Ataylor

Many say that wired is way more accurate than wireless when you compare, say, one Cateye (wired) to another Cateye (wireless), but what about comparing the Cateye to the Garmin? Same outcome? Is wired just overall better? Or does it boil down to the actual unit?

My other question is with regard to the Garmin. Do bike lights or phones or any kind of electrical gadget cause interference with the unit at all? I've heard wireless Cateye has issues with this (i.e. fluctuating speed, stalled travel distance, etc), but I'm not sure if the same can be said about the Garmin. Can any of you guys share your experience with the 130, please? Looking to upgrade, but I'd rather just stick with the wired Cateye I currently own if the Garmin's going to haywire every time I turn my light on.

Iride01 

How accurate do you need?

I'd just consider price and aesthetics. How much do you want to pay? Do wires wrapping around your frame bother you?

A Garmin 130 or any device Wahoo, Lezyne or other will be accurate enough with GPS alone. There might be times your log track shows more disparity, but is that really going to keep you from enjoying cycling? Sensors can give you more accuracy. I use them and they've worked for me very reliably. Even with a light right under the head unit.

For those that have an issue, and I've never personally known any, it seems that all you have to do is move slightly where you mount the head unit or light. But again, that's very rare and I've not seen any post of that issue in a long long time that it was reliably determined that was their issue.

Usually lights are only cited as a possible issue in many suggested solutions. But few come back ever finding their lights a problem.

2cam16

I've owned my Edge 130 since November of last year and have had no issues with lights or phones. I have a light mounted close to it too. Has worked just about flawlessly for me and it has just the right amount of options. I don't need a big screen nor a touch screen.

Seattle Forrest

I use a Garmin watch with their tail light, the one with radar in it. It's never wrong about cars behind me. So they must have cracked the interference nut and had a party with the squirrels.

biker128pedal

I had a Cateye wireless and my headlight caused interference but only when flashing. Oh the speed was wireless and cadence was not. Now I use a Garmin 1030 and no interference from two flashing lights.

My Garmin is more accurate with the speed sensor.

Ataylor

I mean I wouldn't want it to be consistently off during a ride and if so, not more than 1 or 2 MPH with regard to speed. This'll be my first time tracking cadence, so it would be nice if that or any of the other options weren't too far off either.

I love the way the 130 looks. Nice, sleek, compact and, judging by the reviews, it comes with a very visible screen. I would've paid up to $300 for a computer, but I wound up picking up the Garmin for about $220 all in, including speed and cadence sensors.
They do. I like a clean look, but not at the expense of functionality. I'd rather have a wired computer that works well than a pretty one that doesn't.
Not the log track, no, but other things being off might, depending on how off they are and how often it happens.
Good to hear. Thanks for sharing.

Awesome! Thanks to you as well for sharing your experience. I appreciate it.

Radar? Wow, that's pretty cool. Never heard of that. Wonder if they have anything without a camera. Will have to look into that.

As far as the interference goes, I think the issue was with lights that were near the unit, so your tail light wouldn't serve as a problem. Biker128pedal mentioned how he noticed that interference only happened when his light was flashing, so if you don't have a front light or if you do and it was in a solid state, perhaps that's why it wasn't affected?
I leave my light flashing most of the time, too, and I also picked up the speed sensor, so I think the overall consensus here is that wireless + GPS + sensor doesn't seem to cause any issues. If it does, I'll just move the unit a bit as Iride01 mentioned above. I think it'll be just fine, though.

Iride01 

Can you tell while you are riding your bike if you are one or two mph slower or faster now? I ride in pretty much constantly rolling terrain. My speed is never constant. My cadence constant.

For real time information your Garmin 130 will do well both with and without the sensors. It'll almost always be something in the log file you read later that may bug you. But when looking after the ride at a graph that is squeezing 30 plus miles of ride into eight inches of browser width, it sort of make you think something is wrong. Usually it's not.

For some every little discrepancy or even a jagged stepped graph bothers them. But for me a split second worth of discrepancy in the data won't keep me from doing what I need to do or realize what I did.

Ataylor

No, I can't. But that's why I want a computer. If it's going to be off by more than a couple MPH, I may as well just guess at that point.
Wait, really? From what I understand, the speed sensor "smoothes out" the GPS and potentially gives you a more accurate reading - even biker128pedal mentioned that above - but are you suggesting that the 130, without the use of a sensor, can measure cadence, too?
I can totally understand both sides of the argument, but yea', it's pretty subjective, I guess.

Iride01 

Yes an you have to realize I'm making off handed remarks. Don't think I'm implying your Edge 130 or any other device will be off by one or two mph. Only during the few times you might have a connection issue with the sensor after a ride has started will you ever see that briefly. When the device isn't getting data from the sensors, after a few minutes it will switch back to using the GPS calculations.

If you happen to be looking at it during the time it takes it to make the changeover, then you might see strange stuff. And mind you that you may never notice it. It might not happen to you even. But don't expect them or anything to be exact every time. That just won't happen.

But you are telling me that if it isn't piss perfect every time that you'd rather just continue to not know? The several thousand rides of good data with one ride of bad data will be more useful to me than just guessing. But to each their own.

I used a Garmin Edge 500 for over 10 years with no big issues. Just an occasional hiccup, that many times turned out to be my misunderstanding of what a feature really was for or how something was supposed to be used. Every great once in a while in that ten years the wheel and cadence sensor (mine is a GSC-10 with both combined) would give out some bad data or none at all. Usually just before a battery change or strangely after the change.

There is a good bit of accuracy for what you are doing without the sensors. I used only have one sensor and two bikes. I'd use my Edge with both bikes and there wasn't much difference in the distance recorded for one ride with the sensor vs on the bike without the sensor. Not enough of a difference for any training consideration or any other consideration. Coming up a few 10ths one way or the other isn't going to make or break any thing you do with that ride information.

Ataylor

Oh, that's fine. That's what I was trying to figure out. My thing from the very beginning was whether or not there would be constant and consistent interference throughout the entire duration of my ride if my flashing light (or whatever else) was turned on. If you're talking about minor glitches that happen from time to time? I don't care about that.
No, that's not necessarily what I'm saying. There's two kinds of imperfection. I don't mean that I don't want it to glitch ever. What I mean is that it should be just that. A glitch. Something that happens so randomly that you may miss it, as you said.

However, if every other time I look at the screen, something is off, that's not a glitch. That's another kind of imperfection that I wouldn't want to deal with. I'd rather just have a wired computer if that was the case. I know it's not the case, but that's what I thought would happen, before you guys chimed in and shared your experience.

Iride01 

Then I think you're good. Just don't be one of the bean counters that has problems understanding why one ride will have a differing Calorie burn than another ride of the same route. <grin>

With anything that is new to you, there might be plenty of stuff that doesn't seem right. Garmin actually has a community forum for all their sport devices for you to get help from other users that have your specific device.https://forums.garmin.com/sports-fitness/

It has some regular members that give pretty good help and info if the problem can be clearly described.

Ataylor

Cool, glad to hear. Thanks for your help and the link to Garmin forums. I don't think I'll need it, since I won't be using it for much more beyond the simplest of options, but I appreciate the heads up either way. Take care.