 Hey, I'm Blaire with The Verge. We're here at CES 2014 in Las Vegas, and we're taking a look at the second generation Pebble Smartwatch. This is called the Pebble Steel, and it's made out of stainless steel. It has two versions. One has a genuine leather strap. The other has a stainless steel strap. Actually, both straps come in the box. The choices that you have are between a matte black version and a brushed stainless version. The price for this will be $249. It's $100 more expensive than the original Pebble Smartwatch, but you do get a few upgrades to justify that. First is obviously the construction. Also, you have a much reduced size in terms of lug-to-lug distance, so in terms of height of the watch. It's quite a bit more stylish. They've employed a few of the design techniques that you see with more classical watches. It doesn't look quite as aggressively modern as the original Pebble. It doesn't look as sporty as that device. It uses Gorilla Glass, Corning Gorilla Glass on the front. It is still waterproof as before. It's the same screen size, same display technology. Pebble has actually made a big point of keeping the device platform the same as with the original device in order to avoid fragmentation for app developers. Now, the big appeal with this, aside from being a watch, obviously, is the app framework and the things that you can do with it. For example, the Pandora app over here, it can control the music on your iPhone. You can start playback like so. If you hold the button down, you can change the different radios. Another example is the Foursquare app. You can come to this app and actually check in directly from the watch. You never have to take the phone out of your pocket. Pebble makes a big point out of helping app developers develop specifically for the Pebble, for the watch. It now has a new JavaScript API with a new OS 2.0 version of the software, which makes it easier for app developers to make apps just for the watch and make it a bit more agnostic, whether you have an iPhone or you have an Android device. The second version of the OS is noticeably faster. That's the first thing we noticed when we picked up the new watch, noticeably faster than the original. In terms of comparing the two devices, the look and the feel of the new one definitely feels higher-end, more premium. Feels quite good on the wrist. The reduced size is noticeable. In terms of weight, they don't seem to be any different. In terms of thickness, the new one is a little bit thinner than the old. One of the few design compromises that Pebble have had to make is they've had to change to a new power connector here on the side. The original one was actually designed specifically for the design of that smartwatch, so they couldn't really deploy it on the new watch. In summary, the new Pebble Steel is a massive upgrade on the hardware side of things. It brings this smartwatch into a whole new class. It brings it to a new audience who might not have considered a smartwatch in the past. What the company says is that it's committed to iterating and improving, particularly on the app side of things, with both the 149 original Pebble and the 249 Pebble Steel. The future is all about developing the software, while today is about showing off the brand new hardware. The new Pebble Steel will be available with 249 on January 28th.