8,153
edits
Changes
From Fellrnr.com, Running tips
no edit summary
* The V800 uses Bluetooth sensors rather than the more common Ant+, which has some practical implications.
** For [[Heart Rate Monitor]], the Polar H7 works well.
** The options for a [[Footpod]] are more limited. There is the [http://www.amazon.com/Polar-Stride-Sensor-Bluetooth-Smart/dp/B00CCASIMS Polar Stride Sensor] but this is enormous and heavy compared with the Garmin equivalent. It actually weighs about 1oz/30g, which I believe is unacceptable. There are other Bluetooth Footpods on the market, but none of these function fully with the V800.(see below)
** An Ant+ sensor will broadcast data to any device that's listening, so you could have two watches both receiving information. Bluetooth sensors are currently limited to sending data to a single paired listening device. So if you're wearing the Polar H7 Heart Rate Monitor, the data can go either to the V800 or to your iPhone, not both. (The V800 will rebroadcast the signals, but currently only the Polar App can receive them. Later revisions of the Bluetooth specification will allow for broadcasting of data.)
* The support for [[Cadence]] is more limited than I'd like for a high end device.
** The Polar Stride Sensor is fully supported by the V800, with automatic calibration and it will display stride length as well as cadence. However, the Stride Sensor is huge when compared with modern Footpods, weighing over three times as much as a Garmin Footpod. Because of its size and weight, it requires lacing into the shoelaces, making it a real pain to move between shoes. <jfs id="B00CCASIMS" noreferb="true" n="Polar Stride Sensor"/>
** Some third party Bluetooth Footpods, like the "i-gotU" will pair with the V800, but then won't display cadence and will prevent the V800 from recording any distance travelled.
** The Adidas miCoach Speed Cell will work with the V800, but it's not easy. By default it will pair with the V800, but you can't set the calibration factor nor can you set the V800 to use GPS for pace/distance. You have to pair the V800 with the Polar Speed Sensor to activate the menu items you need to configure the Adidas Footpod, which is far from ideal. However, once you've overcome these problems, the Adidas Footpod is a reasonable size and provides cadence (though not stride length). <jfs id="B00FEJ7FBO" noreferb="true" n="adidas miCoach Speed Cell "/>.
** Even though the V800 has an internal accelerometer, this is not used to display cadence.
* The V800 will only upload the data to the Polar website. Polar has introduced to the export of TCX format data, but this export is incomplete (no laps). You can work around this by using the open source projects [https://github.com/pcolby/bipolar Bipolar] and [https://github.com/profanum429/v800_downloader V800_downloader], but this is a far cry from the open approach that Garmin has taken.
* The V800 uses some visual tricks to appear smaller than it is. If you look at the picture below, the watch body appears to be the silvered area, which is quite small. However, the first bit of the watch strap is really part of the watch body, with the strap starting much further out. The only problem is the watch body is inflexible, so on small wrists like mine it does not sit well, and I suspect it will dig into those with particularly large wrists. (I have no problem with watches that appear to be bigger, like the [[Garmin 310XT]].)<br/>[[File:V800 Size.jpg|none|thumb|300px]]
