I’m one of the many people who stopped wearing a watch years ago in favour of a smartphone, and I’ve found it surprisingly pleasant to be able to glance at my wrist when I want to find out the time. Naturally, the SmartBand Talk also serves as a watch, and the big advantage it holds over Android Wear devices, such as Sony’s SmartWatch 3, is that it’s so slim and light. Sony SmartBand Talk review: it tells the time, too

Does it really matter that you’ve done 7,600 steps and not 7,800? Hopefully accuracy will improve as updates continue to arrive – Sony has added the sleep monitoring since its initial release, for instance – and I’m also intrigued to see how Sony will take advantage of the built-in altimeter, which at the moment appears to have no use. And to an extent there’s nothing wrong with that. This is why you should treat any information presented by the SWR30 as a rough guide, not a definitive report. For instance, during a half-hour conversation where I may have got a little carried away with arm movements to demonstrate my point, the SWR30 added more than 200 steps to my daily total. When it comes to the pedometer, however, be warned that a sensor hanging from your wrist can be easily misled. The SmartBand Talk also tracks how long you walk for, a handy feature if you want to set yourself a goal of being on your feet for a certain amount of time per day. On average, it only tracked around two-thirds of the time – so on a 45-minute run it would indicate I’d been running for only 30 minutes. To be fair, it did usually correct this when it next synchronised with my phone, but it’s odd that it needs to.

It’s supposed to be able to tell when you set off at a run, rather than your normal, sedate amble, but the SWR30 fails abysmally on its own. I’m less impressed by the reliability of the running tracker. Sony SmartBand Talk review: pedometer and fitness functions

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