Apple Watch?

NetworkNewb

So what are opinions of those have used it or even if you haven't? Wife wants to get me a birthday present and being I don't really have "need" for anything I'm thinking of telling her to get me an Apple Watch.

I'm thinking that or maybe a drone... Think I may get bored of drone though (could get bored of the watch too though)

636-555-3226

drone ftw. every apple watch i've ever seen is like every fitbit i've ever seen. a great idea for a few weeks then it's an expensive piece of metal that is sometimes on your wrist but that you hardly ever interact with. drones are the gift that keep on giving

NetworkNewb

636-555-3226 wrote: »

an expensive piece of metal that is sometimes on your wrist but that you hardly ever interact with.

Feel like this could definitely happen with me too. Could take some pretty cool video shots with the drone forever though...

wd40

636-555-3226 wrote: »

drone ftw. every apple watch i've ever seen is like every fitbit i've ever seen. a great idea for a few weeks then it's an expensive piece of metal that is sometimes on your wrist but that you hardly ever interact with. drones are the gift that keep on giving

I bought a Galaxy Gear S2 Sport (Black) because I started running and NEED to count my steps .. I stopped running 2 days later

thomas_

Haven't heard much. If my girlfriend asks I usually give her a list of tools from ifixit. Not that I use them that often, but I do like having random tools.

ITSpectre

Apple watch is crap.... Apple just cannot keep up with android or Samsung.

Samsung Gear s2 can be used independently of the phone AND can call people without the phone. Apple watches are like glorified fitbits with the apple logo.... You can also look into the Samsung Gear VR headset..... Virtual reality. Kinda cool if you wanna check it out and its only 100.00 which is not bad of a price.

NetworkNewb

Alright, just messaged a guy I used to work with who owns a company that sells drones now. Gonna test some out next week... We'll see

Plantwiz

Personally, I'd skip both.
Agree 100% with the comments about the watch becoming an expensive piece of metal.

Drones...refuse to support the invasion of privacy of others they bring on. No good will come from them.
I would like to believe people will use them for good purposes, but history has shown folks abuse the few cool freedoms we have and ruin it for others. I do not like the idea that this crap can fly overhead at parks, ball games, public centers, yards, etc.. without permission. Even R/C planes have to be registered, why not go fly those, they are pretty fun and many areas have groups one can join/participate with and fly. Or simply get a pilots license and fly a real plane Little Cessna 172 is fun.

At the moment, there really isn't anything tech=like that I find to be a 'must-have'. Hybrid car or even an auto-pilot car? Might be worth having. Otherwise, nothing is that exciting to me.

Good luck on your testing!

DatabaseHead

Drones are amazing, my co worker actually has his programmed to follow his phone via car in the morning and it returns home.

Such amazing technology.

Plantwiz

@Databasehead, (and NetworkN)


Curious, why do you find this 'amazing' technology? Why would you want something to fly behind you, why not simply fly yourself? What if someone decided to tail you or tail your drone, who watches the watchers?

When things are new, and there are very few, I get there is a fascination about the item, but what happens when 7 billion people in the world all have one, or three or ten drones? Do these ALL fill the air space? What about privacy? Or simply looking up and seeing the sun and sky? What about devices that are hacked? What about devices that simply fail (loss of power) mid flight and hit someone walking? Damage a vehicle?

Understand, I'm not looking to be confrontational nor get into a lengthy debate. I am genuinely curious why drones are desirable to mere mortals? IS it simply bragging rights? (since few have them at the moment). How do these things improve your life or the life of your family? (besides simply being a cross between an R/C device and a vex robot). I'm obviously missing something with the alleged coolness of these things, fill me in please.

The_Expert

I have both and like both... I wear my Apple Watch everyday. Functionality-wise, I mainly use it to receive notifications. Once you get text messages on your wrist, you'll always want a display like that.

Of course, the Apple Watch does so much more, but those features aren't used quite as often by me.

A drone is cool, but you'll probably end up using it less than the watch. I have both a Parrot AR 2.0 and a DJI Phantom Advanced. The stigma against drones and their operators has really risen recently. Restrictions are also in place that will prevent you from flying one where you really want to.

i say get the watch.

doctorlexus

Well, I can add my two cents, as I've owned several quadcopters/multirotors and RC helicopters since 2011 (It's mostly semantics I suppose, but I don't like to call them drones as I believe that puts too much of a military image in people's minds). For this post, I'll refer to any consumer level multirotor as a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle).

First of all, I think the privacy concern with UAV's is blown way out of proportion. Most people who have them just want to get some nice aerial video because it can be stunning to look at, especially with quality equipment. There will always be a few outliers who want to abuse technology for negative purposes, but that doesn't make the technology in itself bad. Moreover, quality video requires quality gear, which means it's going to be heavy, which means your UAV will be heavy, which means your UAV will be noisy. No one is going to hover one outside your window without you noticing. Even the little ones with cheap crappy cameras are pretty obvious. It would be easier for someone to just climb a tree with a decent camera (and people have been able to do that for decades).

