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From Fellrnr.com, Running tips
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[[File:Garmin 225-top.JPG|thumb|none{{BuyAmazon|200pxAZID=B00XKRWTUE|The {{AZN=Garmin 225}}, showing the display of Heart Rate from its Optical Heart Rate Sensor.]]
{{BuyAmazon|AZID=B00XKRWTUE|AZN=Garmin 225}}
comment: batch update
{{DISPLAYTITLE:Garmin 225 Review}}
[[File:Garmin 225-top.JPG|thumb|right|300px|The {{Garmin 225}}, showing the display of Heart Rate from its Optical Heart Rate Sensor.]]I've [[Best Running Watch| tested several optical heart rate monitors]] and found them rather ineffective, so I came to the {{Garmin 225}} with low expectations. I initially found that the 225 worked better than I expected, but when I did more rigorous approach I found the [[Optical Heart Rate Monitoring| accuracy was lacking]]. I'm a little disappointed in the way Garmin has crippled the 225 software compared with the 620, and I was hoping the [[Garmin 235]] would be a big improvement. Sadly, while the 235 adds things like The addition of [[Connect IQ]], it's optical HRM is nowhere near as good as the 225. '''If you want optical heart rate monitoringa big functional improvement, the 225 is the best and I've foundd argue it should be a major factor in your choice of watches.''' A simple rating of the Garmin 225 can be based on how well they can answer some For a more fundamental look, there are four basic questions:
* '''How far did I run?''' This is the most basic question, and the 225 has rather poor GPS accuracy, so its estimate of how far you've run needs to be treated with a quite a bit of caution.
* '''How fast am I running?''' Knowing how fast you're running can be a nice to know, or it can be vital for your training or race performance. Because of the nature of GPS, watches that rely on GPS signal alone tend to have serious problems with current pace. Without the ability to display current [[Pace From A Footpod]] while getting all other data from GPS, the 225 can't answer this question. The poor GPS accuracy exacerbates this issue, and I've seen the pace estimate wildly wrong on the 225. The 225 would be my top pick for marathon runners, but I firmly believe that this is a killer feature, as accurate pacing is essential for a good marathon performance. (I've some slight hope that Garmin will add this feature in with a firmware update, as they have to a number of their newer watches.)
* '''What's my cadence? '''[[Cadence]]''' '''is one of the most critical and often overlooked aspects of running. If you get your Cadence right, many other things naturally fall into place. There is support for Cadence from the internal accelerometer, though I find that's not as accurate as the [[Footpod]] which it supports.
The 225 is not a good choice for ultrarunners, as its battery life is too short. See [[Best Running Watch#Watches for Ultrarunning| Watches for Ultrarunning]] for more details. (Turning off the optical heart rate monitor only increases the battery life a couple of hours.)
=Optical Heart Rate Monitoring=
No one likes to wear a chest strap, and it can be particularly annoying for ladies as it can interfere with support clothing. This makes the idea of [[Optical Heart Rate Monitoring]] that uses the changes in capillary fill under the watch quite attractive, so I focused on this functionality.
{| class="wikitable"
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|[[File:BridgeGarmin 225.jpg|none|thumb|x300px| You can see the 225 has rather mediocre accuracy, and is rather worse than the similar [[Garmin 620]]. It does badly around the twisty section, cutting the corners too much due to smoothing. It does a little better with the sharp turn seen on the right side of the diagram. It gets a little lost going under the bridge on occasion, but that's not too much of an issue. The lap markers in blue are more widely dispersed than they would be with a better device. (This diagram has tracks color coded with green indicating good accuracy through to read red indicating poor accuracy, and the lap markers as blue dots.)]]
|- valign="top"
|[[File:AccuracyGarmin 225.jpg|none|thumb|x300px| This close up section of a zigzag shows the 225 tracking okay most of the time, but a disturbing number of the tracks are poor. (This diagram has tracks color coded with green indicating good accuracy through to read red indicating poor accuracy, and the lap markers as blue dots.)]]
|- valign="top"
|[[File:ZigZagGarmin 225.jpg|none|thumb|x300px| Here you can see the 225 displaying the typical GPS behavior with the tracks that have the green lines shifted slightly down and to the left, blue up and to the right. This is less marked that other devices, but you can see the pattern. You can also see the lap markers shifted based on direction. (This image has the tracks color-coded for direction, with green coming from the right, blue from the left.)]]
* '''Alerts'''. Some watches will alert you when a metric is out of range. The alert for [[Cadence]] is really useful and one of my favorite features.
* '''Web Configuration'''. Some watches allow you to setup the configuration via a web site, and then download your changes. This is vastly easier than fiddling with the watch.
=Visual Comparison=
{| class="wikitable"
=Comparison Table=
{{:Best Running Watch-table}}
=Teardown=
There's a nice teardown of the Garmin 220 (the 225 without the OHRM) on [http://www.microcontrollertips.com/teardown-garmin-forerunner-220-sport-watch-heart-monitor/ microcontrollertips.com].
