First and foremost, disclosure that I have switched from Windows PC to Mac OS X 10 years ago and never looked back. I do have Win7 installed on my Mac to be compatible with some clients for work but its via virtualization.
Additionally, after struggling with various vendors' wifi networking gear, including range extender at home (read: I don't have an IT personnel to make sure its working at my house, and I am not an IT person), I changed all network gear to Apple's. In all, we are all Apple house, including iPhone, iPad, Macs and AppleTV, not to mention fair amount of AAPL stocks.
We are all Apple house because it requires no IT expertise and it simply works by plugging in. Reliability is near 100% and it all works together without any complications. Could I have gotten PC equivalents for less cost - yes. Would I have struggled and get frustrated by it- yes and have been there. We were all PC house 10 years ago (Dell, HP and then IBM desktop and laptops using XP, and countless networking gear from all the usual vendors). So its not all marketing and branding as some would suggest. Those who do, probably have not experienced Apple ecosystem or that they are proficient in IT and they are willing to work with it to make it operable.
I do own and like Band and have no intent to change to Apple Watch - at least not now. My reason is simple. I just like regular watch better and not ready to replace it. So I wear watch on my left and Band on right.
With that said...
Who is abandoning their Band for the Apple watch or like me who tried for months to get a band and finally said the heck with them and ordered the Watch.
Abandoning is probably the wrong word choice here. Who is changing to, for whatever reason...
So you're willing to spend $200 more for a name? It's completely locked down (as is the entire Apple ecosystem), has a shorter battery life and early models are very glitchy? .......Either they have a very good advertising department or people are just that naive and stupid.
I hope I'm not that naive or stupid but perhaps I am. I rather not spend the time working to connect and make all the other devices trying to work together. I rather pay more to have things work out of the box and stay working than having to make it work all the time, like I've done in the past.
As for $200 more for AW, actually, I would get the large stainless steel version with Milanese bracelet so it would be about $750 or $550 more. But I'm not buying AW because its bit too ugly for my taste.
If Apple products were really as good as their marketing we'd have a real problem
Why? Do you not like good things???
........Whilst both devices are wearable, the Apple watch is a fashion item, whose functionality includes a watch, amongst other things and cannot function without an iPhone. The Band is first and foremost a fitness product, designed to work cross-platform and connect to Microsoft's Health platform, with or without a Windows Phone or indeed, any phone.................and I'd most likely keep my watch on too.
Apple would disagree with your statement. They have hired and is focused on medical experts to work on AW. Their iOS Healthkit app is far further along than MS Health. Take a look and come to your own conclusions.
As for not being able to do anything without iPh, not true. ApplePay, music, health monitoring and so on all work without having iPh present. Yes it requires iPhone to be fully functional and use other features, as well as collect data but its not required that you carry your phone with you all the time.
I'd looked into it for my wife (she actually likes it) but she uses her work-provided BB phone and does not want to carry 2 phones (I totally agree).
As for being a fashion item, isn't everything we wear have some fashion aspect to it...
Apple watch currently has no independent apps. It has to be tethered to an iPhone. Without an iPhone, the Apple Watch is useless currently. The Apple Watch it NOT compatible with Windows or Android. So, why are we talking about this here? This thread is an iMore topic.
When it releases on 4/24, its been reported that there are over 1000 independent apps already. Again, it is not useless without out iPh as one would lead you to believe.
Not intended to be compatible with Win or Android phones - its not their approach. So it probably is a deal breaker without an iPhone.