Bike computer with large memory
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Bike computer with large memory
Hello,
I am planning to go on an extended cycling touring trip soon, and I will not have access to my phone. I was hoping to find a relatively inexpensive (about $200ish or less) computer that would be able to record my gps activity to upload after the trip. It would need to have a very large memory or an sd slot. I don't really care about any other features besides the basics.
Thanks for your help
I am planning to go on an extended cycling touring trip soon, and I will not have access to my phone. I was hoping to find a relatively inexpensive (about $200ish or less) computer that would be able to record my gps activity to upload after the trip. It would need to have a very large memory or an sd slot. I don't really care about any other features besides the basics.
Thanks for your help
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Check out the Bryton computers. Their top end models run about half the price of comparable Garmin or Wahoo. And their lower end models offer more features than comparably priced computers under $100.
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Locus map for Android is highly customizable and connects with bt and ant sensors. Around $10. Can work offline with route generation and offtrack rerouting with brouter plugin. Track recording and export and import of various file formats.
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Unfortunately, smart phones only offer about four hours of operation with the screen on.
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"I will not have access to my phone." Does this mean that you are not taking the phone with you or you will not have cellular service along the way? If you are taking your phone with you but aren't expecting much cellular or wifi service during your trip, look at putting a copy of Cyclemeter on your phone. It uses a local database that is independent of any online service. All your ride data is stored on the phone. It's only $10,00 a year for a subscription. I don't know what kind of computer you are currently using but the Wahoo Companion app and Garmin Connect make it easy to copy/share a ride to Cyclemeter. While I do use Strava, all my rides are stored in Cyclemeter since I get much better stats from Cyclemeter than I do from any online service.
If you're not taking your phone, look into the Wahoo Elemnt or Bolt. They have enough memory for about a month's worth of rides. Since they are pre-loaded with maps of almost every country in the world, you can delete the maps you don't want/need and get more memory, if needed.
If you're not taking your phone, look into the Wahoo Elemnt or Bolt. They have enough memory for about a month's worth of rides. Since they are pre-loaded with maps of almost every country in the world, you can delete the maps you don't want/need and get more memory, if needed.
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You have to give the app superuser access in the security options in order to display over the lockscreen. This also lets you drag around the map without having to enter a password.
You can set the app to cache the map tiles that you browse, so that they're available offline. Or if you buy a region for a few dollars, it will save the region to memory. Alternatively there are people who have built custom maps from online sources of certain popular routes and made the package available for free to download, which you can unpack into locus maps. For example, there is a German guy who has created locus maps packages for all of the EuroVelo tracks.
If the maps are already saved to memory, you can simply switch on airplane mode to switch off radio signals except for bluetooth for the speed/cadence sensor, and this will save a lot of battery power.
I used to use Mobile Atlas Creator to cache and package map tiles of hiking routes to run on OruxMaps on Android. But a long time ago, a lot of the map sources, like openstreetmaps, banned mass download/ripping of tiles because of the large bandwidth required. I think that's why Locus Maps charges money to download map tiles because they get the copy of the map source from the owner, load it onto their own servers, and send you the tiles from their own servers when you buy the region.
Wahoo I believe caches the maps onto local memory with regular updates. I know that Lezyne requires you to have internet connection to download the openstreetmap tiles onto their devices. The problem with Lezyne is that you always need an internet connection to redownload the route and tiles everytime you power off and on the device, because the memory gets wiped once you turn it off. Bryton instead saves an entire region of openstreetmaps onto the device. In order to update the maps to the latest version, you have to use their PC software to update the firmware of the device. But All of these devices use a simplified version of openstreetmaps. If you use Locus Map, you can load different variations of openstreetmaps, like the cycling or hiking version (I believe they're all the same dataset, but with different parameters to render elements differently so that cycle paths or hiking tracks are more visible). The nice thing about Locus map is the ability to shade elevation, and draw contour lines. The curor can also display the altitude of the point at the cursor, so that you can estimate the elevation.
For backcountry routes of New Zealand, the NZ Land and whatever agency publishes free topographical maps of the entire country. They're also available online. It shows all huts, tracks, waterways, rope bridges, etc. It's the same as the paper maps that you buy at the Department of Conservation shops. With Mobile Atlas Creator, you can rip the online tiles and save it as a package to load into OruxMaps or Locus Map.
Map tiles come in different levels. I can't remember the unit scale of a level, but it might go from 1 to 20. At high levels, more geographical or manmade structures are rendered.
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Zoom_levels
If you use Bike computers like Wahoo, Lezyne, Bryton, you might get maybe up to tile level 13 or 14 of resolution, plus the streets. If you use OruxMaps or Locus map, you can cache maybe up to level 18 with buildings with address numbers and geographical features but would take a lot of memory. If you stick in a 65GB micro SD card in your smartphone, you won't have a problem with storage. I don't know the exact levels that the bike computers have, I'm just making an assumption based on memory limitations and the need to render on a black and white screen.
I switched to Locus map over from OruxMaps because Locus has more features that work well with a bicycle and sensors. It's also a little more easier to use (but still lots of option you have to learn what they do) and has more variety of available map sources and types, plus the route creation, navigation, and auto rerouting. I think it's got a bigger team working on it too.
Last edited by tomtomtom123; 11-03-19 at 02:14 PM.
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I record rides on my phone "off-line" using Strava. Usually I'll upload at the end of the day, but on occasion I'll record a couple of rides, then upload in a batch.
I don't know of any specific data limit on how many rides you can record. Strava is pretty slow with the uploads, but it really should only be a few hundred kb per ride. One should be able to save a bunch of rides with a couple of GB of free memory.
