Gear S2 what is the point of wi-fi?

[Jeff Allen1]

The whole point of having a wearable watch for me is so that I don't miss notifications. In actuality, I am missing more notifications now than I did before this little $350 smartwatch investment.

When I walk around my "huge" 2BR apartment, my Galaxy S6 charging in my bedroom is sometimes outside of the 30 foot bluetooth range. Not only does my watch fail to notify me that is has lost contact with my GS6 but I will now miss all text messages received whilst I am out of range.

So, I turned wi-fi on hoping my Galaxy S6 would be able to notify my GS2 via wi-fi but ... nada. What then is the point of turning wi-fi on for the GS2?

To me, is seems this phone is 90% about watch faces and 10% everything else.

 

[Jeff Allen1]

Wait, it is working but the watch doesn't light up and the vibrations are very light even though I have it set to STRONG and LONG.

 

[Ittlebit]

The vibration isn't as strong as I would like but over a short period of time I have become more mindful of it. Your notification won't turn on until you make the gesture of looking at the watch. That way if you choose to ignore it your watch will stay dark.

Note 4 with Gear S2 3G

 

[Ittlebit]

Did you get the WiFi to work? I believe that the WiFi is to expand the service area beyond that if the Bluetooth. For me, my S2 watch works much farther away then my OG Pebble and that I assume is because of the WiFi.

Note 4 with Gear S2 3G

 

[FitzAusTex]

I will concur that the first few days I had my non-3G ,I thought the vibration was weak, now I immediately notice it.

 

[edubb256]

The vibration isn't as strong as I would like but over a short period of time I have become more mindful of it. Your notification won't turn on until you make the gesture of looking at the watch. That way if you choose to ignore it your watch will stay dark.

Actually this is an option. If you want the watch screen to turn on, you must enable that option in Gear Manager on the phone. It is off by default.

 

[Ittlebit]

Actually this is an option. If you want the watch screen to turn on, you must enable that option in Gear Manager on the phone. It is off by default.

Thanks, I missed this setting.

Note 4 with Gear S2 3G

 

[Jeff Allen1]

Actually this is an option. If you want the watch screen to turn on, you must enable that option in Gear Manager on the phone. It is off by default.

I have this setting enabled but it only works when connected via bluetooth. If you get a notification while connected via wi-fi, the screen will remain dark. Further, notifications received while connected via wi-fi have a MUCH weaker vibration bordering on imperceptible.

 

[Barrett Jasper]

You can turn on a longer and harder vibration. I find mine perfect. No issues getting my attention at all. It is a bit under noticable indeed. I agree but I guess I just feel it fine. I also turn of NFC since I don't use pay on watch hardly at all and just use my phone so the more you can turn off that you don't need on all day the better like WiFi and location. Just use these settings when needed but no sense keeping them on all day until you're ready to use. The best thing WiFi is good for is when you are out of range of Bluetooth such as when you don't have your phone with you if you have the 3-g model that is, or you're further away from your phone to wear Bluetooth won't connect other than that if you're always close enough to your phone with Bluetooth you don't need WiFi on whatsoever and Wifi is a much heavier drain on battery than Bluetooth as well as GPS. I don't use GPS on my phone whatsoever, I mean my watch because I use it on my phone with a much larger screen for navigation so I also don't use GPS so between GPS, WiFi, location, I save a ton of battery life and simply turn them on when I need them and back off when I don't you'll get far better battery that way like I said I can get through a full day easily and still have roughly 40% left maybe even 5260 after 8 hours if I'm not Super Active on my watch but I do look at it several times a day also and I still get notifications push to me through my Bluetooth and I set my mobile settings if yours is a mobile version to automatic on and off instead of full-time on unless you need it all the time to be on most of the time I make calls through my phone instead of watch unless I'm driving and that's the only time I turn on my mobile phone to a completely on state instead of Auto on and auto off and that will eat up battery a little more to definitely so everyone's uses vary depending on their lifestyle but those are some tips to try based on yours so Tinker around a bit and you'll probably get used to turning things off when you don't need them and you'll get much more life out of your battery, this of course depends on the watch you have as well