The OnePlus One smartphone may still be sold on an invitation-only basis but that hasn’t stopped OnePlus from turning its attention to other projects, specifically, a smartwatch.
The wearable’s existence was picked up by BGR.in, which received a tip-off, images and early concept sketches of the device. According to the report the company is “close to launching” the smartwatch, and it will be dubbed the OneWatch.
The image shows the rear of the watchface and its strap, as you can see it’s a round watch like the Moto 360, while the picture appears to be of a forthcoming product page for the wearable with the slogan “It’s about time”.
We can also see from the sketeches some of the features aboard the OneWatch, at least, assuming they all made it from the drawing board into the actual production device. It has an OLED touch display with Sapphire Glass on top, while the battery technology is curved and appears to be mounted inside the strap. Meanwhile, the rear of the watch body has QI wireless charging capability, the strap is purportedly leather, and there seems to be some titanium used in the device’s construction.
Interestingly, the OneWatch also features a traditional “crown” style button or dial for controlling some of its functions, it’s not yet clear exactly what this is for, but it’s implied it is configurable, which perhaps indicates it can be set to form a range of tasks.
There’s no mention of software at present, but given that the OnePlus One used Android with the custom CyanogenMod 11S build on top, it seems likely we’re looking at an Android Wear device. The point there, however, is that Android Wear devices so far have run stock software, which appears to be by decree from Google. How OnePlus will deal with this is unclear for now.
It’s also intriguing that the OneWatch was discovered via a leak (and a rather comprehensive one at that), as previously OnePlus’ style with the One smartphone was to be extremely open and up-front from the start. The company spent a lot of time interacting with its fans on its forum page, where much new information was showcased on a regular basis ahead of launch. Perhaps OnePlus will take a similar approach with the OneWatch, but this bit of early info may have arrived prematurely as far as OnePlus’ schedule is concerned.
by pbriden via Featured Articles
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