While we were excited yesterday by the prospect of Samsung’s first smart watch, the Galaxy Gear, there was one big, looming question that remained unanswered – what can it do? Samsung wasn’t particularly apt at describing the ins and outs of the Galaxy Gear, particularly when it comes to the device’s new app ecosystem, however today we’re getting at a much better look at some apps that Samsung plans on having available at launch.
In total, Samsung says there should be 70 apps available for your Galaxy Gear from the get go. While that’s an impressive number, it still comes pretty far below the 500 applications that launched with the iPhone 3G / iPhone OS 2.0 back in 2008. As the Galaxy Gear runs a pared down version of Android 4.3, it should be a fairly simple processor for future developers to get their apps up and running on Samsung’s newest endeavor, though that advantage appears to be a double edged sword.
Some of the apps appear to simply be highly pared down and unoptimized versions of their Android counterparts; take eBay for example, which appears almost exactly like their Android application scrunched down to fit on the Galaxy Gear’s lowly 320 x 320 resolution. Path, the private and small social network from San Francisco fairs better, though it seemingly does so by simply removing a vast portion of the application’s functionality. There’s a compromise either way, and it’ll be up to the developers to figure out how to create fully functional applications on such harsh limitations.
The Samsung Galaxy Gear is set for an October worldwide release and will run you $299. It syncs with your existing Android device and relies on your smartphone’s cellular connectivity for data, just like Google Glass, and comes with a 1.9 megapixel camera and a 800 MHz processor.
Source: The Verge
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