I've heard complaints that it doesn't accurately monitor your sleep cycles because it uses an accelerometer which obviously doesn't work if you don't move enough.
There is a product called Zeo that supposedly detects your brainwaves but then people complain about having to wear a strap on your head. http://www.myzeo.com/
Anyone want to share their experience with these sleep aids?
I bought the Zeo a couple months back based on reading about here on HN.
What a huge difference in the morning! I used to be the kind of person that needed a 20 min hot shower to properly wake up. Now I wake up mostly alert and almost never groggy.
I noticed the change most this week since I flew to Philly for Thanksgiving with family and don't have my Zeo. The last few mornings without it have been hit or miss.
The pretty graphs and statistics were interesting for the first couple weeks, especially to compare how alcohol and caffeine affect my sleep, but the novelty wears off. The smart wakeup is by far the best feature and if the Wakemate can do a similar job, it'll be a cheaper solution that I can take on the road.
My father and I both enthusiastically tried the sleeptracker when it first came out. I am horrible for waking up in the morning, and this did not help one bit.
The article asks why they did not put the alarm in the watch - the sleeptracker chooses that exact strategy and it did not work well for either of us. One, the alarm was not that loud (probably cannot be that loud in such a design). Two, if you had your wrist under your pillow it was inaudible. And three, the alarm is trivially accessible and easy to turn off - not a good thing for an inventive and persistent snooze buttoner like myself.
The product was a huge disappointment to the both of us. The price point and design for this product are encouraging - I will probably try it out.
I've used the zeo for a while. Love it, but in the end I move the headband off my head in my sleep (active sleeper) and would wake up with no data 1/3 of the time. That is frustrating. From what I read this is true for about 10% of users.
As far as the Zeo goes, it is a great product. Very interesting future (there are some obvious 'this is a first release' flaws) but overall, it rocks. Knowing to the minute how much you slept with REM and deep sleep markers is quite interesting and fun.
I've got an extra in Boulder if anyone wants to try it out.
which obviously doesn't work if you don't move enough.
That's interesting, because I suspect I may be one of those. Any idea how many people have that problem and if I can determine upfront whether this product will work for me?
Well seeing how it was mentioned all over the media like Dr. Phil, 37 Signals, and Wired, Associated Press, G4TV, etc... I would say it is far more ubiquitous than the zeo.
I've heard complaints that it doesn't accurately monitor your sleep cycles because it uses an accelerometer which obviously doesn't work if you don't move enough.
There is a product called Zeo that supposedly detects your brainwaves but then people complain about having to wear a strap on your head. http://www.myzeo.com/
Anyone want to share their experience with these sleep aids?