Samsung's original Galaxy Gear to switch from Android to Tizen
Ian Morris | May 14, 2014 11:30 pm BST
While it's fair to say that the original Samsung Galaxy Gear didn't exactly sell in vast quantities, it seems like the firm is keen to keep supporting the device, and a video shows it running the same Tizen OS as the Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo.
And indeed, a spokesman for Samsung confirmed to at MWC this year that the original Gear would get moved over to Tizen, but no indication was given about when that might happen. Now, a video demonstrates the original Galaxy Gear running the Tizen OS, and doing a very good job of it too.
For Samsung it makes sense to move the old watch to the new platform. For one, there's no point supporting the Android-based app store for the Galaxy Gear. Samsung never allowed third-party developers access to Gear owners anyway, so the store was never awash with apps, and in our testing with the original watch the selection was dreadful, and many apps simply didn't work.
Moving over to Tizen means that there's essentially one smartwatch platform for Samsung's watches. Of course, with Android Wear coming from Google, one might argue that Samsung has truly backed the wrong horse, but we like Tizen and think it deserves a chance.
Questions do remain, of course, about those who don't want to move off Android. Will those devices continue to work? The Gear relies heavily on the phone to support most of its features, so at some point Samsung could simply stop supporting the Android-powered watches.
Read more: Samsung Galaxy Gear review
(YouTube) f9zplGtH-wA (/YouTube)
Via: SamMobile