The Cogito Classic: A connected watch for business

Do you want a watch that looks like a watch or one that looks like a leftover movie prop? I prefer the former. The Cogito Classic might just be the iconoclastic timepiece that doubles as your personal communications partner. On the surface, it looks like an analog watch. Hopefully you still remember how to tell time the old-fashioned way. For me the Cogito Classic is first a watch and second a notification system for email, phone calls, calendar events, and text messages.

My question, when I first encountered devices like the Cogito Classic, was "Can smartwatches be used for business?" Now that I've had a month or so to wear and use one, I'd have to say yes.

There's nothing quite as strong as the opinion of someone who's changed his mind about something. You might recall my having stated that I'm not a fan of wearables. I can't say that I'm 100 percent converted, but I'm convinced that there might be a place for them in business for the chronically connected user.

To get the watch to work, you have to connect it to your smartphone via Bluetooth and download the Connected app. I suggest you use the included QR code inside the front cover of the user manual for this.

And a word of warning, if your phone and watch go out of Bluetooth range of each other, the connection is broken and you have to reconnect (pair) them before the Cogito watch will deliver notifications again.

Problems, Undocumented Features, Issues:

There are problems with this device that I've experienced, however your experience might be different, but keep on the lookout for these things.

• There are two 2032 batteries inside the watch - one for analog function and one for notifications. The notifications one is on top. Keep a Nickel handy to remove the back and replace the notifications battery fairly often or to remove it and perform a hard reset.
• Pairing problems occur if your watch and phone get out of range of each other. You might have to perform a soft or a hard reset on the watch.
• The only way to interact with the watch is via the app. Your watch and your phone must interact through the Connected app.
• When you update the watch software, which happens pretty often, you have to unpair and forget the watch in your phone's Bluetooth settings.

Available Notifications:

• Incoming call (with Caller ID)
• Missed call
• Text
• Social Media
• Calendar Events
• Reminders
• Low or Critical Battery Power

One notable feature that I hope everyone uses is that you can mute your watch during meetings and conferences. Alert notifications give a gentle, short beep tone, but it's still annoying if a lot of these go off during a meeting or conference. You still get the notifications, but without the beep. Thanks in advance for using this feature.

The Connected app has one interesting feature that you might like: Activity monitor. Enter your gender, age, level of activity, height, and weight and allow the watch and app to work together to give you feedback on your level of activity. Just like your notifications, you can reset (wipe out) the data on demand.

Using the app, you can also set alarms for yourself that aren't tied to any other activity, calendar, or reminder.

To get the Cogito Classic to pop up alerts, you have to enable them in your phone's Notification Center. Sorry, this is skewed toward Apple products because I don't own an Android phone anymore and have no point of reference for you on those products.

For those of you who must be connected all the time, why not do it in style? The Cogito Classic is a nice watch with the added bonus of smart features. It's great for people who want to know what's going on, but not constantly staring into a phone screen. You can just glance down at your watch to see if you have messages or other notifications. It's handy. It's business-friendly and it's a boon to you who want to be on the leading edge of technology, but also don't want to spend a fortune doing it.

The Cogito Classic's modest $179.99 price tag puts it into the wearable market's "affordable" category for me. And hey, it's a cool-looking watch even if you never use its smart functions. I like its larger size, the silicone rubber band, the brushed steel face ring, and its analog timekeeping. I like it. It look business appropriate and would be at home on the golf course, at poolside, or in the conference room.

AboutCONNECTEDEVICE:CONNECTEDEVICE is a pioneer in the design, development and manufacture of digital lifestyle products and solutions -- technology that is both intelligent and intuitive, functional and fashion-forward. Creating one of the world's first smartwatches with the COOKOO and COGITO brands, their watches are now available in retail locations throughout the world.