A video showing a demo of the Apple Watch has appeared online, with the device’s startup process taking a lengthy 70 seconds before it then appears to struggle with both its home screen and apps.
The demo unit featured in the video is said to contain mostly the same internals as the hardware that will go on retail, though post-launch software optimization has already been confirmed by Apple. The startup time highlighted in the demo could be hindered by a few factors, including potentially sluggish demo software or it running a modified OS intended for in-store use only, which could lead to the device taking longer to boot.
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However, while many will argue that the Watch will rarely need to be restarted as the majority of users will likely leave it on charge overnight, a glaring issue with the tech highlighted in the video is the user’s struggles with its apps.
After the Watch finally reaches its home screen, the user selects the Weather app which, after taking a few seconds to load, promptly crashes. After this, the user swipes the screen in order to access another app, only for it to freeze for a few seconds.
Watch the video below:
While software optimization could lead to these issues being ironed out in the near future (though I can’t imagine its startup time being dramatically faster at launch than it is in this video), it’s still curious that Apple would feature demo kits in their stores that are blighted by such glaring issues, unless these demo kits are far closer to the retail version of the device than we’d hope.
