Apple Watch Series 2 UK release date and pricing

Apple’s iPhone 7 event may be over, but now is the time to unpack everything we’ve seen. One of the biggest announcements of the evening was the Apple Watch Series 2. At first glance, the second-generation Apple Watch is almost indistinguishable from the first. The companion device is still a familiar square shape, but it’s beneath the improved OLED display that the major improvements are to be found.

Tucked away inside the water-resistant wearable is a dual-core processor that is 50 percent faster and offers double the graphics capabilities of the original. There’s a brighter display, coming in at 1,000 nits, which will make it a lot more usable in direct sunlight. But how much will it cost? You can find pricing for all of the different Series 2 variations and the reduced pricing for Series 1 smartwatches below.

Apple Watch Series 2

Apple also has options for the Stainless Steel Case with Space Black Link Bracelet and with a Milanese Loop, which start at £699 and range up to £1,049. The Series 1 has also seen a price cut, which means the first-generation wearable — complete with the new dual-core processor — will now start at £269.

Source: Apple

Courage is not how you sell iPhones

Today, during its annual iPhone event, senior vice president of worldwide marketing, Phil Schiller said Apple was ditching the headphone jack found in pretty much every audio device ever made because of “courage.” Yeah, not so much.

According to Dictionary.com (I use my actual book dictionary to prop up my monitor) the definition of courage is: “the quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty, danger, pain, etc., without fear; bravery.”

Let’s break that down really quick. Is Apple facing difficulty, danger or pain without fear by removing the mini-jack? One of the reasons it is removing the audio port is space. Apparently there’s not enough room for all of Apple’s fancy new chips and cameras for the port. The difficult thing would have been to make everything fit.

As for danger. It seems unlikely that Apple is any immediate peril. Unless of course there’s some malevolent creature threatening the company’s employees with physical harm if they don’t kill the headphone jack. Maybe it was awakened by the construction of the new Apple headquarters. It’s probably like that creepy monster from Stranger Things.

That leaves pain. In reality the only pain being felt will be in users’ wallets when they lose their $9 lightning-to-mini-jack connector or throw down $160 for those AirPods. You should really stock up on this adaptor that gives your new iPhone a tail.

Maybe every time a new iPhone is sold, someone gets pinched. Probably by that awful monster that lives under the new Apple headquarters. Creatures can make you do some crazy things. We miss you Barb.

Maybe Apple needs to be reminded what courage actually means. Like when first responders put their lives on the line to save others. That’s pretty courageous. Oh and let’s not forget the men and women that are part of the armed forces. While their bravery is on display, it’s very rare for them to bring up a proprietary wireless audio standard for a new product.

What Apple did today isn’t courage. It’s another ‘C’ word: Consumerism.

Click here to catch all the latest news from Apple’s “See You” event.

Apple killed off its super expensive gold Edition watches

With today’s launch of the Apple Watch Series 2, Tim Cook and company added the sleek new Ceramic Edition, but quietly did away with the more ostentatious, solid 18-karat gold version. While that ceramic Series 2 model doesn’t exactly come cheap at $1,249, it’s still a fraction of the price of Apple’s previous top shelf, $10,000-plus Gold Edition.

Unlike its gold predecessor, Apple is playing up the durability and scratch resistance of the Ceramic model as a luxury feature worth an extra $1,000. The company claims their proprietary material is four times harder than steel — which could explain why it costs nearly four times as much. On the other hand, the chip upgrade and lower price for the Series 1 watch makes it a little more affordable to get an Apple product on your wrist. And for anyone following along at home, there are now five models of Apple Watch to choose from: Series 1, Series 2, Series 2 Nike+, Series 2 Hermés and that new ceramic model with the mouthful name: Apple Watch Edition Series 2. Making things slightly more confusing, the Series 2 is actually available in a “Rose Gold” flavor, but like the iPhones and MacBooks, that’s just a descriptive term for an Aluminum finish.

Click here to catch all the latest news from Apple’s “See You” event.

