The Adidas MID FX 38 digital watch
This watch is battery powered and uses a digital display to provide a 24 hour clock that provides the set time, day and lap time in a numeric combination. This watch is definitely aimed towards an individual with interest in sport activities, personally I could see a school gym teacher using this product to record lap times. The watch performs a number of tasks, the most obvious provide the time plus a chronograph, timer and alarm. Its general use is to provide the time on the move. There is no mention of water and shock resistance that would usually be stated on the product or in the manual. So I would say this product seems to be designed for common daily environments and not for any professional sport activity. The Adidas MID FX 38 uses relatively old technology and a combination of buttons to navigate and change the settings of the numeric state. I think this product has been visually designed with the audience in mind. It looks sporty with a split round bordered screen. Its made of rubber and plastic which complement each other. There are a number of buttons 5 in all, which also complement the design and give this watch quite an interesting visual appearance.
How ever when it comes down to using the buttons to interact with the settings, there is a sense that this product has been designed without being tested. The navigation to access the watches settings is somehow different from anything I have come across, and the provided instructions are hard to follow. Causing frustration when trying to perform a simple task, resulting in this product being very hard to use. The interface didn’t provide me with a familiar way of adjusting the time compared to a standard watch. Resulting in it being very hard to interactive with, this I believe is due to the mapping of the product itself. Even though the watches instructions are quite unclear they are very consistent in the way of being repeated through the use of one button that cycles through the watches functions.
This technique can bee seen a lot in interactive products, for example the I-POD’s functionality, physical and interface movement is built under the idea of cycling through a number of options to achieve the task.
The watches interface needs considerable redesign mainly on the idea of simplifying its existing state, to provide the user with a much more straight forward approach of adjusting the settings.
The users that would most likely find this product attractive to purchase being individuals interested or influenced by sports activities. The user should realistically be able to use this product with very little complication, as I could imagine an individual interested in sport wouldn’t be greatly interested in computers.
The system use of this product would be aimed towards a casual novice user, directly.
The idea of mastering this product could take some time and I’m not sure the audience of this product would spend hours fiddling with a watch. Selecting information from this product is very difficult as the instruction and mapping is very unclear, causing the user to easily get confused by the small lettered words printed on the display.
The GUI of this product is very limited besides the split screen that divides the numeric format. It provides a very straight forward display and mainly distinguishes priority of visibility by scale, for example the time hour and minute digits are significantly larger than the seconds, date and lap time.
The products functionality is complicated and very difficult to master. I believe editing the settings of this watch would quickly be forgotten, providing the task of referring back to the user manual in the future.
Changing the set time with The Adidas MID FX 38 digital watch
The Task - To adjust the time with the packaged instruction manual
Hold the watch upright
Press and hold S4 for 3 seconds, the display will light up for 3 seconds and the second digits will start flashing.
Use S3 to switch between the time year and date options.
Use S1 and S2 to move up and down in values.
Press S4 to return to time and calendar display.
The result being the adjusted time that has been currently set
(I had a problem with the actual instructions basically they didn’t work. This was due to the instruction manual being mapped unclear to the actual product its self, so I had to adjust them, I also get the impression the instructions have been translated)
What I think
Ok, ranting on a bit back there.
This watch doesn’t appeal to me as a user, mainly the reason being I like solid metal watches. There are a few little things I like about this product first of:
Its design as I just mentioned I like metal watches, I reckon this would be pretty catchy if it was in metal with the over sized obvious button sticking out in orange chrome.
Apart from that the setting controls are way complicated when compared to other watches.
I personally use the pull out and twist pin that allows me to adjust the time and date with an easy twist scrolling action. Other than the over all interactive performance I did notice two ways of moving through the setting preferences. Which I’m happy to keep for the redesign, these are the one way cycling through options and flashing what is being selected for adjusting.
How ever when it comes down to using the buttons to interact with the settings, there is a sense that this product has been designed without being tested. The navigation to access the watches settings is somehow different from anything I have come across, and the provided instructions are hard to follow. Causing frustration when trying to perform a simple task, resulting in this product being very hard to use. The interface didn’t provide me with a familiar way of adjusting the time compared to a standard watch. Resulting in it being very hard to interactive with, this I believe is due to the mapping of the product itself. Even though the watches instructions are quite unclear they are very consistent in the way of being repeated through the use of one button that cycles through the watches functions.
This technique can bee seen a lot in interactive products, for example the I-POD’s functionality, physical and interface movement is built under the idea of cycling through a number of options to achieve the task.
The watches interface needs considerable redesign mainly on the idea of simplifying its existing state, to provide the user with a much more straight forward approach of adjusting the settings.
The users that would most likely find this product attractive to purchase being individuals interested or influenced by sports activities. The user should realistically be able to use this product with very little complication, as I could imagine an individual interested in sport wouldn’t be greatly interested in computers.
The system use of this product would be aimed towards a casual novice user, directly.
The idea of mastering this product could take some time and I’m not sure the audience of this product would spend hours fiddling with a watch. Selecting information from this product is very difficult as the instruction and mapping is very unclear, causing the user to easily get confused by the small lettered words printed on the display.
The GUI of this product is very limited besides the split screen that divides the numeric format. It provides a very straight forward display and mainly distinguishes priority of visibility by scale, for example the time hour and minute digits are significantly larger than the seconds, date and lap time.
The products functionality is complicated and very difficult to master. I believe editing the settings of this watch would quickly be forgotten, providing the task of referring back to the user manual in the future.
Changing the set time with The Adidas MID FX 38 digital watch
The Task - To adjust the time with the packaged instruction manual
Hold the watch upright
Press and hold S4 for 3 seconds, the display will light up for 3 seconds and the second digits will start flashing.
Use S3 to switch between the time year and date options.
Use S1 and S2 to move up and down in values.
Press S4 to return to time and calendar display.
The result being the adjusted time that has been currently set
(I had a problem with the actual instructions basically they didn’t work. This was due to the instruction manual being mapped unclear to the actual product its self, so I had to adjust them, I also get the impression the instructions have been translated)
What I think
Ok, ranting on a bit back there.
This watch doesn’t appeal to me as a user, mainly the reason being I like solid metal watches. There are a few little things I like about this product first of:
Its design as I just mentioned I like metal watches, I reckon this would be pretty catchy if it was in metal with the over sized obvious button sticking out in orange chrome.
Apart from that the setting controls are way complicated when compared to other watches.
I personally use the pull out and twist pin that allows me to adjust the time and date with an easy twist scrolling action. Other than the over all interactive performance I did notice two ways of moving through the setting preferences. Which I’m happy to keep for the redesign, these are the one way cycling through options and flashing what is being selected for adjusting.
posted by John Robinson at 9:09 am
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