Growing up in the 1940s and 1950s, the neatest toy out there was a Dick Tracy Two-Way wrist radio. There were several different types available; ones that did nothing but looked great, ones with a crystal radio that let you hear AM stations if you ran an antenna up your sleeve, ones that let you talk to a friend as long as there was a wire connecting the two wrist radios and by the 1960s even ones that really did broadcast but had a range about like Bluetooth today and required an additional receiver belt pack and a really big antenna (but it would let you talk to your friend while riding bikes).
I never had any of them.
I was deprived as well as depraved.
But finally I can have my very own Dick Tracy Two-Way Wrist Radio and it's even better than the one Detective Tracy had. Mine can make private calls and not just broadcast calls but I can still Reply All if I really want to. It will get radio signals, play music, give me directions, tell time, check the weather, monitor my heart, keep track of my exercise, handle my schedule and can change personalities faster than an extra from Central Casting.
Unfortunately, like Dick Tracy I'm getting old. And every once in awhile suffer from vertigo and I decided I really needed a way to reach out for help in an emergency. Sure, I have a cell phone and home phone and computers but when I had a really bad vertigo attack a few months ago there was simply no possible way I was going to be able to get to them. But I do always wear a watch and today there are standalone watches that use a SIM card and can have their own phone line so that even if I am away from the cell phone I am still not cut off from lines of communication.
I looked around to see what was out there and found it is an amazing variety now available ranging in price from under $50.00 to several hundreds of dollars. I ended up going with a Samsung Gear S3 since it looked like a traditional watch.
It has all the Smart Watch functions and paired with all the cell phones I tested; an old Windows phone, LG K20, Samsung S4 & S5 and even a J1. The Windows phone and J1 only paired for phone calls but with the others all the functionality worked.
Later I had a chance to pickup an older Samsung Gear S so jumped on it. And I like the Gear S even more than the S3. It's bigger and easier to read for old farts like me and only has on button which helps me remember what to push.
So are there other kids out there who finally got their Dick Tracy Two-Way Wrist Radio?
I never had any of them.
I was deprived as well as depraved.
But finally I can have my very own Dick Tracy Two-Way Wrist Radio and it's even better than the one Detective Tracy had. Mine can make private calls and not just broadcast calls but I can still Reply All if I really want to. It will get radio signals, play music, give me directions, tell time, check the weather, monitor my heart, keep track of my exercise, handle my schedule and can change personalities faster than an extra from Central Casting.
Unfortunately, like Dick Tracy I'm getting old. And every once in awhile suffer from vertigo and I decided I really needed a way to reach out for help in an emergency. Sure, I have a cell phone and home phone and computers but when I had a really bad vertigo attack a few months ago there was simply no possible way I was going to be able to get to them. But I do always wear a watch and today there are standalone watches that use a SIM card and can have their own phone line so that even if I am away from the cell phone I am still not cut off from lines of communication.
I looked around to see what was out there and found it is an amazing variety now available ranging in price from under $50.00 to several hundreds of dollars. I ended up going with a Samsung Gear S3 since it looked like a traditional watch.
Later I had a chance to pickup an older Samsung Gear S so jumped on it. And I like the Gear S even more than the S3. It's bigger and easier to read for old farts like me and only has on button which helps me remember what to push.
