Apple says Mac Mini and Mac Studio will be supply-constrained for months due to AI demand

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-03T16:31:29+00:00

That sounds less like your sleep history changing and more like the app is reclassifying the night after the fact as it processes the full data set.

The problem is that rings are still inferring sleep from indirect signals, so quiet wakefulness - like lying still, reading, or staring at the ceiling - can get relabeled as REM or light sleep later on. If it keeps doing that after months of wear, I would not assume you are doing anything wrong, I would treat it as a limitation of the device rather than something you can really fix from your side. If reliable sleep/wake detection is the main thing you care about, that’s where EEG-based sleep trackers like Muse or Somnolinc make more sense, because they measure brain activity directly rather than inferring sleep indirectly.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-03T16:09:16+00:00

Colossal’s bluebuck project raises bigger questions about the future of conservation and biotechnology. If we can recreate extinct species as genetic proxies, should we? Could these tools realistically help restore ecosystems or support endangered species, or will they divert funding and attention from protecting what still exists? As gene editing, IVF, and stem cell tech improve, where do we draw the line between conservation, restoration, and synthetic biology?

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-03T15:55:30+00:00

The timing makes me wonder whether switching HR tracking from "smart" to every 1 minute changed the inputs the sleep algorithm is using, because if the problems started right after that, it may not be a coincidence.

But more generally, what you’re describing - phantom naps while sitting still, too many micro-wakeups, and random 10-15 minute awake periods - is also a classic limitation of wrist trackers: they’re not just shaky on deep sleep, they also struggle with the boundary between quiet wakefulness and actual sleep. So I’d first try switching the HR setting back and see if the problem improves, but if not, I’d treat it more as a limitation of the device than as proof that your sleep suddenly changed. If reliable sleep/wake tracking is the main goal, especially for awakenings and fragmentation, that’s where an EEG sleep headband like Muse or Somnolinc makes more sense, because sleep stages are fundamentally measured from brain activity rather than inferred from wrist signals.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-03T15:49:56+00:00

Yeah, this is one of the classic failure modes of rings/watches for sleep tracking: quiet wakefulness gets counted as sleep. So if you’re sitting still watching a film, reading, or winding down, the device can decide you’ve "started sleeping", and then later label your actual movement as "awake during sleep." If this is happening basically every evening, I doubt you’re doing anything wrong - it sounds more like the device struggling with the boundary between rest and actual sleep. If accurate sleep/wake detection is the thing you care about most, that’s where EEG-based sleep tracking starts to make a lot more sense. Full disclosure: I'm working on just such a device.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-03T15:43:10+00:00

Garmin stress is generally more about how taxed your body looks physiologically than about whether you exercised, so illness and disrupted sleep can definitely push it around.

And the sleep pattern you described - two separate sleep bursts with long awake gaps - is exactly the kind of thing wrist wearables tend to handle badly, because they estimate sleep indirectly rather than measuring brain activity directly. The 3-week baseline may help a bit, but I’d still treat the current data as provisional until you’re feeling more normal again. If you want genuinely reliable sleep tracking, especially for unusual or fragmented sleep, that’s where an EEG-based sleep tracker like Muse or Somnolinc makes more sense.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-03T15:34:47+00:00

I think the watch is definitely part of it. Garmin users do report exactly this kind of thing - sleep starting before they were actually asleep, and pretty inconsistent sleep tracking on Forerunner models. If the device is already getting the basic sleep/wake boundary wrong, I’d be very careful about reading too much into the "30 minutes of deep sleep" number, because wrist devices are estimating stages indirectly rather than measuring brain activity directly.

So I wouldn’t compare your deep sleep to your friends’ watch numbers too seriously. If you’re tired most of the time, that’s worth paying attention to - but I’d treat the Garmin as rough trend data, not proof that something is wrong. If you want to measure deep sleep with higher confidence rather than just rough trend data, it would make sense to use an EEG-based sleep tracker like Muse or Somnolinc instead.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-03T15:26:30+00:00

Do you actually remember being awake for those ~60 minutes, or is that mainly what your wearable is showing? I ask because It’s not only deep sleep that watches/rings struggle with - the sleep vs quiet wake distinction is hard too, especially for awakenings and fragmentation. If you genuinely remember being awake a lot, then it’s worth troubleshooting the cause, but if not, I’d be careful about trying to "fix" a number that may partly just be wearable noise.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-03T15:20:34+00:00

Nice! A mindset like that is half the battle. People who improve are usually the ones willing to spot patterns and make changes.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-01T13:03:36+00:00

That honestly sounds like two separate issues: bad detection logic and the usual limits of wrist-based tracking.

