Cherry Mobile G2 Watch Quick Review: Wearable for the Masses?

We quickly review the Cherry Mobile G2 watch!

by: Juan Loco

The just released Cherry Mobile G2 is an interesting proposition for first time smartwatch buyers. The main selling point really is that the watch syncs well with your phone and allows you to receive calls – and with the proper apps – different notifications for SMS, Facebook and Twitter.

Cherry Mobile G2 watch specs

• 1.44-Inch TFT Touchscreen Display (128 x 128 Pixels)
• Smartphone Dialer
• Bluetooth notification via Mediatek SmartDevice app
• Audio and Video Player
• 4GB Internal Storage (3.68 available)
• VGA Camera
• Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR
• Pedometer
• USB Mass Storage
• 500mAh Battery
• 228x38x15 mm @ 66 g
• Price: ?1,899.00

As far as overall construction go, the G2 is mostly made out of plastic. The strap neatly merges with the time piece, and appears to be non-replaceable. Thje USB charging port for the watch is hidden inside the strap, and tucks neatly when not in use. The downside is that the strap is non-replacable, so if you damage it, you can say goodbye to the watch. The port also allows you to transfer files to and from your PC.

The TFT display of the G2 is pretty average, though it does have fairly good contrast and adjustable brightness. You can change the watch face from analog to digital depending on your taste or mood. The touchscreen is responsive, and swiping from one menu to another is fairly smooth. We initially thought that there was no back button to get out of sub-menus, but we discovered that swiping down from the top takes you back out into the menu that you came from.

The G2 syncs with your smartphone, allowing you to access your phonebook, messages and contacts on the device itself. When someone calls, you can see the identity of the caller and you can opt to answer or reject them on the watch. One annoying thing that we found was that the audio for the call gets routed to the watch by default – we’re not really fans of talking to our watches in public so we hunted in the settings to see if we could turn this off. Sadly we weren’t able to find a setting to turn it off, though we did notice that you can actually take the call on your phone by selecting it on your phone’s display when someone is calling.

The G2 has a camera which can take pictures and record videos, though we doubt you’d be using the device for taking pics that you want to upload on Facebook or Instagram. The device does have sound recording and could be useful if you’re into that cloak and dagger stuff.

As a media player, the G2 can play videos, view images and play music that is either stored in the watch or synced on another device. For example, the device would be able to play the audio from your cellphone’s Google Play Music app. The watch allows you to switch tracks, without you having to bring out your cellphone. Speaking of music, the watch has 4GB of storage to put media files in, though we highly discourage watching movies on the tiny 1.4-inch display.

The speaker on the G2 is a bit weak. The audio settings go up to 16 but you still might need to bring the watch closer to your ear, something you may not want to do in public. The same can be said about the audio quality of the music player – sound is audible but it’s not the means by which you’d want to enjoy your music tracks.

There are other nice features such as a pedometer, call history, phone book, and a file manager. The tools menu shows your usual alarm, calculator and stop watch. There is a calendar but it doesn’t sync with your Google calendar.

Like we said at the start of this article, the main selling point of the G2 is its ability to sync well with your phone, allowing you to receive app notifications and read SMS, as well as receive calls and dial numbers of your contacts.

Randolph Novino of Pinoy Screencast pointed us to the Bluetooth nofication app called Mediatek SmartDevice which is downloadable from the Google Play Store. Once installed, the app will sync with the G2 via bluetooth. A notification will appear on your phone stating that the watch and phone are connected. Now open the MTK app to see the options on what sort of notifications you would want to receive on your watch. These range voice calls, SMS, Facebook notifications, Twitter mentions, and even notifications for games like Star Wars Commander.

All notifications will now appear on the Remote Notifier feature of the G2. The feature doesn’t segregate or organize the notifications so you will receive SMS side by side with Twitter mentions. It’s not really a drawback since the point of having the watch is to get alerted at once without you having to take out your phone.

The G2 tells time AND provides the convenience of receiving notifications and alerts on your wrist. Some folks go for that convenience. At a price of P1,899, the G2 is a good entry-level smartwatch for folks on the go who desire to constantly receive notifications from their phone.

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