Fossil OLED Watch

[rewolf]

...The display is not only very poor to unreadable outside, but leaves much to be desired indoors as well...

I guesss that's the compromise they had to make to avoid a rechargeable battery. Those MP4 OLED watches have to be recharged after 12hrs when the time display is constantly on.

[LEDluvr]

This Fossil sounds like a read disappointment - like their other LED watches. What a shame. Someone needs to fired over there.

[redled]

It boggles my mind how people who's job it is to design watches can be so clueless. This watch probably had to pass across dozens of peoples desks before going to production, but it still managed to end up useless, annoying and insulting to the end user. Nice job Fossil, you idiots.

[LEDluvr]

Fossil isn't getting any of my money!

[AlmightyTallest]

Well, at least we have a good forum for this sort of thing. It's good to be able to warn other enthusiasts about a product that isn't living up to the hype.

[Site admin. can only exclaim - AMEN!! ]

[Majestyk]

Jeff / Majestyk another opportunity for you???

The horror...The horror! :)

[collector]

End of my story on this Fossil OLED - Returned watch to the Fossil store earlier today. Received full refund, so at least I did not have to sell it on eBay and maybe / probably lose money!!!

[AlmightyTallest]

Sent mine back via UPS Saturday morning. Lost $7.50 in shipping but better than losing over $100 on a watch I was not able to wear.

[rewolf]

It boggles my mind how people who's job it is to design watches can be so clueless. This watch probably had to pass across dozens of peoples desks before going to production, but it still managed to end up useless, annoying and insulting to the end user. Nice job Fossil, you idiots.

Maybe they'll start thinking when half of the watches is returned...

[collector]

Ed did a review on two other Fossil's this month.

http://thedigitalwatch.com/MOM.htm

Neither fared too well. Ed, did you return these?

Yes, I know Fossil is a low end watch brand, but I would have expected better.

Bottom line for me as far as Fossil is concerned - NEVER AGAIN!

[retroleds]

I am going to return these today, but I personally wouldn't say "no" to another Fossil. If I worked out on a golf course, spent a lot of time out on a boat or somewhere else bright, these watches are very visible. I'd just strip off the solid band to loose about 2/3 of the weight. It's really a shame - the jump hour one is really stylish, but no back or side light. The multi-function is as nice a watch in that feature set as you can get, but a better choice IMO is a Fila gents that is almost the same size and shape. The Fila is 1/2 the price, has almost identical features, the display is a bit hard to read in dim light BUT the display goes to a medium, forest green mettalic with black characters in bright light.....Ray Charles could read the thing! I think I put up a picture of the Fila here about a year ago....problem for many American buyers is that Fila is associated with the hip-hop culture and many caucasians wouldn't be caught wearing a Fila item.

[rewolf]

I agree with Ed's judgement about both Fossil watches he reviewed.

I wouldn't say all Fossils are bad, at least the Fossil Starck watches are very nice: (BTW sorry for the rakuten.co.jp links below, but the official Fossil photos are so crappy!)

I have a PH1002 (the classic Starck), very nice: stopwatch, timer, alarm, dual time, EL, all you need.
A newer version of it is the beautiful PH2002.

Can't quite recommend the "Sand" PH1065: same features as above, but looks a bit cheap with its transparent case. They updated it later with chrome plating, PH1081, looks much better, but I didn't buy it. For photos click here

Recently I purchased a PH1077, and it is perfect! Full dot matrix curved (!) mirror LCD, excellent readability, EL backlight, super stylish (IMHO).
It has only one drawback: the pseudo-analogue display mode isn't very clever: the hours hand advances only in full hour steps, so at a glance 5:59 looks like 5:00 (only the minute hand's position is different), making this display mode practically useless (not the similarities to the OLED watch...)
Some nice photos of the PH1077 are here.

The FILA F1: I purchased one some time ago (NIB for 20GBP): overloaded with features and yes, the display is nice in good light, but not in dim light. I didn't really like it, but my father did - I gave it to him and he wears it almost every day (he's 67 and doesn't even know what hip-hop is ). Would a caucasian (white-skinned) hip-hopper wear a FILA? (in europe 'caucasian' means people of caucasus, I had to look it up in a dictionary to understand ).
And if you want to know a heavy watch, try the o.d.m. MDD99: 238g

The Fossil FS4291 looks promising (if one likes round shaped watches - I don't).

I have to stop here - enough new candidates for "Modern of the Month"

[embelton]

Retroleds:I dont wear anything other than what is OK with the hiphop community.
I even have a t-shirt saying "I AM HIPHOP".

Aint that cool or what?

[retroleds]

Retroleds:I dont wear anything other than what is OK with the hiphop community.
I even have a t-shirt saying "I AM HIPHOP".

Aint that cool or what?

EMby - That is cool with me. I don't have any problem with the FIla brand....I grew up in a very racially diverse area - I ain't "hate'n" on anybody over their color, but maybe over their culture(or lack thereof). I just think it was a shame that such a nice watch wasn't distributed under a brand name that would have appealled to more than 15-20% of Americans(we do make up a sizable percentage of the watch buying market). Some people don't have a problem with that ; obviously I didn't.

[TheFordGuy]

The same thing could be said about Cadillac in regards to a particular demographic that fancies them.

[Fitron]

The same thing could be said about Cadillac in regards to a particular demographic that fancies them.

What? Elvis impersonators

[magnusson_r]

I just have one question: Is the display continuous, or must you always push a button in order to display the time?

There is no point whatsoever in having a (low-consumption) OLED display, if you must push a button to display the time. You may as well go with regular LED which is much brighter.

[Planet-LED]

magnusson_r,

Welcome aboard! You can paste this into your browser and see the display for yourself. It seems a closer cousin to a video game than it does to an LED watch. You be the judge:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtPtJ93ph50

[rewolf]

I just have one question: Is the display continuous, or must you always push a button in order to display the time?

There is no point whatsoever in having a (low-consumption) OLED display, if you must push a button to display the time. You may as well go with regular LED which is much brighter.

To answer the question: you have to press a button. If it were continuous, you'd either have to replace or recharge batteries every other day.
There will be no such thing as a continuously-on self-lighting watch display with months of battery runtime in the near future, it's physically impossible. I posted the reasons somewhere in another thread. (And 50 years ago, there were people that said it'd be impossible for man to fly to the moon (and nowadays there are many that don't believe man was ever on the moon) )

[Majestyk]

I don't know why but for watches, I always thought Organic LED was a break through technology with a very low power, constant display. So now I have to wonder, what's the big deal? You still have to push a button for the time to light up.

By the way, Sony unveiled their first OLED TV earlier this month. It was just a tiny thing but I've been saying this for two years now (and maybe I'll be right on this one) OLED will eventually replace both LCD and Plasma TV's...Yeah kind of getting out of watches there.


Jeff

[magnusson_r]

QUOTE: ""I don't know why but for watches, I always thought Organic LED was a break through technology with a very low power, constant display. So now I have to wonder, what's the big deal? You still have to push a button for the time to light up.""



Ah! But you cannot have really cool animated graphics (e.g.--karate guy, running man) with ordinary segment LEDs, can you? And therein lies the reason for using OLED in Fossil's exciting new wristwatch!!

Sadly, unbelievably, there it is, folks.

[Majestyk]

Oh I know about the extras that come with OLED. Hence the displays on phones (etc) and now TV's. It just doesn't give watch technology enough boost to have to push the button, which is why LCD won over LED, of course.