Your flesh is weak to smartwatch rumours, so give in and drink the juice Microsoft is pouring for you. Today, there’s a sweet cup of Windows 8-loving smartwatch to ingest as The Verge reports on new developments from camp Microsoft. Could you handle a smartwatch running Surface on it? Microsoft thinks you can.
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According to the rumour-mill, the prototype smartwatch has been shifted over to team Surface. This is a step in a positive direction as previous smartwatch rumours pointed to a watch that would interact with Kinect, akin to the Nike+ Fuelband. But that fizzled and died – in its place is a proper smartwatch which Microsoft will possibly even push out before Apple’s “iWatch”.
Adding another log to the fire is Amongtech which says that Microsoft has begun placing orders for 1.5-inch screens as well as a series of removable wristbands in blue, red, yellow, black, white and gray. Both these sites outright confirm (a pretty dangerous gamble) the watch, as well as the Oxynitride Aluminum casing which will house the internal wizardry. Oxynitride Aluminum is said to be a translucent aluminium which is “three times stronger than glass” and “expensive”.
Other rumours include 6GB storage and LTE, which is a damn sight easier to swallow than a Bluetooth/NFC smartwatch that relies on a smartphone to think for it. The Surface smartwatch is also said to run a heavily modified version of Windows 8 as the focus is interconnectivity with other Microsoft devices. A smartwatch that interacts with the Xbox One might not be such a bad idea in hindsight…
Here’s the deal then: Microsoft will most likely co-include the release of a smartwatch, if it even exists, with the launch of the Xbox One (coming late November 2013) as it attempts to unify phone, PC, laptop, tablet, console and watch into one. You could become a walking, talking, thinking, breathing personification of the Microsoft dream. For us, that’s one step away from Microsoft cranial implants but hey, nothing stops the march of progress.