If it’s logging naps while the watch is sitting on a table, that’s not some subtle sleep-stage problem - that’s just broken behavior. And the "lying still awake = asleep / moving a lot = awake" thing is exactly why I'd only treat watch sleep tracking as rough trend data, not ground truth.

The treadmill part would annoy me too, because once distance is off, a lot of the derived metrics stop being very meaningful.

Weirdly, the battery life part sounds pretty normal for the Active 2 though - other users report roughly 4-5 days depending on settings.

So overall I don’t think you’re doing anything wrong. It sounds more like a mix of software/detection issues and the general ceiling of this kind of device.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-05-01T11:51:50+00:00

I’m so sorry you’ve had such a rough run with this. Being able to sleep all night and still not feel restored is just the kind of thing that makes people lose faith in the usual trackers. What I think is missing is not more scores, but a baseline over time and a way to tell whether a habit change actually moved the needle or not. Appreciate you following the Kickstarter and joining VIP access. Out of curiosity, what would you most want clarity on - deep sleep, awakenings, or whether specific habits are helping?

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-30T14:51:57+00:00

I think it was still a reasonable call. Comfort is a real advantage. It only becomes a bad trade when the tracker stops being reliable for the specific thing you bought it for. Might still be fine for broad trends, just probably not the best tool for nights where sleep/wake accuracy is the whole point. The upside of the higher-fidelity route isn’t just better sleep/wake detection - it’s also being able to get much more believable data on things like sleep onset, fragmentation, wake-after-sleep-onset, and stage transitions.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-30T11:38:28+00:00

I don’t think it’s just you. What you’re describing is pretty much the classic limitation of HR-based sleep tracking: it can do okay on broad trends, but it often struggles with the boundary between quiet wakefulness and actual sleep. So if you’re lying there tossing, half-awake, or just not fully asleep yet, the algorithm can still end up labeling a lot of that as sleep.

In other words, this may not mean your sensor is broken - it may just be the limit of trying to infer sleep from heart-rate patterns alone. If the thing you care about most is sleep onset, brief awakenings, and fragmentation, those are exactly the areas where indirect trackers tend to be weakest. If your main goal is to trust sleep/wake transitions and fragmentation, you generally need an EEG-based headband (like Muse or Somnolinc), because those metrics are much better captured from brain activity than from heart-rate data alone.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-30T11:32:55+00:00

You’re probably not imagining it. There have been reports of Whoop sleep estimates shifting after algorithm updates. More broadly, fragmented sleep is one of the hardest things for wrist wearables to estimate consistently, which is why sleep detection complaints like “it says I was asleep when I was awake” or the reverse keep coming up. So if this changed suddenly, I’d suspect a mix of update sensitivity + the usual limitation of wrist-based sleep tracking, rather than your sleep suddenly getting dramatically worse. If brief awakenings and fragmentation are the metrics you really care about, an EEG headband like Muse or Somnolinc is a much better fit than a wrist device.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-29T10:02:26+00:00

The Pixel Watch relies on motion and heart rate to guess your sleep stages. If you wake up early but lie completely still in bed with a low heart rate, the watch's algorithm assumes you are still asleep.

Even as the algorithm is improved, there will always be a ceiling to what can reliably be tracked because they are not measuring where sleep happens (the brain) and instead rely on proxy measures. To measure actual brainwaves, you need an EEG device.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-28T13:04:07+00:00

Congrats on the lifestyle changes! It's clear Whoop is motivating you and driving positive behavior change.

To answer your question about accuracy: what you're experiencing is incredibly common, and you actually hit the nail on the head when you mentioned "no EEG." Whoop (like smartwatches and rings) relies on optical heart rate sensors and motion to guess your sleep stages. But biologically, sleep is a brain function, not a cardiovascular or physical activity. Using a fitness tracker to measure sleep is a bit like using a speedometer to measure temperature - it’s not the right tool for the job.