The Apple Watch Nike+ is a running watch I might actually use

I’ve been wearing the original Apple Watch every day for the past eight months, but never as a running watch. As much as I enjoy the device for its notifications, slick Activity app and stylish design, I would never, ever trust it on a training run. My hangup, and many runners’ hangup, has been the lack of a GPS radio. Without that crucial bit of technology, the distance tracking is off — and no, running with your iPhone on your person to triangulate your location isn’t the same.

Needless to say, if your distance tracking is inaccurate, so will be your average pace, and to a runner, even a casual one, that is bad news indeed. So until now, I’ve been sticking with my trusty Garmin Forerunner watch, even as I continue to use the Apple Watch for everyday step tracking. With the newest-gen Apple Watch, though, I might be willing to reconsider.

The new device, called the Series 2, has a built-in GPS radio that comes standard. But I’m particularly intrigued by a version the company developed with Nike, called the Apple Watch Nike+. In addition to looking like a Nike Watch — it’s available in four sporty color combinations, all variations on black, gray, white and green — it comes loaded with Nike’s own running app. As you might be aware, though Nike itself has dabbled in hardware, including the FuelBand fitness tracker and a dedicated running watch, Nike’s real asset is its software — both its app and the community of runners that has grown up around it.

Upon closer inspection here at Apple’s iPhone 7 launch event in San Francisco, I learned that the watch features two faces, each of which has so-called “complications” that make it easy to start a run a quickly. Do that and the watch will start tracking every stat that a runner like me could hope for: pace, distance, calorie burn and heart rate. What I like, too, is that all of this information is displayed on a single screen, so that you don’t have to swipe or press a button to cycle through them, which is what you have to do on many competing running watches, not to mention the original Apple Watch. That’s especially impressive how small the display is: You’d think the UI would be cluttered, with all those stats crammed in, but they’re easy to parse, even at a glance.

It helps as well that Nike’s app design is just so slick. The whole “easily cramming lots of info onto one screen” thing is just one example. The black-and-gold color scheme is — ugh, I hate this word — sexy, and even after a quick demo here at the event, the app felt intuitive. It wouldn’t take long for any of you to master it either.

Meanwhile, Nike’s competition leaves a lot to be desired. Even Apple’s own Workout app (on the current version of watchOS) involves a lot of taps to start a workout, and further taps and swiping to either pause the workout or cycle through stats. You always had the choice of third-party running apps, but they obviously didn’t come pre-loaded on the Watch, and even after you went through the trouble of adding them, third-party apps weren’t always as fast or as capable on the Apple Watch. Garmin, though an expert at running hardware, has never had a memorable app, website or even watch interface. The fact that Nike’s app is good-looking and easy to use counts for a lot.

The one feature that I really want, and that the Apple Watch Nike+ doesn’t have, is interval training. I know many of you have heard me say this before, but I prefer run-walk intervals: They help me stave off injuries, and I actually achieve a faster overall time than I probably would have otherwise. The Apple Watch still doesn’t do that, at least the Nike+ app doesn’t, but I remain hopeful that a software update could fix that. And besides, I realize I’m not just writing this assessment for myself — I’m writing it for Engadget’s readers, many of whom, presumably, are runners. No doubt most of you don’t bother with walk intervals like your hobbling friend Dana anyway.

As a watch (read: not just a piece of software), the Apple Watch feels, well, like an Apple Watch. Same size, same shape. The rubbery band is made of the same soft elastomer as Apple’s other sport watches and is even slightly easier to fasten, in my humble opinion. What I can’t vouch for today — and this is important — is how accurate the GPS tracking is. That right there is a pretty big reason for me to withhold judgment. What if the biggest selling point turns out to fall short? I will indeed put this through its paces in a full review, but I do remain optimistic: I’ve never seen a GPS-enabled device whose distance tracking was terribly far off its rivals. Heart rate monitoring is another story — quite the mixed bag there.

The watch costs starts at $369 for the 38mm model, while the larger 42mm version will cost slightly more, at $399. (Those are the same starting prices as the non-Nike Series 2 watches.) You can order the Nike+ version starting this Friday, September 9th, and will ship in October — just in time for me to test it in some cool fall weather.

This story is developing. Please check back for updates.

Click here to catch all the latest news from Apple’s “See You” event.