Samsung Gear S3 Classic [review]

 Samsung’s Gear S2 was a hit. The innovative, round smartwatch with its rotating bezel wowed tech  lovers and analog watch fans alike with its practicality and sleek design. Now Samsung is back with the  Gear S3 Classic and Gear S3 Frontier, two traditional-looking smartwatches with classic Swiss design  elements.

 We took a sneak peek at the new watches to see how they compare to last year’s Gear S2 and  whether Samsung is ready to win over more analog watch fanatics to the smartwatch craze.

Traditional Swiss watch look with a masculine feel:

When it comes to watches, people usually want an elegant, classic look or a sporty, rugged look. Samsung consulted with Swiss watchmakers and a watch designer named Yvan Arpa to craft two exquisite smartwatches that aim to look just like analog Swiss watches.

The Gear S3 Classic is for the classy businessman who’s most comfortable in a suit, while the Gear S3 Frontier is geared toward the more rugged outdoorsman who enjoys going off the grid. If the Gear S3 Classic were a man, he’d be George Clooney, all dark and handsome with a little dazzle. The Gear S3 Frontier is more of a Bradley Cooper, still classically good-looking, but a little rough around the edges.

.

No matter what Samsung says, the Gear S3 series is made for men and men only !

Unfortunately, both watches are larger than the original Gear S2 Classic with 46mm diameters. They’re also thicker and sport traditional-looking watch bezels with an index. The larger size is in somewhat of a step backward for Samsung (we thought the Gear S2 was perfectly sized), but the company stresses that these watches are for people who like bigger, chunky watches. I spoke with several men who loved the designs, though I remain a little sad. However, there’s no denying that the new Gear S3 watches look more classic than the futuristic-looking Gear S2.


The Frontier’s index is numbered like the dial on most outdoors watches, and the Classic uses hash marks. Both Gear S3 watches have stainless steel cases that are waterproof up to 5 meters for 30 minutes, thanks to an IP68 rating. The steel of the Frontier is coated with a dark color, while the Classic comes in a sleek, shinier machined silvery steel finish.

Both watches have two buttons and a rotating bezel, just like last year’s Gear S2 watches, and they look different on each model. The Frontier has flat buttons that are flush with the watch’s casing, while the Classic has more classic buttons that stick out like the crown on analog watches.

A rotating bezel controls slick software:

With the Gear S3 line, Samsung heeded the old adage: If it’s not broken, don’t fix it. The smartwatch uses the same innovative, circular Tizen-based interface as the Gear S2, and you use the same rotating bezel for navigation.

Twist the bezel right, and you’ll see a number of widgets, which give you lightning quick access to your favorite apps. You can also view your step count, control your music, or call an Uber right from the widgets. It’s the ability to take quick action that makes the interface so clever. Samsung opened up a Software Development Kit (SDK) to app makers, so that there will be more widgets available when the Gear S3 launches.

Battery Life :

Samsung says the battery should last 3 to 4 days on a charge, thanks to the 380mAh battery inside the device. The battery is nearly double the size of the 250-300mAh in the Gear S2 watches and there’s a power saving mode that kicks in when the watch hits 15 percent battery, which cuts down on some functions to ensure that it lasts long enough for you to make it to the charger. After that, there’s a watch-only mode that shows you the time for a full day before the battery finally dies. The idea here is that you’ll always know the time. After all, what’s the point of a watch that doesn’t tell the time?

The battery isn’t the only thing that made the Gear S3 thicker than its siblings. Samsung packed an MST coil inside the Gear S3 to enable the full power of Samsung Pay on the smartwatch. Although you could tap to pay using NFC on the Gear S2, you couldn’t use it with Samsung Pay’s MST technology, which works on the vast majority of payment terminals that accept mag-stripe cards.

More informations : GSM Arena