Galaxy Watch 4 .... Anybody else preorder?

[Ludatyk]

Does anyone use a nest or ring doorbell and have a galaxy watch 4?

Do you get rich notifications on the doorbell press showing you who is at the door on your watch? That's what I love about my apple watch but fancy switching back to android and getting a galaxy watch 4

Thanks

Yes, I have Nest and the Galaxy Watch 4.

And unfortunately no, I do not get rich notifications from the Galaxy Watch 4. I miss having that when I had my Apple Watch, but it’s odd that it’s not supported by Nest since it’s owned by Alphabet. And from my Android phone… there’s rich notifications, so yeah… I don’t get It.

 

[flybub]

Yes, I have Nest and the Galaxy Watch 4.

And unfortunately no, I do not get rich notifications from the Galaxy Watch 4. I miss having that when I had my Apple Watch, but it’s odd that it’s not supported by Nest since it’s owned by Alphabet. And from my Android phone… there’s rich notifications, so yeah… I don’t get It.

I have the Active 2 and the battery life is better than the AW3 I had. But in regards to function and integration, I think the AW is still leagues better than the Galaxy Watch. I'm due for an upgrade and was waiting to see the S22 before I pulled the trigger. it's between the S22+ and the 13 Pro (currently have a Note 10) and the watch is a big part of that decision.

 

[The_Interloper]

Does anyone use a nest or ring doorbell and have a galaxy watch 4?

Do you get rich notifications on the doorbell press showing you who is at the door on your watch? That's what I love about my apple watch but fancy switching back to android and getting a galaxy watch 4

Thanks

I have a Ring doorbell and get rich notifications (image preview) on the Galaxy Watch 4. What I cannot do, however, is snooze motion from the watch; it simply opens the Snooze dialog on the phone. The Apple Watch allows you to snooze for 30 mins or an hour so it's obviously down to how Ring has coded it.

 

[nickdalzell1]

Maybe it's just that I still got an old fashioned doorbell and therefore don't feel anything lacking but the only thing missing that I can think of from the GW4 that the AW5 had was the 'radio' app. Sure, it has Spotify integration (as well as YouTube Music) but there's no way to stream '80s hits' or '90s hits' or 'beats one' like AW. That's all that feels lackiing so far. That's not a deal breaker, though. I can't imagine going back to iOS or Apple Watch, especially given the continuity lacking is finally here via Windows 11/Your Phone which offers tons more than the simple integration on Mac/iPad. I can open apps from my phone on my laptop, something you can't do with Mac Handoff.

Also, the round display of Galaxy Watch has spoiled me. I can't go back to the square display and weird crown/side button of the Apple Watch. It never felt intuitive or right. Square display watches feel old somehow. Once you go rotating bezel you can't go back.

Also appreciate the better sleep tracking system. Along with Sleep Coaching it's miles, no, light years ahead of Apple Watch/Health. Also love how my 'limited edition' awards don't disappear from Samsung Health the way they always did on Apple Health.

 

[sjsharksfan12]

I bought the Watch Classic 4 today. So far I like it even though Apple Music isn't compatible.

 

[nickdalzell1]

Apple Music only works on, surprise, iOS, macOS and to an extent, Android. It never supported Wear OS or Tizen. Closest you get is Spotify and YouTube Music, so sadly, there's no 'radio' app for simple '80s, 90s, etc' style playlists, only Pandora-style random artists based on genre or something. I work around it by setting up a Bixby routine on my phone when I put my Galaxy Buds in that cues up local music that fits into the '80s hits' stuff, or set up another Bixby routine that fires up Slacker Radio which has the default set to the '80s hits' station for those who like streaming.

FYI, Slacker Radio has gone through some weird name changes in the last year or two, but the older APK is found online and works perfectly fine. For streaming, it works quite well on the free tier--hardly any ads unlike Pandora. Pandora has an add every other song!

 

[sjsharksfan12]

I know that. I did find out though that if you have your phone with you, you can still control things like volume, next track, queue list, etc from the watch. That's helpful.

 

[nickdalzell1]

Being able to control media via the watch has been a thing since the 2013 Samsung Galaxy Gear. Problem is doing it that way doesn't always work. You can't select playlists or specific songs, and sometimes the media controls stop working and say 'unknown' which is still a bug today, depending on the music player. Samsung's own music player seems to work no matter what.

Also, if you got a 'safe volume warning' when adjusting volume, you can't dismiss it via the watch; you have to pull out your phone to dismiss it. This happens both on Samsung as well as some stock Android devices, and is hard-coded and cannot be disabled. Dismissing this warning via phone will make it go away until you restart the phone or if the system UI crashes/reloads.

