Running from the airport to a conference after a couple of hours of sleep doesn’t seem like the ideal way to start a week-long of tech coverage. As a journalist, you’d like to have all your senses sharpened, so to speak. So, I didn’t know what to expect today, as I ran towards ASUS’ conference in Berlin, two days before IFA 2019 officially starts. It turns out – I had nothing to worry about. The announcements, the music, the demo room full of ROG goodness gave me the energy boost needed. First gadget to pop out of the ASUS oven: the VivoWatch SP.
For ASUS fans or wearable collectors, the first VivoWatch announced last year should ring a bell. Its sequel, the SP, has just been upgraded with medical-grade ECG and PPG sensors and ASUS is awaiting FDA certification to call it a proper medical device.
The company also added a Pulse O2 monitoring feature that keeps an eye on your oxygen saturation so that it can paint an accurate picture of your health. From that point forward, the smartwatch can determine your autonomic nervous system age and give you advice on a daily and long-term basis thanks to something called HealthAI.
If you’re equally interested in your activity progress as you are in your health stats, you’ll be happy to find out that VivoWatch SP does have a built-in altimeter and it’s waterproof up to 50 meters. Plus, it will keep records of your speed, distance, duration, pace and more in the HealthConnect app.
Working with a coach helps you commit to your goals but often, when you’re traveling, it’s hard to keep up with a set routine. This is why the pace coaching feature picked my interest since I can set up goals and get real-time vibration alerts when I exceed or fall behind that set pace.
Best of all? It will supposedly last two full weeks, 14 days, on a single charge. Expect it to retail this Q4.
Next on ASUS IFA 2019 list of announcements? The ProArt StudioBook One and PROB9:
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