As smartwatches go, some questions almost immediately come to mind: what shape is it, meaning is it round and does the battery lasts longer than a day? Smartwatches generically tend to look like mini-computers or small square flat screens worn on the wrist and this somewhat diminishes their appeal. Classic round-shaped smartwatches are quite desirable but design is nothing without some proper battery life, and ASUS took up the challenge to address the battery issue with the successor of the ZenWatch that the company is working on. ASUS promises that the new type of ZenWatch will sport a better battery that would supposedly deliver 7 days on a single charge instead of one(that the current ZenWatch and most smartwatches have) but will retain the current design philosophy of the ZenWatch, which although not classic and round I dare say it does look rather premium. And the price for the current ASUS smartwatch is quite fetching too.
ASUS is working on a new classy ZenWatch
Regarding the internals, not much detail is known about the new version of the ZenWatch, which chipset will be used. The vast majority of smartwatches use a Snapdragon 400 originally designed to fit mid-range Android smartphones but there are companies like MediaTek that makes dedicated chipsets for smartwatches. According to ASUS chairman Jonney Shih the company is currently working on simplifying the OS in order to extend battery life and I personally take this information with a pinch of salt because of Google and the restrictive policy it operates for its OS. Modifications that Google allows to be done to Android are slim at best, therefore I’m not yet convinced as to what can be done to improve the battery as Android Wear is already a full-fledged modified Lollipop OS. True, ASUS could pull off its own custom-build OS for the new gadget but I wonder if that would really be a smart move?
The ZenWatch sequel is expected to emerge sometime in Q3 this year so chances are we might get to see a prototype soon