 

[Dave245]

I’m late to the show, but I ordered the Watch 4 Classic yesterday and it’s arrived today

 

[nickdalzell1]

I got the non-Classic (does it even have a name? the 44mm black version) I quite prefer the totally flat display and cleaner apperance. It doesn't seem to be missing anything the Classic has other than being $100 less at the Walmart.

It's far more comfortable than my GW3 was. Perhaps the band? I am never fond of leather bands.

 

[Awesomesince86]

I got the non-Classic (does it even have a name? the 44mm black version) I quite prefer the totally flat display and cleaner apperance. It doesn't seem to be missing anything the Classic has other than being $100 less at the Walmart.

It's far more comfortable than my GW3 was. Perhaps the band? I am never fond of leather bands.

The regular Galaxy Watch is missing the rotating bezel which makes navigating around the OS much easier. Also, the GW4 Classic is stainless steel rather than aluminum. Otherwise, they are pretty much the same.

 

[nickdalzell1]

I knew about the bezel but I was speaking of features. I remember say the Gear S3Classic having a speaker while the Gear S3 "regular" did not, or the Galaxy Watch Active missing a few other features of the OG Galaxy Watch as well. But still odd how the difference in price is so substantial. Walmart had mine listed at $299 while the 'classic' was $399! Perhaps the Classic has LTE as well? I haven't been keeping up on tech that much lately. Kinda happy with my current loadout. I only got the Watch 4 because the new 'Sleep Coaching' in Samsung Health depended on it even though there's literally nothing about the hardware that requires the Watch 4 just for that one software feature.

 

[Shanghaichica]

The regular Galaxy Watch is missing the rotating bezel which makes navigating around the OS much easier. Also, the GW4 Classic is stainless steel rather than aluminum. Otherwise, they are pretty much the same.

Does it have the digital bezel like the active watch 2 does?

 

[Awesomesince86]

Does it have the digital bezel like the active watch 2 does?

Yep, I believe so. Although having owned both, the digital experience just doesn’t match up to the physical rotating bezel. That thing is just so nice.

 

[Shanghaichica]

Yep, I believe so. Although having owned both, the digital experience just doesn’t match up to the physical rotating bezel. That thing is just so nice.

I’ve had the galaxy watch with the real rotating bezel and the active 2 with the digital one. I agree the real one is much better. However the digital one is better than nothing I suppose.

 

[Shanghaichica]

I knew about the bezel but I was speaking of features. I remember say the Gear S3Classic having a speaker while the Gear S3 "regular" did not, or the Galaxy Watch Active missing a few other features of the OG Galaxy Watch as well. But still odd how the difference in price is so substantial. Walmart had mine listed at $299 while the 'classic' was $399! Perhaps the Classic has LTE as well? I haven't been keeping up on tech that much lately. Kinda happy with my current loadout. I only got the Watch 4 because the new 'Sleep Coaching' in Samsung Health depended on it even though there's literally nothing about the hardware that requires the Watch 4 just for that one software feature.

I’m interested because of BIA and blood pressure monitoring. I wouldn’t mind trying the sleep coaching as the sleep monitoring on the Apple Watch is terrible using the native health app. I’m using a few third party apps at the moment. One I’ve paid for and the other I’m paying a monthly subscription for. Does anyone know if the galaxy watch can measured respiratory rate?

 

[Berries-A-Million]

The GW4 classic has a real rotating bezel. I have one and it works great.

 

[nickdalzell1]

I prefer the cleaner look of the digital bezel. I've had issues with previous rotating bezels getting bad bearings after a year and grinding to the point it becomes harder over time to rotate. They dont like dirt from work getting into the rollers. It also does not wash out.

Is anyone having issues with GPS drift during workouts? Comparing to my Watch 3, the amount of distance needed to get one mile feels doubled. For me to get credit for 3 miles I have to walk close to 6. Also, the time per mile (15 minutes according to my watch 3, 30 with my watch 4) is doubled. Bixby also adds 10 minutes for the mileage callouts. Reboot ain't fixing it and I'm waiting for an update to hopefully fix it.

The stress tracker is horrible too. It always shows me at max stress even when I feel perfectly relaxed or just merely excited. As a result I get constant pings about my "high" stress. I haven't found a way to teach or calibrate other than deleting the "bad" reports from Samsung Health and hoping it learns from it.

The sleep tracking is much improved though. I was always getting low sleep scores with my watch 3 (30s to 50s) but now I'm correctly getting the more appropriate deep sleep tracking and scores in the 70s to 80s.

