Overall, I am very happy with this purchase. I find that I use the camera more often than the phone camera for quick shots, though one must take care to ensure the window remains free of "finger grease" or the image will be blurry. When an email comes in (from any account the phone is configured for), you get the notification and can view a preview. Photos do not display, but all of the text is there. You can not reply to an email from the watch. When an text message comes in, you get the notification and can view the message. Again, photos do not display, but all of the text is there. You can reply to text messages using pre-configured templates. The Galaxy Gear app comes with some basic templates, but you can add whatever you'd like. You can also use the text templates to respond to phone calls that you decide to not answer... simply swipe "ignore" and then if you'd like, send a template message, such as "I'm in a meeting" or "I'm driving" The watch has a speakerphone built in, but use of the speaker (for phone or music) really hammers the battery. The watch has limited memory for music, but the speaker quality just isn't "there" and given that you are going to have your smartphone with you, I don't see the need to duplicate the music player in the watch. There are precious few apps available, and functionality is not 100%. I was happy to see clock face apps available that had a second hand, but upon using them, I found that my battery life was horrible, and the display would revert to the basic Samsung screen at least once a day. I just leave it at the clock/weather screen now. Another 3rd party app that I find very useful allows you to toggle various functions on the phone, such as very easily mute it for a movie, nice dinner, or a meeting (the watch will still vibrate), and the "sleep monitoring" mode, while it only logs the time it was in sleep mode and the watch motionless, when it is in sleep mode it puts the watch into block mode so it does not vibrate or light up the screen when an email or text comes in... it does activate when your alarm goes off, and as a lazy bum who frequently hits the snooze button or sleeps through his alarm, this watch has done a very good job of getting me out of bed at 4:30. Battery life, when running the standard clock face, is as advertised. Samsung claims 3 days, and I've done 3 days a couple of times now that the "newness" has worn off, but in general, I charge it every evening, though most evenings it is well above 50% when I connect it. Preloaded apps include the IR remote control also found in Samsung phones and tablets. I have not configured or tested it, as I use the Harmony remote.

This smart watch does it all. I especially like being able to use the voice command to take photos, take phone calls and it logs my steps. I get all my notifications, heart rate and music. It's such a joy being able to move around without my phone and still keep in touch. The clasp assures me that I won't lose my watch.

This is a great $300 notification device. It comes equipped with a rarely used camera that takes excellent pictures but truly has no apparent use. As for being a hands free device while driving first you need to ensure that the Svoice app has been activated and insure that you properly pronounce commands correctly.

I chose this above Samsung's newest offering because it has a camera, which I use frequently at work for photographing parts, but it's greatest convenience is the display of notifications, allowing me to check their importance at a glance. This way, my hands stay busy as I don't have to check my phone every time some memo passes through the company email system. I also no longer miss text messages from my wife when I am out on the shop floor where it is extremely noisy. After installing the GEAR app on my Samsung phone and then pairing it with the Gear 2 Watch, (this smart watch only works with Samsung phones), the device works flawlessly, and surprisingly remains linked up to 50 feet away (through clear air; walls shorten the range a lot). I especially like its ability to place a call and become a speaker-phone, which works really well. People on the other end say it sounds good, and its while its speaker isn't terribly loud, it is more than comfortable enough to hear in a normal environment (the speaker tickles my wrist when the other party speaks. Naturally, battery life varies depending on how much the device is used, and which features are accessed; for me, under "normal" use (a day of typical notifications, plus 10 minutes of speakerphone use, plus 5 photos, and maybe 60 seconds of video recording), I arrive home to find roughly 80% remaining, so I guess three days is a reasonable expectation on a charge. It charges fairly fast when using its included charger (I've topped it off from 73% in around 90 minutes), but more slowly using a common PC USB port. All in all, I am very satisfied with this product.

I read a bunch of reviews with both positive and negative feedbacks regarding the gear 2 and here's my review. First the good, battery life is decent. I always get a minimum of 3days of life before i have to recharge it. Of course this is all depending on how much you use it I.E. playing games and such. Charging is usually complete within an hour on a dead battery. Having the feature to ping your phone if you misplaced is also nice. There are countless customizations for the clock including design and background color or you can chose to put a photo as a background. Theres a sleep mode on the watch that works really well. When in sleep mode the screen is turned off and will monitor how long it was in sleep mode and how many of those hours you were actually asleep (motionless). The real time updates are a nice feature. Every morning i woke up it would tell me my travel time to work. And surprisingly enough it was fairly accurate. It went as far as to tell me if there were accidents on my route. Of course you have to be linked up to Google+ to use this feature. The watch has a built in speaker so you can make calls from your watch. At first i thought call quality would be garbage and that i would have to hold the watch to my mouth when talking and look like a weirdo but that was not the case. Call quality was actually very decent. I would be driving and have my hands on the steering wheel and i was understood clearly when talking. The price tag of $300 has alot of people on the fence. This is my take on the price. I love wearing watches and watches are not cheap in general. I own fossil and citizen watches and they generally cost $400 so buying a watch that did a whole lot more then tell time was a no brainer for me. The features are almost endless and would take to long to go through them all. Some of the downfalls of the watch that i noticed were for one poor picture quality from the camera. The only nice feature of the camera is any video or picture taken is automatically saved on your phone. Also the watch uses uses tizen for app management. What this means is you cant use Google app store to add apps to your phone. The apps samsung provides arent horrible but there not great either. I dont really find this a big issue seeing as how the phone does alot already. Everyone once and awhile it would crash and shut off but it would happen maybe once every 2 months or so. Not really that big of an issue. Over all this is a great buy no matter what your plans are. If your into working out this is perfect cause it tracks your heart rate,steps,and calories burned and stores it on your phone. It also allows you to scroll through your music without touching your phone. If your just an everyday go to work and come home kind of person then this is great for you too. With traffic updates to and from work. Sleep pattern analysis so this way you can adjust your sleeping for big meetings or projects you may have. And news and financial updates. This watch will adjust to whatever lifestyle you have. Its alot to take in so dont get discouraged or overwhelmed if you buy one. It takes a little bit to get used to. Also very important make sure you buy the warranty. I have owned my watch for 3months with no problems but remember its an electronic and with electronics there are never any guarantees.