Samsung Gear S Release Date October 2014: Too Big and Clunky for Your Wrist?

By Max Bonto, Christian Post Contributor Thursday, September 04, 2014

Samsung is already a familiar name when it comes to wearable tech. The Gear, Gear 2, Gear Fit, and Gear Live have all been out on the market for some time now. Now, the South Korean tech company is looking to release a new smartwatch sometime in October, the new Gear S.

The Gear S, at first glance, is bigger than most other smartwatches with a curved 2-inch AMOLED screen with a 480 x 360 pixel resolution. It's powered by a dual-core 1GHz processor, 512MB RAM, has 4GB of internal storage, and has 3G capabilities.

The watch is also powered by Samsung's own mobile operating system, Tizen. Aside from the usual specs, the Gear S is also equipped with a GPS sensor, an accelerometer, a gyroscope, a UV detector, a barometer, and a heart rate monitor.

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Unlike most other smart watches Samsung has released where it's mostly used as a complement to a smartphone, the Gear S can be used independently like a smartphone. It has its own apps, and with 3G capabilities can be used to call and text.

The smartwatch's 2-inch display enables users to type text messages using a QWERTY touch keyboard – but it takes some getting used to since the screen is still very small compared to regular sized smartphones.

To make things easier, the Gear S is also equipped with the S Voice, a voice transcription software where it decodes a users words into text.

While the watch is still not out on the market, a few tech sites like TechCrunch have already gotten their hands on a test unit. According to them, the only downside to the Gear S is it's big and clunky profile with an equally wide strap, making the smartwatch look enormous on a person's wrist – almost like having a phone strapped on it.

Most likely, the 3G capability and other added features (like call and text capabilities) will make it more expensive but it will make for a difficult sell, primarily because of its size and unrefined operating system.

During the IFA, display units already experienced problems like unresponsive screens and crashing apps. Although the release date is still a month away, Samsung will need to fix any potential bugs for a seamless release.