The Neptune Pine is an unlocked

GSM The Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) is a family of standards to describe the protocols for second-generation (2G) digital cellular networks, as used by mobile devices such as mobile phones and Mobile broadband modem, mobile broadba ...

standalone, full featured

smartwatch A smartwatch is a portable wearable computer that resembles a wristwatch. Most modern smartwatches are operated via a touchscreen, and rely on mobile apps that run on a connected device (such as a smartphone) in order to provide core functions. ...

developed by Canadian consumer electronics and

wearable technology Wearable technology is any technology that is designed to be used while worn. Common types of wearable technology include smartwatches, fitness trackers, and smartglasses. Wearable electronic devices are often close to or on the surface of the s ...

company Neptune. It was announced in January 2013 by

Simon Tian Simon Tian (born February 24, 1994) is a Canadian businessman, inventor, entrepreneur and investor. He is the founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of Fonus and Neptune. Born and raised in Montreal, Canada, Tian dropped out of pre-universi ...

and launched in November 2013 on

Kickstarter Kickstarter, PBC is an American Benefit corporation, public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York City, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative project ...

. Within 27 hours, the campaign had reached its funding goal of $100,000, and ultimately went on to raise more than $800,000 in 30 days, becoming the highest-funded Canadian Kickstarter campaign at the time. The device started shipping in August 2014, and eventually became widely available through

Best Buy Best Buy Co., Inc. is an American multinational consumer electronics retailer headquartered in Richfield, Minnesota. Originally founded by Richard M. Schulze and James Wheeler in 1966 as an audio specialty store called Sound of Music, it was r ...

and

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon (company), an American multinational technology company * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek myth ...

. It was featured in the 2017 film

The Fate of the Furious ''The Fate of the Furious'' (also known as ''F8'' or ''Fast & Furious 8'') is a 2017 action film directed by F. Gary Gray and written by Chris Morgan. It is the sequel to '' Furious 7'' (2015) and the eighth installment in the ''Fast & Furiou ...

, the

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

TV series

Extant Extant or Least-concern species, least concern is the opposite of the word extinct. It may refer to: * Extant hereditary titles * Extant literature, surviving literature, such as ''Beowulf'', the oldest extant manuscript written in English * Exta ...

starring

Halle Berry Halle Maria Berry ( ; born Maria Halle Berry; August 14, 1966) is an American actress. She began her career as a model and entered several beauty contests, finishing as the first runner-up in the Miss USA pageant of 1986 and also placing six ...

and the music video for

Smartphones A smartphone is a mobile phone with advanced computing capabilities. It typically has a touchscreen interface, allowing users to access a wide range of applications and services, such as web browsing, email, and social media, as well as mult ...

Trey Songz Tremaine Aldon Neverson (born November 28, 1984), known professionally as Trey Songz, is an American Contemporary R&B, R&B singer and songwriter. After being discovered by record producer Troy Taylor (record producer), Troy Taylor in 2003, Songz ...

. The Pine received mixed reviews from the press, generally praising its extensive set of features, while criticizing its large size.

Funding

After a successful campaign on

Neptune managed to raise over $800,000 out of a goal of $100,000.

Features

It uses

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

Android Android most commonly refers to: *Android (robot), a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to imitate a human * Android (operating system), a mobile operating system primarily developed by Google * Android TV, a operating system developed ...

version 4.1 but is not a Google-licensed device and therefore does not include Google apps or the

Google Play Google Play, also known as the Google Play Store, Play Store, or sometimes the Android Store (and was formerly Android Market), is a digital distribution service operated and developed by Google. It serves as the official app store for certifie ...

store. These apps can be manually added by the user. The Pine has a Snapdragon S4

system on a chip A system on a chip (SoC) is an integrated circuit that combines most or all key components of a computer or Electronics, electronic system onto a single microchip. Typically, an SoC includes a central processing unit (CPU) with computer memory, ...

(SoC) by

Qualcomm Qualcomm Incorporated () is an American multinational corporation headquartered in San Diego, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. It creates semiconductors, software and services related to wireless techn ...

that has a

Cortex-A5 The ARM Cortex-A5 is a 32-bit processor core licensed by ARM Holdings implementing the ARMv7-A architecture announced in 2009. Overview The Cortex-A5 is intended to replace the ARM9 and ARM11 cores for use in low-end devices. The Cortex-A5 off ...

Dual-Core ARM processor running at 1.2 GHz. The smartwatch has a

capacitive touch screen A touchscreen (or touch screen) is a type of display that can detect touch input from a user. It consists of both an input device (a touch panel) and an output device (a visual display). The touch panel is typically layered on the top of the e ...

