If you thought Apple’s Watch asked for big dollars, think again, because luxury watch maker TAG now has something cool, but you’ll need a decent chunk of change if you want to play.
It may not have a local price or even expected availability date, but the first smartwatch from Swiss watch engineers TAG Heuer definitely has our attention, even though our wallets our crying.
You may have seen smartwatches before, but nothing is quite like this one, with the timepiece expertise of TAG being employed for a new watch called the TAG Heuer Connected Watch.
Inside, the watch relies on an Intel Atom processor sitting in the Z34XX family, with 4GB RAM paired to the processor, while Bluetooth and WiFi have been thrown in for connecting to your phone or tablet. We don’t quite know what the screen is yet, but we can tell you that Android Wear runs on the device, while the display is protected by sapphire crystal, making it very hard to scratch.
Water protection is also thrown in the watch, with TAG calling it IP67 certified, suggesting it will survive up to 30 minutes under water, and there are even physical controls like a real watch.
The casing looks to be particularly friendly to weight and durability, too, with titanium employed in its build.
We’ve seen Android Wear watches before, and with Huawei’s Watch and LG’s Urbane, the Google watch operating system is certainly making its way into more luxurious territories, but the TAG brings it to another level completely, because at $1500 USD, this thing is not cheap.
It will come with luxury watch faces, though, sporting the TAG designs on elegant and sporty watch faces complete with counters for sports and walking, as well as alarms, timers, and stopwatches.
“We are incredibly proud to be unveiling the first connected watch, which brings more than 150 years of history firmly into the future,” said Jean-Claude Biver, CEO of TAG Heuer.
“The TAG Heuer Connected watch gives you the means not only to connect to the future, but also to connect to eternity.”
That last word “eternity” isn’t just a suggestion that you’ll have it for a long time, but a point, because if you don’t like the Connected watch when its two year warranty is up, TAG will let you exchange it for a proper mechanical TAG Carrera watch to replace it for another $1500 USD. From what we understand, this is a discount from the original Carrera price, sort of like saying “you’ve tried a watch for the past two years and not liked it, so here, have a discounted mechanical watch”.
If that sounds like a good deal, make sure you’re good to go, because with a $1500 USD or €1350 Euro price, you will have to spend a fair amount of money to even try this thing out.
