I know you've left 9 BARO. Can you update watch face for consolation?

[Egika]

@André-Faria Basically, I buy a watch and hopefully get what I pay for on a feature basis.
Everything that is added later on, is a gift for free and I don’t expect this to happen at all.

The bi-weekly feature update has been a marketing claim made by Hammerhead for their Karroo2, but not by Suunto for their watches.
At least I have not seen such a claim…

[zhang965]

Egika said in I know you’ve left 9 BARO. Can you update watch face for consolation?:

Basically, I buy a watch and hopefully get what I pay for on a feature basis.
Everything that is added later on, is a gift for free and I don’t expect this to happen at all

Are we living in 2023 or something similar?

[Egika]

@zhang965 so what?
Here’s what has been added to S9P since it had been launched.
All for free - but of course everyone is welcome to always expect more:

starting from June 20th, 2023
Strava live segments on the watch
Readability improvement through font color changes and backlight improvements

starting from November 30th, 2022
SuuntoPlusTM sport apps external device connections, e.g. Activelook and Core
SuuntoPlusTM sport apps can now store and show graphs in Suunto app
New Gravel cycling sport mode

starting from March 29th, 2022
SuuntoPlusTM Guides support (see more details here)
Wrist detection for heart rate measurement. The watch can detect whether it is on or off wrist and will not measure the heart rate if no wrist is detected. This functionality work both during exercising and daily activity tracking.

starting from January 27th, 2022
SuuntoPlusTM features are added to and removed from watch in Suunto app
Possibility to measure blood oxygen during sleep tracking
Possibility to start exercise from navigation view

starting from September 28th, 2021
Media controls on the watch
SuuntoPlusTM Burner shows the amount of fat and carbs burned during exercise
Send predefined replies to incoming messages from watch (Android only)
A new watch face
Improved sync speed with Suunto app

starting from June 10, 2021
Blood oxygen saturation spot measurement
SuuntoPlusTM Ghost runner
Snap to route running for accurate track, distance and pace
Tour battery mode for 170h of trekking with GPS
New watch face familiar from Suunto 3
Suunto app pairing and time sync as part of first use wizard
Raise to wake backlight
Padel added as new sport

[DMytro]

@Egika in principle I agree with you. But a company, in my opinion, has two choices: let the users create their own expectations or provide transparency.
For example, if I am a user who likes SW updates because they keep my watch feeling new, adding new functionality, etc - I am more likely to buy a watch that is supported longer. Now I can have a look at the products the company released in the past and notice that their last flagship was supported for several years and therefore assume that their current product will be supported about as long. If that was, at least partially, influential to my buying decision, I would be disappointed to realise that my watch has received only a few major updates before it became obsolete.
Notice, I’ve said “assume” intentionally, because if the company would make any claims as to how long it intends to support the said device, my assumptions might have been much more accurate. For example, one could state ‘the watch would be supported for at least 2 years, recieving 2-4 SW updates with features/stability per year and obtaining further functionality via SA for at least 3 year’. Number could be less or more, that doesn’t really matter. Likewise it must not meant that said device won’t be supported afterwards, just that this period is ‘guaranteed’. I would say that seeing this statement and looking at competition would help me make a better decision as a potential buyer. And in this way the company ‘channels’ buyers expectations regarding support instead of letting them have their own, perhaps unrealistic, expectations.

In principle, I agree with you saying that updates are just free extra. But regardless of it being true or not, if the company doesn’t meet users expectation, the user might buy their next product from a different brand instead of staying loyal, in addition perhaps creating a ‘bad reputation’.
Again, I don’t think it matters much, whether the reasons are valid or not, it’s rather whether the company is willing to prevent these kind of things by being more transparent or if it’s for one or another reason not on top of it’s priorities list (not saying that it necessarily should be).