The one limit with smartphone Strava is that offline maps can be touch and go. Sometimes I get a good map. Sometimes a very crude map, and sometimes simply a grid.
I usually have two phones. The communication phone and the bike phone. My service provider doesn't like tethering (personal hotspots), but I can often tether just long enough to do Strava uploads/downloads before the service is knocked out and must be restarted.
I don't know of any specific data limit on how many rides you can record. Strava is pretty slow with the uploads, but it really should only be a few hundred kb per ride. One should be able to save a bunch of rides with a couple of GB of free memory.
The one limit with smartphone Strava is that offline maps can be touch and go. Sometimes I get a good map. Sometimes a very crude map, and sometimes simply a grid.
I usually have two phones. The communication phone and the bike phone. My service provider doesn't like tethering (personal hotspots), but I can often tether just long enough to do Strava uploads/downloads before the service is knocked out and must be restarted.
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"I will not have access to my phone." Does this mean that you are not taking the phone with you or you will not have cellular service along the way? If you are taking your phone with you but aren't expecting much cellular or wifi service during your trip, look at putting a copy of Cyclemeter on your phone. It uses a local database that is independent of any online service. All your ride data is stored on the phone. It's only $10,00 a year for a subscription. I don't know what kind of computer you are currently using but the Wahoo Companion app and Garmin Connect make it easy to copy/share a ride to Cyclemeter. While I do use Strava, all my rides are stored in Cyclemeter since I get much better stats from Cyclemeter than I do from any online service.
If you're not taking your phone, look into the Wahoo Elemnt or Bolt. They have enough memory for about a month's worth of rides. Since they are pre-loaded with maps of almost every country in the world, you can delete the maps you don't want/need and get more memory, if needed.
If you're not taking your phone, look into the Wahoo Elemnt or Bolt. They have enough memory for about a month's worth of rides. Since they are pre-loaded with maps of almost every country in the world, you can delete the maps you don't want/need and get more memory, if needed.
And FWIW, my 2016 statistics shows I had 171 rides on my Edge 1000. I delete the history files on the device every year as it’s all saved on Connect and RWGPS. 171 rides is almost 6 mos. of everyday riding.
Last edited by Steve B.; 11-05-19 at 01:46 PM.
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I used to use Mobile Atlas Creator to cache and package map tiles of hiking routes to run on OruxMaps on Android. But a long time ago, a lot of the map sources, like openstreetmaps, banned mass download/ripping of tiles because of the large bandwidth required. I think that's why Locus Maps charges money to download map tiles because they get the copy of the map source from the owner, load it onto their own servers, and send you the tiles from their own servers when you buy the region.
You can also get free general maps to use in Locus instead of buying them from Locus (something I tried a few years ago) but Locus didn't quite handle the transition between maps very well. I live near a border between two states so that needs to work for me.
Index of /maps
https://www.openandromaps.org/en/downloads
I know that Lezyne requires you to have internet connection to download the openstreetmap tiles onto their devices. The problem with Lezyne is that you always need an internet connection to redownload the route and tiles everytime you power off and on the device, because the memory gets wiped once you turn it off.
I switched to Locus map over from OruxMaps because Locus has more features that work well with a bicycle and sensors. It's also a little more easier to use (but still lots of option you have to learn what they do) and has more variety of available map sources and types, plus the route creation, navigation, and auto rerouting. I think it's got a bigger team working on it too.
I like Guru maps, it doesn't have the features that Locus has but it seems "about right". It's kind of expensive now (unfortunately). I don't know if it supports sensors. The developer is active.
Last edited by njkayaker; 11-07-19 at 12:25 PM.
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The Garmin Edge 1030 has an SD card that can be configured to save all ride data to the card. You can then add cards as needed. The older 1000 also uses SD cards and I think you can use 32 gig cards.
And FWIW, my 2016 statistics shows I had 171 rides on my Edge 1000. I delete the history files on the device every year as it’s all saved on Connect and RWGPS. 171 rides is almost 6 mos. of everyday riding.
And FWIW, my 2016 statistics shows I had 171 rides on my Edge 1000. I delete the history files on the device every year as it’s all saved on Connect and RWGPS. 171 rides is almost 6 mos. of everyday riding.
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There are numerous apps that aren't "touch and go" with respect to maps. You download what you need before you go and don't have to worry about it.
Guru maps (it's kind of expensive now, unfortunately).
Maps.me is another. There's now a subscription to remove adds.
Locus maps (mentioned by another poster) but is a bit complicated to use.
Osmand. The UI is a bit clunky.
Last edited by njkayaker; 11-07-19 at 12:08 PM.
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The Garmin Edge 1030 has an SD card that can be configured to save all ride data to the card. You can then add cards as needed. The older 1000 also uses SD cards and I think you can use 32 gig cards.
And FWIW, my 2016 statistics shows I had 171 rides on my Edge 1000. I delete the history files on the device every year as it’s all saved on Connect and RWGPS. 171 rides is almost 6 mos. of everyday riding.
And FWIW, my 2016 statistics shows I had 171 rides on my Edge 1000. I delete the history files on the device every year as it’s all saved on Connect and RWGPS. 171 rides is almost 6 mos. of everyday riding.
__________________
HCFR Cycling Team
Ride Safe ... Ride Hard ... Ride Daily
2017 Colnago C-RS
2012 Colnago Ace
2010 Giant Cypress
HCFR Cycling Team
Ride Safe ... Ride Hard ... Ride Daily
2017 Colnago C-RS
2012 Colnago Ace
2010 Giant Cypress
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I suspect any modern bike computer will have enough memory for this.