 

[The_Interloper]

Is anyone having issues with GPS drift during workouts? Comparing to my Watch 3, the amount of distance needed to get one mile feels doubled. For me to get credit for 3 miles I have to walk close to 6. Also, the time per mile (15 minutes according to my watch 3, 30 with my watch 4) is doubled. Bixby also adds 10 minutes for the mileage callouts. Reboot ain't fixing it and I'm waiting for an update to hopefully fix it.

The stress tracker is horrible too. It always shows me at max stress even when I feel perfectly relaxed or just merely excited. As a result I get constant pings about my "high" stress. I haven't found a way to teach or calibrate other than deleting the "bad" reports from Samsung Health and hoping it learns from it.

The sleep tracking is much improved though. I was always getting low sleep scores with my watch 3 (30s to 50s) but now I'm correctly getting the more appropriate deep sleep tracking and scores in the 70s to 80s.

I gave up on the GW4 (Classic), sold it and switched to a Garmin Fenix. Nice watch but the fitness tracking has dreadful accuracy.

The GPS drift is real but nothing IMO compared to the heart rate monitor. It's just terrible. I find it fluctuates wildly and misses huge sections out, stopping and restarting randomly during workouts. My wife has the regular GW4 and is exactly the same. She'll record an activity, check it later in Garmin health and there are simply big sections of HRM data missing.

The Garmin is night-and-day better, with masses of metrics and insane (7 days+) battery life. Wish I'd got one years ago; would have saved me a fortune in Fitbits, Apple Watches and Galaxy Watches. It can even broadcast over ANT+ so my bike computer can display metrics while tracking an activity so I don't even have to look at the watch.

 

[nickdalzell1]

I was also comparing the distance with my Venu Sq. The Venu matched the Galaxy Watch 3. I'm not having the HR bug yet. Everything seems to work except for the GPS drift and stress monitor bugging out. At least the ECG works. It never worked on Apple Watch, constantly giving me inconclusive. The Body Composition works too, although the very first time you use it, it complains about stuff and forces you to try again over and over. Once you get a successful first measurement, it works fine after.

I expect bugs. Everyone hated Tizen for some reason but I knew Wear OS sucked. I had experience with Wear OS. I dont expect much. I kept my Watch 3 paired just in case. At least they kept Bixby. Google Assistant on Wear is completely broken.

Garmin's at least for me has less detail. Zero sleep coaching, zero compatibility with Samsung Health (I prefer it), and what it does measure is lacking. No sleep stages just hours, green check if you slept well but nothing else. The more feature rich watches seem too expensive.

If sleep coaching were available for the Watch 3 I'd be happier. I cant fathom a reason they force you to get a watch 4 just for that. There is zero reason they couldn't have it on the Watch 3. Same hardware same sensors.

 

[The_Interloper]

Garmin's at least for me has less detail. Zero sleep coaching, zero compatibility with Samsung Health (I prefer it), and what it does measure is lacking. No sleep stages just hours, green check if you slept well but nothing else. The more feature rich watches seem too expensive.

I'm looking at the Sleep data in Garmin Connect right now and it's awash with info. It does indeed show sleep stages, categorised into Deep, Light, REM and Awake. It also measures Pulse Ox and Respiration throughout sleep.

 

[nickdalzell1]

Oh mine shows stuff like sleeping heart rate and respiration but not blood oxygen. It shows hours and that's it. Probably a limitation of the Venu Sq. I prefer Samsung Health over Garmin Connect though. Garmin Connect cant do the little interactive together awards like Samsung Health and there's no sleep coaching or advice given. It's just straight info. No way to tell if it's good or bad. I did like Body Battery though.

 

[Klyster]

Just a heads up people, if you have software version R8xxXXU1GVI3, don't turn off or reboot your watch as it can brick your watch, as mine has been.

I'm in the process of getting it sorted.

 

[Ludatyk]

Just a heads up people, if you have software version R8xxXXU1GVI3, don't turn off or reboot your watch as it can brick your watch, as mine has been.

I'm in the process of getting it sorted.

Yeah, I seen news surrounding this. I rarely turn off or reboot my watch and I never let my watch battery run out. But I think there’s news of Samsung releasing another update to help prevent it from happening… just unfortunate that those that were bricked is potentially screwed.

Seen on the reddit forum that Samsung is not offering to help those who are effected since its out of warranty or that its a case by case scenario.

 

[Klyster]

We have the Consumer Guarantees Act here in New Zealand , the device should last more than a month after the warranty expires.

Bricking a device just after the warranty expires can lead to some pretty easy formed conclusions, right or wrong.

If they want to be dicks about it, I'll buy another brand from now on, but hopefully they'll sort it out without drama