NEW YORK (MainStreet) — You are going to want an Apple Watch. The only question is: is that wise?

You will want it because Apple is genius at creating a retail stampede. The watch also, even to the most jaded among us, looks cool. But is it worth the money? Does it do enough to even bother with it?

Talking money, go shopping for an Apple Watch - starting on April 10 when pre-sale kicks off - with full pockets. The stripped down, entry level watch is $349. The luxe Apple Watch Edition - made of 18k yellow or rose gold - starts at $10,000. Apple CEO Tim Cook at the launch event did not put a cap on how high that price could go. 

What do you get for the money? For starters: know that the coolest Apple Watch features, such as making/receiving phone calls via the watch and using the watch to buy via Apple Pay, require pairing with an iPhone 5 or newer. The good news hidden in that is that for the moment, pre iPhone 6 phones cannot use Apple Pay. Apple Watch changes that. Those older phones suddenly are Apple Pay capable for Apple Watch owners. 

The bad news: the watch is essentially a $349 and up accessory to a $600 and up iPhone - and, no, Apple has revealed no plans to link the watch with Android or Windows phones, and nobody expects that. You don’t own an iPhone? Unless you plan to buy one, stop reading here. This device is not for you. It is parasitic on an iPhone, with which it can pair via Bluetooth and also WiFi. The latter is a useful feature. Bluetooth requires that the devices be quite close. With WiFi, you can leave the iPhone on a hall table, go into your bedroom, and WiFi should keep the two paired without a line of sight.

There definitely are plenty more cool elements here. For instance, an airplane passenger can go through TSA checkpoints, using a barcode on the watch. That’s one less thing you need to be fumbling in your hands at the airport, said Apple at the launch event.

There also is an SPG app that allows a watch owner to check into a W hotel and open the room door, right from the watch and without ever checking in at the front desk. 

The advantage of the Apple Watch, if you listen to Tim Cook and the other Apple talking heads, is that it’s on your wrist where it is easy to notice incoming traffic. The phone is in your pocket or purse and, they suggested, incoming may get ignored.

Question: you are walking down the street. Your Apple Watch lights up with a call from your significant other or maybe your boss. Will you answer it? Keeping in mind that the caller’s side of the conversation blares out through a speaker and for your side, you have to yell into a microphone.

Personally, I'd yank out the phone.

In the launch event demos, the Apple Watch displayed brilliant, easily read notifications on everything from sports events to stock market movements. You can also get reminder notifications (“pack an umbrella for your New York trip”). But note: the Apple Watch comes in two sizes, 38mm (a typical size for a woman’s watch) and 42mm (slightly larger). Would you want to read Finnegan’s Wake on a screen that small? Of course not and especially not when the iPhone 6 is 138.1mm x 67mm, which means it is a vastly more spacious and comfortable screen.

Health is a big component of Apple Watch, and it will feature lots of sensors and apps to track everything from how long it has been since you moved to activating nags to get you moving.

“It’s like having a coach on your wrist,” said Cook. But is any of that much beyond what can be done with apps on an iPhone? Or with a $100 Jawbone? It does not appear to be so.

An Apple Watch bummer is battery life. Apple claims 18 hours but, as a rule, manufacturers always make optimistic claims. Either way, it won’t be easy to get through a long day on a single charge and if you are flying from Mumbai to Newark Airport and plan to check into a Hoboken W, don’t count on having any juice left to unlock the door.

Will you actually buy it? Look at your wrist? Is there a watch on it? Among Millennials, maybe one in four now regularly wears a watch. The older the person, the more likely he is to wear a watch. If there is not a watch on your wrist today, odds that you will plunk down real money for an Apple Watch are slender. But if there is one there - especially one that cost upwards of $350 - you just may be getting in line on April 24 to snag one of the first watches to roll off the Apple assembly lines. And - really - they are cool looking.

—Written by Robert McGarvey for MainStreet

This article is commentary by an independent contributor. At the time of publication, the author held TK positions in the stocks mentioned.