The Jawbone UP was the quantified human’s favorite device. The pedometer/silent alarm/sleep sensor was a rubber bracelet that just sat there – you didn’t have to do much except charge it every few weeks – and it would report all of your vital statistics back to your phone so you could become a better you.
Well, that utopian vision came to a crashing end when users discovered that the UP couldn’t hold a charge. Almost a year later the UP is back with a new design and, more important, new innards to ensure worry-free performance.
The UP is surprisingly feature-rich and allows you to sense your body motion as well as register the things you eat and other exercises you perform using the included iPhone app. You can even register your mood using the app. Jawbone also built-in recommendations and a “food cloud” for those striving to be particularly fit including little notifications that remind you that you tend to exercise more in different cities and that you tend to eat one type of food every day.
More important, however, is that the company rebuilt the inside of the device, locking down the internals and performing a number of water-fastness and rough handling tests on the prototypes. This should prevent the device from shorting out and failing.
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The UP is shipping today for $129. It comes in three sizes and eight colors including “onyx,” “hunter green,” and so-called “orange.” Users who bought the original UP won’t get a discount – they already should have gotten $100 back – but rest assured this one looks a bit better on the inside than the janky original.
