Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Absolute winner, April 26, 2009
This is the first review, ever, I have written about a product but I am so happy with it that I want to encourage others to buy it.
I bought the Garmin Forerunner 405 package (watch, USB connector and Heart rate monitor (HRM)) in July 2009 and it is one of the best purchases I've ever made.
At the time, I had just committed to yet another attempt to get in better shape and thought being able to track my runs (distance, time and HRM) would be an effective way to keep myself motivated. I'm a nerd when it comes to gadgets and I love keeping track of everything (e.g. I love MS Money) so this watch was just perfect for me.
Here are some cools things about the watch that I am particularly happy about:
1) the HRM (which you snap around your chest): starting from the poor shape I was in, it really helped having something in addition to the time and distance of each workout: while I kept running at a slow pace and at the same speed, I could quickly see progress in terms of a lower HR.
2) the fact that my runs gets imported into Google earth. After each run, all I need to do is approach my desktop and the watch starts sending the details of the run (speed, GPS locations, time etc) to the computer. Thereafter, a neat little program shows me the run (speed, HR etc) in Google earth.
3) it allows you to "lock in" the GPS location of a particular spot and then use that as a guide to find your way back. I use this when I travel. Upon arriving at a new hotel (in a new city), I lock in the hotel's location. The watch then has a feature called "go to location" that will guide you back to a particular location you have stored (i.e. it brings up a little compass that will guide you back to the hotel from whereever you might end up later in the day).
4) the optional footpod is convenient to have if you run on treadmills (inside where the GPS won't work). I also attach it to my shoes when I play squash to see how much of a workout I'm getting (as I said, I am a nerd when it comes to measuring things).
Here are some things which are not superb about the watch:
a) the battery in the food pod had to be replaced within 6 months
b) sometimes it can take up to 5 minutes for the watch to locate satelites. This is frustrating! The problem is particularly severe if you have moved from one country to another. Usually, when I run the same routes (within a country), it "remembers" the satelites and it connects within a minute or two.
I hope this was useful. Best, Lars
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
A good running/cycling monitor...just ok at everything else, September 14, 2009
I purchased this monitor while I was stationed at FOB Warhorse in Iraq. My intent for the watch as two-fold, 1) I wanted an easy way to keep track of where I had been during dismounted patrols and 2) to replace my aging and dying Polar RS200sd heart rate monitor.
The Garmin Forerunner 405 (with Foot Pod!) is very good at what it does, which is keep track of where you were, how fast you went, and roll all that up into a neat little software package that lets you do a virtual tour of it all. Very cool. Just not very practical. The GPS information (i.e. location and altitude) is not displayed on the monitor. You can get heart rate, speed, average speed, average HR, etc but no location information. You also can't easily get that once you've downloaded the data to your computer (you have to get pretty clever with Google maps to make that happen). It takes a bit for to get a decent satellite lock, but once it does it has no issues with tracking. As a GPS device, this monitor is rather lacking. Don't misunderstand it does keep track of where you are and what you are doing, it is just impossible to figure it out while you are doing it. Its not like a dedicated GPS that you glance at and know where you are and where you've been.
But wait! Its not a GPS device, its Heart Rate Monitor! It says so right in the title! And yes it does that! But it doesn't do anything with the information it tracks. Its programming is based upon your age, weight, height, and...distance traveled. Heart rate doesn't play into its calculations at all, or if it does it plays such a limited role that in my four months of using it I never once varied from burning 103 kCal per mile traveled. Not if it took me 7:30 with an average HR of 178, or if I dawdled along and did it in 18:00 minutes @ 107 BPM, it was 103 kCal. And if I didn't move? Let's say I was rolling on the mats, or lifting weights, or doing step-aerobics, no matter how high my heart rate got (188), my kCal expenditure was exactly 0. So it doesn't exactly give you the fitness information that other monitors do.
Now, where this system excels is in the bundled software. The Garmin software is outstanding and its integration with Google maps is impressive. The ability to compare heart rate with speed/effort is very nice. It is also easy to customize and tweak to generate reports that fit exactly what you are looking for (HR over time, speed, and elevation for example so you can see just how much that hill really sucked at the end of your run, compared with how easy it felt when you did it at the beginning of your run). The software isn't without its limitations, for one thing you can't edit the raw data, or even view it in any meaningful form. I know the data is there, buried among the software's xml files, but trying to sort it out was just about impossible and not worth the effort.
Another plus is just how robust this watch is. Where my Polar was scratched up, beaten up, and giving in slowly and painfully to the rigors of Iraq the Garmin kept right on going. It took four months of use and abuse with nary a complaint and as a watch there is a lot to be positive about, the display is easy to read, the back light is bright but subtle, the ability to synch its time with the satellites overhead was a real time saver for me.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Worth Every Penny, August 12, 2009
At first I thought the price was high for what I was looking for. But after finding out all this things it can do I purchased a bundle with the foot pod and heart rate monitor. What can't it do is the question??
1) Logs your run (automatically loads it when your near your pc) - you can watch it back over a google map, it shows your pace/speed, heart rate, elevation, mileage at any given point.
2) I have asthma, it constantly reports my heart rate so I can feel more comfortable.
3) You know your exact mileage, at times before the GPS I thought I was running further than I was. When I used this gps I found out I wasnt. Helps with goals.
4) You can set mileage, calorie goals for a week, month etc. and it will keep track for you.
5) I could go futher but by now you get the point
NO RUNNER, JOGGER or biker should be without.
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