[Egika]

@DMytro fully agree with you.
Now looking at the update history of for example S9P above, we see, that up to June 2023 it has been receiving updates and new features for around 2 years.
So from history, as you suggest, it makes sense to assume a 2 years update-flow.
There will always come the point, where economically it makes no sense to adapt things into old hardware - sometimes it might just be impossible. And it is probably not easy to predict what the situation will be in 2 years from now…

[DMytro]

@Egika for the people buying a new suunto now - yes. But for the people that were buying s9p, they’ve looked at s9B update cycle. In addition, update schedule became slightly more spread out in the times of s9p compared to s9B and even Spartans I think.

I guess, assuming 2 years is a safer option.

[TiagoSPM]

2 years? Is this reasonable? Or normal? In which world do you guys live? All that assumptions may have lots of coherence, but you seem to live floating in some kind of paralel reality and not on this earth with deep environment problems…

[freeheeler]

@TiagoSPM
no one forces customers to buy new watches after 2 years. the watches are still working.
the expectation obviously is that customers buy a product and get all the new features from successor devices even after couple of years and that is not guaranteed or self explanatory at all.
bug fixing yes, but every added feature that exceeds specs at release is a free gift from the company.

[DMytro]

@TiagoSPM I’m not saying 2 years is good or bad. I’m saying it would be nice to be transparent about the update duration, just like smartphone market currently does that.

[A Former User]

@Tieutieu said in I know you’ve left 9 BARO. Can you update watch face for consolation?:

@André-Faria still the S9P is a very good watch. The question could be : what update that could be pushed on it has not !?

Resources that work at 100%
Sleep tracking that work at 100%
Step counting that work at 100% and not when arms are moving
And Suunto knows this from first day otherwise they wouldn’t also have worked on new algos and implemented it in the race.

@Egika i totally agree with you.
And to be transparent, I am not complaining, I had the s9p ti when launched and sold it not long after.
I am sharing what is my vision of how a device that costs almost 700eur should be supported, and for sure Suunto has the right to not do as I would like, but I think it is useful for them to know that clients think it is not cool and go to other brands because of that (and other stuff).
As others said, when you buy a watch from a brand you see what they did in the past in terms of support, and in Suunto case the s9b was a good example, guess it didn’t last long.

And yes I know that other clients come to Suunto also

[Tieutieu]

@André-Faria I am with you on the points you mentioned. my thoughts were more about « functional » updates than « corrections ». Fully agree that such corrections should be delivered. But as I wrote, I still hope that such update could come.

[Egika]

@TiagoSPM said in I know you’ve left 9 BARO. Can you update watch face for consolation?:

2 years? Is this reasonable? Or normal? In which world do you guys live? All that assumptions may have lots of coherence, but you seem to live floating in some kind of paralel reality and not on this earth with deep environment problems…

Sorry, I don‘t get the environment problems reference in this context.
I think a 2 years period of adding new features to an existing watch is reasonable and I like it.
Anyway, it is not us who do the decisions about programming new firmware for existing devices. We are just exchanging personal views and expectations on this topic here. I understand, that others have different ones.
Now, that‘s probably it…

[TiagoSPM]

@Egika Yes, I understand we are all customers here, just discussing what each one think about Suunto decisions, well, this is part of the story. But as customers I think we should do more pressure on the topic: how long should we expect to last our watches (longer then they expect us to expect!) and not be some kind of dazzled consumers only thinking about new models, even if they are almost the same watch. And then the environment thing is: less and wise consuming of natural resources, as, despite how most of us live nowadays, this is a great problem of our time. So, back to the consolation topic: I don´t think that better investment on updates are bonus. They are a MUST for a company that propagates environment care as a plus. Maybe they decide to do a signature plan, so they can maintain their selves as a business, or something else. I don´t now. But I think this is priority. And stop launching new watches with almost nothing new!

[freeheeler]

@TiagoSPM
it’s not always up to companies, but also up to customers. do we really always need the latest stuff?
I think there is a demand for having AMOLED and of course some people like to operate their watches by a crown.
it’s the companies who develop and offer this kind of equipment to meet market requirements. but in terms of sustainability it’s also up to us to question ourselves: do I need it?

it’s not only a companies task to meet sustainability goals, but also customers. not only watches, also phones, cars, bikes, skis and not to forget functional clothing