, a

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for Wireless LAN, local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by ...

web browser A web browser, often shortened to browser, is an application for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's scr ...

, a 5.0 MP rear-facing

camera A camera is an instrument used to capture and store images and videos, either digitally via an electronic image sensor, or chemically via a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. As a pivotal technology in the fields of photograp ...

and a VGA front-facing camera, both of them with LED flash, a multimedia player and recorder for music (

mp3 MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany under the lead of Karlheinz Brandenburg. It was designed to greatly reduce the amount ...

) and video (

mp4 MP4 (formally MPEG-4 Part 14), is a digital multimedia container format most commonly used to store video and audio, but it can also be used to store other data such as subtitles and still images. Like most modern container formats, it allows ...

), a 3.5 mm headphone jack and an internal

GPS The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a satellite-based hyperbolic navigation system owned by the United States Space Force and operated by Mission Delta 31. It is one of the global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) that provide geol ...

antenna that supports

satellite navigation A satellite navigation or satnav system is a system that uses satellites to provide autonomous geopositioning. A satellite navigation system with global coverage is termed global navigation satellite system (GNSS). , four global systems are ope ...

. Other data inputs are an

accelerometer An accelerometer is a device that measures the proper acceleration of an object. Proper acceleration is the acceleration (the rate of change (mathematics), rate of change of velocity) of the object relative to an observer who is in free fall (tha ...

, a

gyroscope A gyroscope (from Ancient Greek γῦρος ''gŷros'', "round" and σκοπέω ''skopéō'', "to look") is a device used for measuring or maintaining Orientation (geometry), orientation and angular velocity. It is a spinning wheel or disc in ...

, a

pedometer A pedometer, or step-counter, is a device, usually portable and electronic or electromechanical, that counts each step a person takes by detecting the motion of the person's hands or hips. Because the distance of each person's step varies, an ...

, and a

digital Digital usually refers to something using discrete digits, often binary digits. Businesses *Digital bank, a form of financial institution *Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) or Digital, a computer company *Digital Research (DR or DRI), a software ...

compass A compass is a device that shows the cardinal directions used for navigation and geographic orientation. It commonly consists of a magnetized needle or other element, such as a compass card or compass rose, which can pivot to align itself with No ...

. The Pine smartwatch can be released from the wrist strap by pressing a button on the strap for a better audio signal during a phone call or to take photos with the 5 MP rear-facing camera which is otherwise blocked by the strap. PineDetachedFromWrist-Band

A Micro B USB to

USB Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard, developed by USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), for digital data transmission and power delivery between many types of electronics. It specifies the architecture, in particular the physical ...

cable is required to charge the smartwatch. It can also connect to a

computer A computer is a machine that can be Computer programming, programmed to automatically Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (''computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic set ...

so that the internal

SD card Secure Digital (SD) is a proprietary, non-volatile, flash memory card format developed by the SD Association (SDA). Owing to their compact size, SD cards have been widely adopted in a variety of portable consumer electronics, including dig ...

can be recognized as a

mass storage device In computing, mass storage refers to the Data storage, storage of large amounts of data in a persistence (computer science), persisting and machine-readable data, machine-readable fashion. In general, the term ''mass'' in ''mass storage'' is use ...

for

file management A file manager or file browser is a computer program that provides a user interface to manage files and folders. The most common operations performed on files or groups of files include creating, opening (e.g. viewing, playing, editing or p ...

. As a phone, it can be used in conjunction with a

Bluetooth Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). In the most widely used mode, transmission power is li ...

headset and can operate in a hands-free manner with its built-in microphone and speakers, also its Bluetooth functionality supports

Stereo Stereophonic sound, commonly shortened to stereo, is a method of sound reproduction that recreates a multi-directional, 3-dimensional audible perspective. This is usually achieved by using two independent audio channels through a configurat ...

for wireless music playback and making calls. It offers a talk time of up to 8 hours on 2G and six hours on 3G. Internet usage time is up to seven hours and music playback is up to 10 hours. The watch was initially designed to be waterproof, but it was found that the manufacturer was unable to apply the desired treatment. While this option is not available at retail, Kickstarter backers who wanted waterproofing could have their products transported to a third party, opened, and treated with the aftermarket HzO spray before delivery.

References

External links

Engadget.com - Here's what it's like to use a watch as a phone XDA-developers.com – Forum: Neptune Pine (stand alone, android, smart watch/phone) Official Neptune Pine videos Neptuneninja.com – Resources, apps and hardware guides for the Neptune Pine
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pine Smartwatch by Neptune Smartwatches