I wanted a rubber band anyhow.- I wish this watch supported the OK Google functionality. S Voice has gotten much better over the years, but it still doesn't match OK Google. I'm sure S Voice will continue to get better over time, but it is what it is. I won't dock points here because S Voice does work well, just not quite as well as OK Google, which would be my personal preference if it were an option.Pros:- The main reason I got this watch was for dealing with notifications. While at work, I typically spend anywhere from three to six hours a day in meetings. I've got two work mail accounts and two personal accounts. Between the mail accounts, texts, calls, Google calendar events, and Slack channels that I'm in with our clients, I've got notifications coming in all day. I never wanted to pull out my phone to check incoming notifications in the middle of a meeting. It's great being able to just glance at my wrist to determine whether a notification is something urgent or if it's something I can just ignore.- The AMOLED screen is gorgeous. Blacks are super black, making everything else stand out as being super vibrant and crisp on the watch face.- Battery life is fantastic. After a full day of work with constant notifications throughout, I'm coming home with about 75% battery remaining. My notifications calm down after work hours, and by bed time it's usually around 60%-65%. I'm sure I could get two full workdays out of this watch if I had to.- Wireless charging stand is included and works very well. When it's time to hit the sack I can just set my S7 Edge on its wireless charging stand and set the Gear S2 on its wireless charging stand and I'm good. No fumbling around with micro USB cables in the dark. The charging stand also seems to have a magnet that helps guide the watch into the proper position. You get it close, and it just kind of pulls the watch right in where it's supposed to be, so there's no doubting whether you've placed it properly.- The rotating bezel interface is really well thought out. Twist it counter-clockwise for notifications, right for everything else.- The S Health integration is well done. I didn't think I'd get much out of it but surprisingly I'm finding myself using some of the S Health features. If you're active and like to walk or run or monitor your heart rate and things like that, then I think you will appreciate this as a nice little bonus.- The watch actually looks like a watch. Some of the previous smart watches were either way too big for my taste or looked too much like something out of Star Trek. It's nice to see the newer smart watches like the Gear S2 and LG Watch Urbane are bringing their designs back down to earth now and looking like normal watches. I wore it at work all week and I don't think anybody even noticed that it was a smart watch; I work with the kind of people that definitely would have asked about it had they had noticed it was something more than just a normal watch.In summary, I'm very happy with this smart watch. The notification management alone makes it a huge win for me. The phone now stays in my pocket all day, and when I'm in meetings or at my desk, I just glance at my wrist when the watch vibrates to check my notifications. The battery life is absolutely superb, wireless charging is such a welcome feature, and the screen looks fantastic. I do feel that if you don't have a need for something like this to check notifications while in meetings, or don't get many notifications to begin, or if you don't care about the S Health features, then you can probably get by without it just fine and you won't be missing out on anything. But for my needs, it's really an excellent package for $300.

My use case was simple. Notify me of text and email (because I keep my phone muted to not interrupt meetings), pedometer and heartrate, lots of cool watch faces, and other cool and smart features (timer, calendar, weather, news, sport game alerts, etc...) This does them all.The ease of telling my child I am pulling in to pick them up, just with a few clicks. Seeing who is calling by glancing at my wrist, and possibly sending an autoreply text. Responding to my wife's text during a very engaging meeting without pulling my phone out. Once again having the one easy to lookup on my wrist and lots of elegant, sporty, and entertaining watch faces to choose from.I load plenty of images on it, and music, so I can stream music to my Bluetooth headset. Works great, but the music seems to really drain the battery.Speaking of battery, I charge it every night (charges very fast... Faster than my phone). I tracked my battery consumption in detail for weeks, to make sure it would not die on me. I have had this for 6 months, and never had my battery die on me yet. Several days were close, because I was playing with it, testing it, running really long days, or using it extensively. It has a battery saving mode when it gets down to around 15%. I would use that, if I was out and really needed to save battery, but I usually just opt to keep it in normal mode.I run my brightness at 3, which is plenty bright. I leave my watch on always on mode, which always displays he time. It takes more battery, but like that feature, so I can glance down for the time without flicking my wrist. I know some watch faces that burn more battery, and others that are good battery savers. I keep tabs on battery life and toggle them as needed. I sometimes use the flaunt app, that leaves the full watchface on, when I have lots of extra battery and want to show off some extra fun watch faces.I don't use the Mic a lot, but is is handy. For example, had my hands full defrosting a freezer, so used hands free Mic to set a timer. Asking quick questions is cool, and getting an answer if the wrist.I was interested in a smart watch since they first came out, but I waited for years. This one had 2 strong features. First, it is not nearly a bulky as the competitors, and I prefer the round face. Second, it is the most intuitive design I have her seen. The spinning bevel edge is delightful to spin through screens or increment up and down.A speaker would be cool, to take a quick call without pulling my phone out, but when I have my Bluetooth headset, that's not an issue.The watch band was ok. I got a metal black band instead and definately prefer that.Big fan of this product.

Bought as a gift and they loved it. Still using it after over a year of heavy use.

Positive : Looks super cool.Battery back up is amazing if not paired to the phone.The rotating bezel is too cool.Negative : Small dial sizeNot compatible with many apps as much as a Google os powered watch does.Tizen os has many paid apps which Google offers for free.Conclusion : Buy it only if you are fine with the basic apps provided which provide most of the compatiblity, it does not gives freedom since most of the apps are paid.

Works great looks good are the arm.Very easy to use.

Nice watch good

ok