The Beepwear Pro Software and Organizer
The watch is shipped with two floppies
which contain the Beepwear Pro software. You will need this software to customize
your watch and to setup your own personal organizer on the watch. The Beepwear
Pro software has several features that allow you to customize how your watch
works. They include the ability to set the time on your watch manually, select
between five different melodies and one chirp to use when the pager goes off
or silent mode, and the aforementioned address book that will be used as the
watch organizer.
While
you can customize the sound your watch makes when the pager goes off, you
can configure such options as an automatic indiglo light whenever you touch
a button at night. You can also decide how long you want that light to stay
on. Hate for your pager to go off at night? You can use the Beepwear software
to automatically turn your pager on and off at the times that you will be
using it. If you don't like the idea of being on atomic time and would rather
set your watch to the time at work or school simply use the Beepwear software
to turn off the auto time update feature and set the time for yourself.
The organizer stores up to 150 names
and numbers. To move the data from the Beepwear software or to customize your
watch using the Beepwear software you simply using hot-sync it with your monitor.
You heard that right, hold the watch up to the screen and with a mouse click
the data is transmitted through your monitor and onto the watch.
How Did it Work?
Throw in the indiglo light, stopwatch,
alarm, and of course the pager and suddenly you are leaving several things
at home when you hit the road. And that's exactly what I did with it. I used
it day in and day out for a couple of months, and also took it on a long road
trip across the U.S. While the watch did update the time it displayed when
I crossed into different time zones I couldn't receive pages once I was outside
my coverage area. This is because I was on the metro plan which does not have
nationwide coverage. Make sure you get the national coverage plan that works
in numeric mode if you plan to use this watch on the road.
At
this point I might as well mention that the watch shipped to me came with
four batteries - three ready to go and one already in the watch. Why mention
that? I averaged about five weeks with each battery. Considering how much
I use the indiglo night-light and many of the other features I consider that
quite reasonable. Obviously this watch will go through batteries quicker than
your standard digital watch. One thing that is appreciated is that the Beepwear
software will store your address book information so you can easily reconfigure
your organizer once you put in a fresh battery. A good idea to keep in mind
is that the more you turn off your pager at night and at times that it isn't
necessary then the longer you can extend your battery life.
While reading your pages you can
use a button to stop the scrolling text, and even press another to go back
in the message. I really liked being able to scroll back and forth in my messages
to make sure I didn't miss anything.
Conclusions
While pagers and cellular phone
prices are at all time lows I really liked the convenience of packing my pager
on my wrist. Active sorts who don't need to have their pockets or belt occupied
with electronics can see the logic in that. The design is rugged and with
the added convenience of a built in organizer I was ready to get work done
whenever I left the office or I was away from my day planner. Pick a style
that works for you and you won't be upset about your purchase. James Bond
may have a cooler watch (it's debatable), but my watch actually works outside
the realm of Hollywood.
Victor
Oshiro 7 September, 2000
