Apple Watch S9/Ultra 2 Hands-on S9 SiP Enhanced, More Diverse Gameplay

'Apple Watch S9/Ultra 2 Hands-on with S9 SiP Enhanced, Diverse Gameplay'

At the 2014 Apple Autumn Conference, the Apple Watch product line officially met with consumers. In the nine years since its debut, it has become the best companion for many people’s outfits and a “health steward” on many people’s wrists, allowing each user to achieve a better lifestyle through the Apple Watch.

Apple Watch

While constantly iterating, the Apple Watch has also become more perfect, including the SE, digital series, and Ultra, and has already built a relatively stable user base. So, what upgrades do the new Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 bring us this time?

In recent years, the updates to the Apple Watch have gradually slowed down. This year, the new Apple Watch Series 9 has not changed in terms of appearance. The 41mm and 45mm cases, paired with aluminum and stainless steel materials, maintain the same design style as before.

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Apple Watch Series 9

In terms of color matching, the aluminum Apple Watch comes in versions such as Midnight, Starlight, Silver, and Pink, with Pink being the new color for the Apple Watch Series 9. Among these colors, I personally prefer Midnight and Starlight, which look more versatile and can be well matched with different watch bands. As for the stainless steel version, it comes in Silver, Gold, and Graphite, which are also familiar to us.

This year, Apple has also prepared a large number of new watch bands for the Apple Watch. One of the more interesting ones is the newly launched “woven twill” watch band, which contains 68% post-consumer recycled materials and has a subtle sheen and suede-like texture. In the Nike sport bands, colorful flecks are added to create a sense of layers. Moreover, at least 32% of the entire Nike band is made of recycled fluoroelastomer, and the flecks contain at least 66% recycled fluoroelastomer, making it a more environmentally friendly watch band.

Multiple new Apple Watch straps

The upgrade point of the Apple Watch Series 9 is still the internal chip. It is equipped with the new S9 SiP chip, which has 5.6 billion transistors, 60% more than the Series 8. In addition, this chip has a 30% improvement in GPU performance and a built-in 4-core neural network engine, which can double the speed of machine learning.

In terms of basic parameters, the performance improvement of the new chip mainly focuses on two aspects: graphics performance (GPU) and machine learning performance. When watchOS 10 was released, we saw a lot of new animations in the new system, and many physical buttons have added a lot of frosted glass effects. These more elegant animations have higher requirements for graphics performance. Therefore, the combination of Apple Watch Series 9 and watchOS 10 is currently the most perfect combination of software and hardware.

As for the improvement of machine learning performance, it mainly focuses on Siri and gesture operation. In Apple Watch Series 9, Apple has brought the ability for Siri to handle information locally, without the need for internet connection. In addition, Apple has also introduced the “pinch gesture” operation, which is based on the powerful NPU of the S9 SiP.

Pinch Gesture

I tested the pinch gesture with Apple Watch Ultra 2 (both Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 support it). It can successfully replace some previous tap and short swipe operations, making it particularly useful in situations where Apple Watch cannot be used with both hands. In addition, since this feature is efficiently computed by the NPU, it does not affect battery life.

In addition, Apple Watch Series 9 is equipped with the second-generation ultra-wideband technology chip. The addition of this chip allows the S9 to connect more closely with other devices within the Apple ecosystem. You can use it with HomePod to play content, or quickly locate the specific location of the iPhone on the watch.

In addition to internal updates, the screen of Apple Watch Series 9 has also been upgraded. Its screen brightness reaches a maximum of 2000 nits, which is equivalent to the screen brightness when watching HDR content on the iPhone, ensuring clear details on the screen even in bright outdoor environments.

Last year, Apple introduced the new Ultra version for Apple Watch, which seems to be a watch specifically designed for outdoor and extreme sports enthusiasts compared to the standard digital series. However, after using it in practice, I found that the Apple Watch Ultra is also good for daily use because it has the longest battery life in the Apple Watch family. “Up to 36 hours” and “up to 72 hours in low power mode”. When the Apple Watch doesn’t need to be charged every day, I can say goodbye to battery anxiety and also say goodbye to the magnetic charging cable during short weekend trips.

Apple Watch Ultra 2

In the second generation of Ultra, the all-new Apple Watch Ultra 2 has all the functions of the S9, including the S9 SiP chip, dual-finger touch operation, and on-device Siri. In terms of internal chip-level experience, the Apple Watch Ultra 2 is basically the same as the S9. However, based on its large screen and long battery life, the second-generation Apple Watch Ultra 2 also has many unique highlights.

This time, the screen brightness of Apple Watch Ultra 2 can reach up to 3000 nits. Such screen brightness not only allows us to see the screen content clearly under the glaring sunlight outdoors, but even after wearing UV-resistant sunglasses, we can still see the numbers displayed on the screen. In addition, Apple Watch Ultra 2 also has a brand-new watch face that uses the outer ring of the screen to directly display dynamic information such as altitude, depth, or seconds, making full use of all the space of the largest watch face.

Apple Watch Ultra 2

Another detail worth mentioning is that the new Apple Watch Ultra 2 can automatically activate the night mode depending on the environment. When we are in a movie theater or outdoors at night, the screen content of Apple Watch Ultra 2 can automatically turn red, allowing us to see the displayed content clearly without being too bright.

Today, Apple Watch has become an indispensable part of the Apple ecosystem and has matured significantly through various iterations. Although this year’s Apple Watch has not made any changes in terms of its appearance, the new features such as “pinch with two fingers” achieved through the integration of software and hardware, as well as the comprehensive upgrade of UI design and functionality in watchOS 10, make Apple Watch even more user-friendly.

Of course, I am also looking forward to the upgrade of Apple Watch next year. When the Apple Watch celebrates its tenth anniversary, let’s wait and see what improvements this wrist assistant will bring.

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