Originally Posted by
TheTrevor
I've been watching for SM issues carefully across various forums. The main complaint seems to be excessively sensitive buttons resulting in screwed-up settings if you let it bounce around loose in a range bag pocket -- to me, this indicates that the inexpensive case accessory offered for the SM is a good idea.
I haven't seen any reports of DOA or field-failed units, but the installed base of devices are all relatively new and, at a guess, not especially numerous yet. The fact that it's worn on the wrist instead of clipped to the belt seems likely to do good things for longevity.
Now that they have the Mac updater out, I'm going to order one with the assumption (sigh) that an iOS app to dump data from the SM will be along at some point this year. (I don't really want to drag an expensive MBP out to the range and matches to collect data between strings.) I won't know for sure unless I take one apart, but I think it's likely that the SM borrows a lot of off-the-shelf tech from mobile devices, which means the electronics and display are likely to be pretty robust. If there's going to be a failure, it's going to either be environmental (water intrusion killing the electronics) or something going wrong with the microphone or speaker.
ETA: as an experienced early adopter, I also consider it a very good sign that the folks at DAA are actively engaged with their customer base and soliciting feedback & input. It speaks well of DAA that they are showing up anywhere people are talking about the SM and answering questions.