Samsung finally reveals its foray into smartwatch territory-- the company reveals the Galaxy Gear, as well as the 3rd iteration of the Galaxy Note phablet, at the Samsung Unpacked IFA 2013 event.
Looking like a chunky plastic wristwatch, the Galaxy Gear pairs with Samsung smartphones via Bluetooth 4.0 + BLE. It provides previews of incoming messages and emails, as well as "other valuable features and commands" (as Samsung puts it) such as pedometer, Find My Device (finds a lost phone from 1.5m away), compatibility with 70 Android apps (including Pocket, Evernote, RunKeeper and Runtastic), camera and, shockingly enough, a digital timepiece. Shocking.
Inside the Gear are a 1.63-inch 320x320 Super AMOLED display, 800MHz processor, 512MB RAM, 4G storage and a 315mAh battery promising "about a day" of use.
While the decision to use Bluetooth 4.0 allows for less drain on the battery, it also cripples the Gear-- the device is only compatible with the newly announced Galaxy Note 3 (more on that below) and the 2014 edition Galaxy Note 10.1 on launch. It will eventually pair with the Galaxy S4, Galaxy S III and Galaxy Note II, but only following an eventual software update.
Samsung reveals 6 colours of Gear at IFA 2013, the oddly named Jet Black, Mocha Gray, Wild Orange, Oatmeal Beige, Rose Gold, and Lime Green.
The second IFA 2013 Samsung reveal is perhaps more typical-- the Galaxy Note 3 is the next step in oversized smartphone-tablet hybrid design, now with a larger 5.7-inch 1920x1080 Super AMOLED display, 13MP rear-facing camears, 1.9GHz quad-core processor and removable 3200mAh battery.
It is slimmer (8.3mm) and lighter (168g) than previous models, and packs S Pen stylus input for note taking and the like.
Enterprise customers might be interested to learn the Note 3 features KNOX security for enhanced data protection and BYOD applications.
Both Gear and Note 3 will be available in over 140 countries from September 2013.