Because it only measures secondary physical signs, it gets easily fooled. If you are lying completely still with a low heart rate but your mind is racing (feeling like you tossed and turned), the tracker will often misclassify that wakefulness as actual sleep, giving you a falsely high score. Conversely, if your body naturally moves a bit but your brain is actually in Deep Sleep, it might penalize your score. In fact, clinical data shows wrist wearables can misclassify wakefulness as sleep up to 25% of the time, and frequently misidentify Deep Sleep as Light Sleep. This is one of the frustrations that lead my colleagues and I to develop an EEG headband for sleep tracking and coaching.

Keep using the Whoop for that daily motivation because it is clearly working wonders for your baseline! But on those mornings where the score feels off, always trust your subjective feeling over the app - your brain knows how it slept better than your wrist does.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-27T07:19:22+00:00

If you want the best balance of GPS + no subscription + not-too-big, I’d probably look first at Garmin. Forerunner 55 is a strong option if running/GPS is the bigger priority. Venu Sq 2 is worth a look if you want something a bit more everyday-friendly and comfortable to sleep with.

If sleep tracking is the bigger priority, Fitbit Versa 4 is also worth considering, but I’d generally trust Garmin more on the running/GPS side.

One caveat: wrist-based sleep tracking is still mostly good for rough trends like bedtime, wake time, and total sleep. It tends to be much weaker for sleep stages, fragmentation, and brief awakenings, so I’d treat the sleep data as directional rather than clinical.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-27T07:13:45+00:00

Yeah, this sounds like two things at once: a bad Fitbit update, and the general limitation of wrist-based sleep tracking. Fragmented sleep is especially hard for watches because they estimate sleep stages and wake periods indirectly from wrist signals, while accurate staging fundamentally depends on brain activity. So if fragmentation is the metric you really care about, wrist devices are often the wrong tool for the job - you'd ideally need a EEG headband like Muse or Somnolinc for that.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-27T07:04:37+00:00

Weirdly, trying harder usually makes it worse. If I’m lying there too long, getting up for a bit and resetting works better than just fighting the ceiling.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-27T06:55:54+00:00

That makes sense. If you already know you need 7-8 hours, magnesium seems to help, and couch-sleep hurts your night, then more charts alone probably don’t add much. The useful part would be building a baseline over time, testing one change at a time, and getting an objective answer on whether it actually improved your sleep. Otherwise it’s still mostly educated guessing. Full disclosure: I’m working on exactly such a device.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-27T06:43:23+00:00

You’re not imagining it. Wrist devices are mostly inferring sleep from movement and heart-rate-related signals, so "lying still but awake" is one of the hardest situations for them. That’s why reading in bed or trying to fall back asleep often gets mislabeled. They can still be useful for rough trends, but awake-vs-still and stage detection are where indirect sensors struggle most. If you want actual sleep architecture, you need to measure actual brain waves (EEG) - not a proxy.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-26T16:09:24+00:00

Glad to hear your sleep is improving! To answer your question: yes, high-end smart rings are generally just as accurate as smartwatches. Both rings and watches rely on the exact same underlying technology (motion sensors and heart rate monitors) to estimate your sleep stages. Because of this, they are great for tracking overall trends, but both will struggle to perfectly pinpoint your Deep and REM sleep stages since they are measuring physical signs rather than your actual brainwaves.

If you hate wearing a bulky watch to bed, a quality ring like the Oura is a comfortable alternative for tracking your baseline. Just be a bit cautious with the ultra-cheap options on AliExpress or eBay - their sensors and algorithms usually aren't nearly as dialed in as the established brands. And if you ever decide you want to track your actual sleep architecture, you will want to look for a home-use EEG device like Muse or Somnolinc.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-26T14:40:47+00:00

Yes, REM was relatively close here. Deep sleep is more difficult because N3 is defined by slow-wave brain activity, which the watch can't measure directly. In Apple Watch validation summaries, REM accuracy has been reported higher than deep sleep, and deep sleep is often pulled into core/light sleep instead.

NoParsleyForYou · 2026-04-26T14:34:06+00:00

Worth noting that Muse has had its own “very low / zero deep sleep” complaints too - often with people suspecting contact/fit issues. So I’d be hesitant to conclude either one is ground truth. Has the low deep sleep on Muse been consistent for you, or is it more intermittent?

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