I demand BangleJS3!

An occasional splash from using the sink faucet was enough to make the device unresponsive and cause it to constantly reboot. This is surprising to me because IP67 rated devices are supposed to be protected from not just occasional splashes, but also water immersion of up to 1 meter for 30 minutes.

FYI: If it was just a splash it shouldn't be any worries, but if the watch ended up directly in the water stream underneath the faucet it could have been exposed to water pressure that would greatly exceed the pressure it would experience when just immersed to 1 meter.

As far as I know the IPX7 rating does not include IPX5/6 which would be necessary for any relevant protection against splashes and jets of water from all directions. So even dropping an IPX7 device from some distance into 1m deep water is probably not tested so I would only expect such a device to be able to be slowly submerged to this depth without damage.
For my Bangle I would not shower or swim with it, but I expect it to survive rain,sweat and the occasional few drops during washing my hands.
An 5ATM rating like my old BIP S would be very nice, that watch survived showers just fine. But even for that rating Amazfit suggests not showering/bathing with it and warns against pressing the button when under water.

[used wrong email to log in, please ignore]

I see your point about IP67 not protecting against water pressure. To clarify, I didn't bring the Bangle.js 2 into the shower and I didn't intentionally put it under a stream of running water. On the other hand, I didn't remove the watch before washing my hands and I allowed water to run down my hand and make contact with the watch. Since the Bangle.js 2 product page describes the watch as "waterproof", I didn't think this kind of common situation would be an issue, but I was apparently wrong.

If 3 atm or 5 atm water resistance is needed to protect the watch against common water exposure situations, then I would like to request this feature in the Bangle.js 3.

Hi @crisp, I'm sorry you've had problems with this. How long have you had your watch and where did you get it from? What kind of water damage was there? The Bangle definitely should be able to put up with a few seconds of hand washing - this sounds like a manufacturing issue to me. Maybe send me a PM or start a new thread?

As far as the case goes, it's a tricky one. I already get complaints that the current Bangle is too expensive, but if I were to increase the quality (and hence price) it starts getting comparisons to things like the Apple Watch and then I get more unhappy customers. Ideally I'd definitely use higher quality plastics in the next one though.

... and yes, changing the arrangement for the SWD pins is something super high on my list. I wouldn't produce a Bangle 3 with the same arrangement as now at all :)

Does anyone actually care about the barometer?

No. Never use it, happy give it up for better water resiliance.

Barometric pressure gives better altitude information than GPS can, especially when GPS reception is not that great like on the Bangle.

I'm just thinking why a speaker is needed in a new B.js 3 watch, f.e.:

To quickly find the watch (you can set a signal to BT disconnect, for example);
For alarm;
For games (simple music like a midi, sfx), MIDI support would be cool;
For a speech synthesizer, for example, to tell the current time;
For extreme situations, if the speaker is loud enough, it can be used when a person lost in the forest or to be more noticeable when riding a bicycle at night or as a bicycle bell (nothing unusual is needed here, just a loud squeak).

Your options :)

I am happy with the Bangle.js 2 and would buy it for my kids if it was better waterproof and the charging connector would be improved.

@Gordon is there any chance that the new B.js watch will have wireless charging according to the Qi standard?

Maybe? My concern is that I'd have to supply with with a Qi charger then rather than a cheap cable, and suddenly the cost skyrockets.

Bangle.js only works because it's a sensible price. If I charge Apple Watch money people expect an Apple Watch, and nobody is happy

Also if you need to charge your watch/phone every day or two wireless is helpful, when charging every 14 days or more I guess attaching cable is not such burden?

EDIT: BTW just checked https://www.apple.com/watch/battery/ and it is indeed so insanely low as I guessed

I'd say don't supply one out of the box, only as a optional extra. Many people already have a QI charger or would rather choose their own.

I suspect my view is the antithesis to what people expect of (open source) watches- I like a watch to be completely independent of a phone and be packed with sensors and stand-alone functionality. Phone battery lasts one day tops and sometimes I don't even want to bring it with me. I vote to keep as many sensors as possible, including the baro, which is useful for rudimentary weather forecasting.

My v2 wishlist would probably include:

• round display (if doable, resolution and colour depth don't matter much)
  
• buttons as well, for gloved operations
  
• better GPS (first and foremost for precise timekeeping)
  
• a basic beeper for alerts
  
• LoRa if doable, imagine connecting to meshtastic with a watch alone
  
• how do they get the baro sensors waterproof in regular ABC (alti-baro-compass) watches? Are those some bespoke waterproof sensors, or is there like an elastic membrane barrier?
  

Hi,

Thanks! I think LoRa might be a bit of a stretch, but as this is a bit of a hackers' watch personally I'd love to go back to a point where we had more buttons and an unscrewable case.