Second, UAV's do have many legit purposes. The movie industry uses them, they give great perspectives for sporting events, they provide footage for site surveys, for realtors wanting to look at properties from air (roof condition, etc.). And for the average joe, they can be a lot of fun. I certainly enjoyed messing around with them for a time, and I made some great videos (at least relative to the quality of equipment I had).

All that said, I ended up selling off all my gear for a number of reasons. For one, it can get expensive. You make some videos for fun, but eventually you want to do better, and that's going to mean better equipment, which means more money. You get to a point where you realize you're just not going to do any better without investing more money. Another reason is the FAA decided to get involved in it, and I just didn't want to deal with the regulation. I was at the point where I didn't want to invest more money in the hobby, and the FAA regulation was just my signal to throw in the towel. I'm not saying regulation is necessarily a bad thing, especially now with so many incompetent pilots buying ready-built UAV's and crashing them into buildings, people, etc, but when I started back in 2011 there was virtually no regulation, and you had to have some idea what you were doing to put one together, so the niche group of people who were flying them tended to be more responsible as a whole. Now we've got a governing body that knows very little about the hobby trying to regulate an ever-growing group of people who also know very little about the hobby. Neither side knows what they're doing, and I personally don't want to be at the receiving end of some misinformed police officer who decides to tase me one day because he simply doesn't understand why I'm flying something remotely. *hands in the air, checking out of the entire circlejerk* OK, so maybe I just gave away that I'm a little bitter.

Regardless of government regulation, though, and all the inexperienced pilots entering the hobby, another big motive for me taking my leave was that the shots I really wanted to get were simply shots that would require being unsafe. You can only film so many landscapes before you get tired of seeing grass, trees, dirt, and what essentially amounts to little to no human interaction. Really, the best videos, whether by air or ground, I think, are the ones that involve people. But it's inherently dangerous and irresponsible to fly UAV's over crowds, or in most urban environments. No matter how good of a pilot you are, equipment sometimes fails. And if you've got a 3 kilogram multirotor taking spectacular video, but then something fails and it drops on someone's head from a lethal height, your original intentions just won't mean anything anymore.

The only way I could really see enjoying UAV's again is if I worked with them in the film industry. You still have risk there, but at least everyone involved knows the risk, and you're working in a structured environment with consultants and safe guards and people who are aware of potential dangers. Unfortunately, I don't have the skill or connection to get a job doing that. So I've settled for IT

Let me add one more thing, in case I came across as discouraging to new pilots. I don't have anything against new people getting into the hobby. My problem specifically lies with the size of UAV new people are starting with these days. I started with something called a Blade MQX, which was a little lightweight thing. If it fell on your head, it wouldn't hurt at all, and it was great to learn on. But these DJI Phantoms are not toys, and people should not be purchasing them as their first multirotor IMHO. If you crash them, you're out a lot of money, and you could seriously injure someone. Start with something small.

NetworkNewb

I would get it to take some cool pictures every now and then. Got a young daughter growing up and think it could some cool pictures of her as well. I Saw one fly over my house the other day. I don't see the fun in just flying it around but to each their own.

Mooseboost

I got my apple watch as a gift. Oddly, I use it a lot more than I expected to. With that being said, I don't know that I would have purchased one on my own. It is part of my daily wear. I have a metal band that is a little more dressy that I wear to work and a sports band when I workout,

It has actually caused my to be more active with the little reminders - but I imagine most smart watches would do that. I don't have any other watch to compare this to other than wearing a pebble for awhile - which the apple watch wins that competition easily.

My wife would never let me have a droid. I would get into too much trouble.

Plantwiz

Thanks for the feedback!

Personally, I am not worried that a drone will fly up to my window, I agree, I'd hear it before that point. What I dislike, hugely dislike, is when they are used over crowd shots, graduation, races, public venues, parks, etc... And NO ONE granted permission or warned the crowd it would happen. I hate that folks think they can snap photos on a whim and post online without permission. Sure, when someone is standing on a public street or in a public space they can snap a photo, but back in the day before every person with social media felt the need to post their entire day online, the photo they took at graduation or such may sit in a photobook, and in the past decade may reside on a digit chip, but now, it sits online...basically, forever. And there is no telling where or how it gets used from there.

People with foster kids do not particularly appreciate their children being photographed and images posted on line, many times it is for safety sake, sometimes it is just for the annonymous break the kids need until their parents are ready for them again, but there need not be temporary family photos posted across the web.

