Dial review: Six months with will.i.am's 'smart cuff' wrist computer

Some gadgets get better with age. New operating software arrives as if by magic to provide extra features, sort glitches and even sometimes enhance battery life, for instance.

The musician will.i.am earlier this year released what he calls a smart cuff. I tried it out when it was in its final stages before release in the Spring.

I’m still using it now and it’s transformed out of all recognition. It’s called the dial and it’s proving to be a canny little device, especially if you like music.

Unlike most wearable devices, the dial has a sim card inside it, so you don’t need a smartphone alongside it, unlike the Apple Watch, for instance.

I wouldn’t recommend ditching your phone altogether – though you can make and receive calls on the dial, if you really must, or via the funky Bluetooth headphones which come supplied. Also, though you can read an email on the cuff’s small screen (it measures 1.63 inches), composing a reply is easier on a bigger touchscreen.

To be clear, there is a touch-sensitive keyboard on the dial’s screen but it’s pretty small. I have typed several text messages on it and the best approach is to place your finger extremely carefully on the letter you’re after. It’s certainly possible but it’s not comfortable for any length of time.

Still, there’s a row of predicted words to choose from which speeds things up and, better, a microphone so you can dictate your message.

But the dial is nothing if not versatile. Speaking to it invokes Aneeda, a voice-activated personal assistant. Aneeda speaks with a cut-glass British accent but her dialogue is quite transatlantic. The result is quite appealing, if a little jarring. Request that Aneeda plays music by Adele and she’ll reply, “I be rockin’ them beats”. Ask her to play music and she’ll ask “What kind of stuff you wanna hear?”

Music works tremendously on the dial, not least because when you buy it, it comes with a mobile contract from Three. This is important because the tariff includes a free subscription to the i.am+ music service. Since that costs £9.99 from Spotify or Apple Music, this is not to be sniffed at.

What’s more, that data usage of streaming music on the dial is also included in the tariff, as long as you’re streaming it in the UK. Tariffs start at £23 a month, with an upfront cost of £49 for the dial. Note that you can buy the dial on pay-as-you-go but the upfront cost jumps to £359.99.

There’s an extensive library of music though as with other services, some black spots. Don’t, whatever you do, ask Aneeda to play Send in the Clowns as the two versions offered, including one by Bryan Ferry, are astonishingly bad. It’s a small point – I can’t see Stephen Sondheim rockin’ them beats on a dial.

Music playback through the headphones sounds great and the cans are cleverly designed so that when you take them off they can hang round your neck – a magnet snaps them together.

The dial has GPS built in, and it can give you walking, driving and public transport directions easily – the mapping information comes from the excellent Here Maps.

I found that I only wanted to use Maps sparingly because GPS canes the battery, as it does on every smartphone. i.am+ knows this because it makes you go into settings to turn the GPS on each time. That’s fine, but I’d have liked to have been able to ask Aneeda to turn it on and off rather than my having to dive into the settings menu.

Battery life, by the way, has got better and better. In the early days I found that if I was in a poor signal area, the battery didn’t last long. But in high-signal areas like cities for instance, it lasts almost a full day, even with a decent amount of music streaming.

The battery for the dial is cunningly all in the back half of the cuff, so it’s easy to unclip and replace with a spare if you do run low. Obviously it would be better if the battery lasted longer but it’s not bad.

One area which really could be improved is the time it takes for the display to activate when you raise your wrist. When you do, the screen stays blank for around two seconds, by which time you presume your wrist twist wasn’t registered and start doing the whole manoeuvre again. As you turn the dial away from you to restart the process, the screen invariably illuminates.

Of course, when you’re used to it you know what to expect but compared to rivals like the Apple Watch this is way too slow. And with other watches, like the Samsung Gear S3 having the time displayed constantly, it makes the dial look less inviting.

There are other limitations. Although the dial is very good at setting an alarm, it won’t yet set a timer – which is particularly handy if you’re cooking, say and don’t want to get oily fingers on your smartphone. I’m told this feature will follow.

The Aneeda voice operating system is pretty slick and even has some capabilities when it comes to follow-up questions. It’s up to date, able to read me news stories when I asked “What’s the latest on Brexit?”

The dial also has features rarely found on other gadgets, such as a camera designed for selfies.

Smart watches and devices like the dial are becoming more popular. With new models just released or in the offing from Samsung and Apple, the dial needs to find its niche before it can find its feet (or wrist perhaps).

I’d say that the classy Bluetooth headphones and the clever music-encompassing tariff from Three may be the ways for the dial to succeed.