I can imagine there maybe being some IO pins on the inside, so you could unscrew the case, maybe insert a spacer (or swap to a smaller battery), and then a second PCB with whatever extras you wanted in it.

how do they get the baro sensors waterproof in regular ABC (alti-baro-compass) watches? Are those some bespoke waterproof sensors, or is there like an elastic membrane barrier?

It's a good question - I'm not sure. Maybe there are different sensors that are designed to be exposed to water (maybe which have a membrane internally). Even if you could seal them to a hole in the watch, I don't think the normal MEMS ones like getting wet

Slightly offtopic today on hn someone wish a watch wishlist:
https://lock.cmpxchg8b.com/watch.html
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33674904

I can imagine there maybe being some IO pins on the inside, so you could unscrew the case, maybe insert a spacer (or swap to a smaller battery), and then a second PCB with whatever extras you wanted in it.

Oooooh! That does sound good, perhaps this could be made compatible with Sensor Watch daughterboards, I'm sure there is some overlap in user bases, and you could take advantage of the open HW framework already in place.

https://lock.cmpxchg8b.com/watch.htm

Coincidentally I wear that exact Protrek and it feels like it's for the same reasons! I love the DCF77-disciplined timekeeping and the ability to sense one's surroundings to an extent. I just wish this kind of functionality and form came in a tweakable, open source package.

Hi Gordon, haven't been on the forum for a while. Now I was looking through it because my barometer seems to have been broken. No more readings for a week or so :(

And yes–I personally care a lot about the barometer. Still planning to write a GPS-calibrated barometric altimeter. That probably needs way less battery than alt by GPS. Also to judge the weather. But I get it, waterproof would be nice.

Anyway, any ideas what I could do about the sensor?

EIDT: just read the other threads. Will try out firmwares (I think I'm on 15) and battery flattening.

Could you also try the reset as in https://forum.espruino.com/conversations/381706/ IF you also have a SPL06.

perhaps this could be made compatible with Sensor Watch daughterboards

Wow, that's such a cool idea using old Casio watch housings! But yes, something like that would be great (especially if there was room for a FPC connector).

my barometer seems to have been broken

Sorry to hear that - as above though, that post could help you. Or actually just running your watch right down (there's an option in Settings->Utils) and seeing if the full power cycle fixes it.

Still planning to write a GPS-calibrated barometric altimeter

That would be great! I have actually added seaLevelPressure to Bangle.setOptions so it should be reasonably easy to make an app that looks for a GPS event, and when it's received it then compares that with the barometer's reading and sets the value accordingly.

Yes, I understand, but the Qi charger can be sold separately, in general, it’s good if it is possible to charge the future model both by wire and without wire by Qi.

Let's say there will be 2 models on sale, the old one will be cheaper, and the new one will be more expensive (pro version). On the contrary, I would like a more thoughtful device, even more expensive ( x 1.2, x 1.5, x 1.7 $). With a simple good speaker, good vibro, fast GPS, with case which can be simply disassembled and replaced with parts, no oxidized contacts, and so on. But inside there should be a low-power SoC and more biggest AoD screen.

If someone needs a minimalistic Open Source watch, at the cheapest price, then this is PineTime, with all their limitations.

Yes, there are no problems if you do not load the watch, but I constantly use timers, voracious watch faces, so I charge my B.js2 1-2 times a week. And now I not use GPS every day, as I did with the first B.js.

With Qi will be very convenient. Let's say I have a power bank with Qi, which can be used to charge both the phone and the watch while traveling. Some phones even have Reverse Wireless Charging.

And to be honest, cheapest version of Apple watches costs $ 250 - $ 300, and the max is > $ 800

The Apple watch (or Android or WearOS based watches) are scaled down phone chips, see e.g. https://www.notebookcheck.net/Apple-S7-Processor-Benchmarks-and-Specs.575945.0.html - 1GB RAM, 32GB flash, dual core CPU running at 1.8GHz.

Bangle 2 is 256KB of RAM, 64MHz CPU, 8MB of flash - that is 4096 times less RAM, 30 times less CPU speed . You basically expect different class of device than Bangle 2 is and are willing to pay premium price for that. There are also people that are not buying Bangle 2 because current price is already too high.

If someone needs a minimalistic Open Source watch, at the cheapest price, then this is PineTime, with all their limitations.

Well Pinetime is previous generation (like Bangle 1), I was actually thinking Bangle 2 is current generation of minimalistic Open Source watch.

Yes, I know the specs of the watch. No, I do not expect a completely different watch than B.js 2, I need a low-power microcontroller on my wrist, but with additional features.

About the premium price: I'm willing to reasonably overpay for the things that are needed: Qi, speaker, larger AoD screen, different case, different GPS module.
And above, I gave examples of premium prices, relatively speaking, this is from $ 300 and more, this is not at all x1.5-1.7 B.js2 price.