As far as Ariel shots...well, on a low budget that was once achieved with helium and balloons, small cameras, and when the flip Cam's came out, they helped make it pretty slick.

Like I mentioned, wasn't looking to challenge anyone, merely curious, so thank you all for the comments.

tpatt100

I have both Apple Watch and a few different "drones", I am surprised that after almost a year my wife and I are still wearing the watches, a few coworkers are still using theirs as well. Once you get one it sort of grows on you and I notice when I am not wearing it. You don't need it, it's an accessory. If mine broke I would miss it. It has made me more active though, gotta fill in those circles and the notifications are nice. My wife likes it more than I do though, she seems to use more of the features than I do.

As far as drones go I wish I lived out in the country because besides my small ones I need to drive to my local park to fly mine. The expensive ones with cameras are popular but really I would suggest you get a smaller less expensive one and see if it's something you will enjoy and stick with before you drop more money on the expensive ones.

The big reason I wanted to get better with flying was so that one day I could get into FPV flying but I don't really see myself spending the cash for that any time soon.

NetworkNewb

Pretty much only real reason I would get a drone is to take pictures or videos and was looking at this guy:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B013U0F6EQ/ref=s9_simh_gw_g421_i1_r?ie=UTF8&fpl=fresh&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=&pf_rd_r=KEA954XHPFWWH89NMYC5&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=6aad23bd-3035-4a40-b691-0eefb1a18396&pf_rd_i=desktop

Being busy alot of the time makes me wonder how much I would actually use it though. I dunno, got some debating to do.

tpatt100

Yeah time and location of where I live is why I don't think I will get a more expensive quadcopter. I use to do RC car racing when I was stationed over seas, now that is a hobby I am feeling the urge to get back into.

ITSpectre

doctorlexus wrote: »

For this post, I'll refer to any consumer level multirotor as a UAV

*In Call of Duty voice*

UAV online ready for deployment......:D

Ok Im going to address Plant... and answer the question with a question....

My idea for having a drone would be a security thing... ok lets say like on "Home alone" one of my fav movies.... he has this RC car and it chases the bad guys... so now in 2016 we can have a bunch of drones... that is a added layer of security. Lets say someone tries to break into your home and you don't know who or what car he drives... guess what the drone can follow him and get his picture provided there is a webcam attached to it. It can also take pictures and video as well.

So now why would someone want a drone? A drone is a way to see the world from a different viewpoint. If you have ever played with gopro's or anything similar you know you can attach it to a dog, your car, etc and see the world in a different way. A drone allows you to take video from a aerial point of view.... something you cannot do with a normal camera or phone.... I mean imaging flying the drone at your home and you are watching a live feed from your tv... or computer... its a good way to survey land, and just get a better picture.

Mooseboost wrote: »

My wife would never let me have a droid. I would get into too much trouble.

Neither would mine... but imma buy her at least 200.00 worth of shoes then ask..... she will say yes then.........:D

Plantwiz wrote: »

Hybrid car or even an auto-pilot car? Might be worth having. Otherwise, nothing is that exciting to me. Good luck on your testing!

Nope that would be worse.... a auto pilot car would cause so many accidents and people would then become super lazy and abuse it. I was talking with my friend about this today at lunch... I made the comment "What if you are driving a auto pilot car that can auto stop and the person next to, or behind you isn't.... then you have a accident" also cars can also be hacked so you have worse of a risk with a hacked car then having a drone fly around.... But it's all good honestly I am VERY surprised we dont have flying cars by now. I would love to see technology advance or be released to where we have cars that fly, real hoverboards, and houses on high stilts like the jetsons.

NetworkNewb

ITSpectre wrote: »

I made the comment "What if you are driving a auto pilot car that can auto stop and the person next to, or behind you isn't.... then you have a accident"

Gonna go off my own topic here. Actually most new cars already have an automatic breaking system in them. My 2014 vehicle even does... Can turn it on and off, which I believe I turned mine off awhile ago. I found it a little annoying sometimes, for instance if the road turned to left and the car in front of me went into a turning lane on the right and slowed down to turn, the vehicle would see the car infront of me was slowing down and would slow mine down as well... Since my vehicle doesn't detect the road turned. But I believe next year Telsa is supposed to release a vehicle with auto-drive mode, which looks pretty sweet, and only starts at 35k . Should be interesting times ahead!

thomas_

I think it would be cool if someone made a drone with some sort of attachment that let you clean your gutters out. There's a gutter "robot" that's a couple of hundred dollars, but you still have to get on the ladder to put it in the gutter. If you had a drone you could just operate it from the ground and clean the gutters out. I guess even just a drone with a crappy camera could help you see how much stuff was in the gutters.

I think there was a company that was pioneering flying cars a long time ago, but they had some bad crashes and their company subsequently folded.