- Jun 16, 2007
- 3,102
- 24
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I bought a pair of Nabu X activity tracker wrist bands from the Razer store, they have a deal until the end of the month, buy one, get one free (2 for $50). So I have two.
I used to own a Fitbit Force, but returned it because I felt it was a bit overpriced for something that basically only counts steps. I liked having the Fitbit and having that activity awareness kinda pushing me to be more active. But something like that didn't seem to be worth more than $100. So initially I was pretty excited I could get a Nabu X for basically $25.
Here is my initial impression of the Nabu X after 1 day with a pair of them. I've been testing one with my iPhone 6 Plus and the other with my Note 4.
The hardware seems pretty nice. The activity tracker is basically a small plastic thing that slides into a nice rubber wrist band. It looks like the wrist bands should be replaceable and I think may come in other colors (I only saw black for sale, but saw pictures of a white band). The rubber feels comfortable, but say it's a dust magnet. So far neither of mine have collected much dust and it's super easy to wash them if needed. The clasp is fairly basic and easy to use (some activity tracker wrist bands seem to try to over engineer this part).
There are 3 lights on top that can light up in 3 different colors. These convey different messages. 3 solid flashing colors means a notification has come in, think red is for calls, green for messages, and blue for all other notifications. And double tapping the tracker will give 1 green light if you are less than 33% through your step goals, 2 lights for up to 66%, and 3 lights for up to 99% and I think three rainbow lights when you get 100%. You can change which goals you see when double tapping.
Sometimes I need to double tap it more than once to get a response. But it hasn't bothered me too much.
Unfortunately the fit hits the shan when it comes to the software. And I'm really hoping it's just a software problem causing all these issues that will be fixed in time...
The main app is the Nabu X Utility. This controls pairing of the Nabu with the phone and also seems to sync data from the tracker and share it with other apps. There is a Market place when you can install some other apps. That is where I got the Nabu Fitness app (also available directly from App Store or Google Play). When you install this app, it has to request authorization from the Nabu X Utility, which I assume is what allows them to talk and share the data.
Problems I've had though is the Fitness app often doesn't update or it's data is reset. I went hours yesterday without seeing it update any information. I also had problems where the Fitness app token became invalid and it had to re-request authorization from the Utility app. And even the Utility app a couple times would become unpaired with the wrist band and need to ask me to pair again.
Last night I did get one of the wrist bands to start working pretty well with the Fitness app after I reset the wrist band and removed it from my devices list in the Utility app, then added it back in. Then it appeared to be updating in real time for the first time. So today I'm trying to do the same thing with the second wrist band, but I'm again experiencing a lot of problems with the Fitness app losing it's authorization with the Utility app.
Most of my time has been spent using the iPhone 6. But I've experienced similar problems on the Note 4 as well. So neither platform seems to be working all that great.
While my Fitbit seemed too expensive, at least the software just worked. With the Nabu X, you are getting what seems to be pretty decent hardware, but a train wreck of a software experience. But hopefully Razer can get these syncing and authorization issues fixed, if so it might become a very good value.
I used to own a Fitbit Force, but returned it because I felt it was a bit overpriced for something that basically only counts steps. I liked having the Fitbit and having that activity awareness kinda pushing me to be more active. But something like that didn't seem to be worth more than $100. So initially I was pretty excited I could get a Nabu X for basically $25.
Here is my initial impression of the Nabu X after 1 day with a pair of them. I've been testing one with my iPhone 6 Plus and the other with my Note 4.
The hardware seems pretty nice. The activity tracker is basically a small plastic thing that slides into a nice rubber wrist band. It looks like the wrist bands should be replaceable and I think may come in other colors (I only saw black for sale, but saw pictures of a white band). The rubber feels comfortable, but say it's a dust magnet. So far neither of mine have collected much dust and it's super easy to wash them if needed. The clasp is fairly basic and easy to use (some activity tracker wrist bands seem to try to over engineer this part).
There are 3 lights on top that can light up in 3 different colors. These convey different messages. 3 solid flashing colors means a notification has come in, think red is for calls, green for messages, and blue for all other notifications. And double tapping the tracker will give 1 green light if you are less than 33% through your step goals, 2 lights for up to 66%, and 3 lights for up to 99% and I think three rainbow lights when you get 100%. You can change which goals you see when double tapping.
Sometimes I need to double tap it more than once to get a response. But it hasn't bothered me too much.
Unfortunately the fit hits the shan when it comes to the software. And I'm really hoping it's just a software problem causing all these issues that will be fixed in time...
The main app is the Nabu X Utility. This controls pairing of the Nabu with the phone and also seems to sync data from the tracker and share it with other apps. There is a Market place when you can install some other apps. That is where I got the Nabu Fitness app (also available directly from App Store or Google Play). When you install this app, it has to request authorization from the Nabu X Utility, which I assume is what allows them to talk and share the data.
Problems I've had though is the Fitness app often doesn't update or it's data is reset. I went hours yesterday without seeing it update any information. I also had problems where the Fitness app token became invalid and it had to re-request authorization from the Utility app. And even the Utility app a couple times would become unpaired with the wrist band and need to ask me to pair again.
Last night I did get one of the wrist bands to start working pretty well with the Fitness app after I reset the wrist band and removed it from my devices list in the Utility app, then added it back in. Then it appeared to be updating in real time for the first time. So today I'm trying to do the same thing with the second wrist band, but I'm again experiencing a lot of problems with the Fitness app losing it's authorization with the Utility app.
Most of my time has been spent using the iPhone 6. But I've experienced similar problems on the Note 4 as well. So neither platform seems to be working all that great.
While my Fitbit seemed too expensive, at least the software just worked. With the Nabu X, you are getting what seems to be pretty decent hardware, but a train wreck of a software experience. But hopefully Razer can get these syncing and authorization issues fixed, if so it might become a very good value.
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