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Sunday, October 26, 2014

How to Force Update to Your Moto 360

Last week, Motorola issued an update for the Moto 360 smartwatch.  The update takes the software version up to 4.4W.2 and includes many updates and improvements.  The update will be rolling out in phases to all Moto 360 watches over time.  But if you are impatient like me, here's a method you can try to force an update to your phone.

What Does 4.4W.2 Update?  First, let's see what this update does.  According to Motorola, the 4.4W.2 update makes the following improvements:

-Smart Battery Saving - When your battery hits 15%, your Moto 360 will turn off ambient mode, so you don't have to remember to.

-Timely Time Checks - Moto 360 will synchronize the time with your phone more often to make sure it up to the minute.

-User Interface Tweaks - We observed with customers that there are many times where you want to use your Moto 360 as truly a classic watch-a beautiful way to see the time.  A new gesture now lets you see the full watch face without permanently dismissing a notification.  Just touch the top of a notification and swipe down.  You'll see the notification again when you have another high priority notification.

-Mood Lighting - Moto 360 will adjust to the lighting of the room while charging, so that it isn't too bright or too dark.

-Readying the wires for Bluetooth - There are a couple of under-the-head enhancements that will pave the way for connecting Bluetooth headsets to the watch.

-Bug Squashing - As usual, bugs are squashed to enhance the overall user experience.

How to Force an Update.

Here's how I was able to force the update to be pushed to my Moto 360.  While I cannot guarantee that this will work for everyone, it did work for me.

1.  Unpair Your 360 From Your Phone - To do this go to "Settings" on your phone.  Go to "Bluetooth," find your Moto 360, click on the arrows to the right and choose "unpair."  From what I can tell, this step is key to forcing the update.

2.  Uninstall Android Wear - Go to "Settings" on your phone, then go to "Apps" and find "Android Wear."  Then just "Uninstall" Android Wear.

3. Reset Watch - Go back to your watch and go to "Settings."  Choose "Reset" and go through the process of re-pairing your watch to your phone.  

4.  Install Wear - When your watch prompts you to Install Android Wear on your phone, make sure you do that and pair your Moto 360 to your phone.  It may take a while for this process to complete so be patient.

5.  Check For Update - Once the pairing is complete, go back to your phone's "Settings," go to "About," and click on "System updates."  

That's it.  It may take a few minutes to do this but this should force the update to be pushed to your watch.  Let me know if this works for you.