jyjyjy81

I have decided to purchase a Garmin 800 in the very near future but have a few questions. I am new to ultra events having participated in 3 12 hour events last year plus the ADK540 (DNF...but did OK) and for 2011 I plan on trying a few 24 hour events. I have a PowerTap.

1. The battery life is estimated at 15 hours. Will I be able to "merge" data after replacing the battery part way through a 24 hour event?
2. How many hours of power data can it hold? (the Cyclops PowerTap holds only 12 hours worth of data)
3. Can I load a race route onto the Garmin and it guides me through? ( may be silly question but new to using gps stuff)
4. Have Garmin units dropped in price in the past or is it likely the price of the 800 will stay constant for the foreseeable future?

Thanks!

MetinUz

I also have PowerTap, and the short battery life of Garmin is a major reason why I am not interested in one. I think the PowerTap computer records for 14 hours at 1 second setting, but you can configure it to store samples every 2 or 5 seconds, which proportionally extends the recording time.

Marcello

1. The 15 hours is the estimated life of the internal battery when fully charged to start. Garmin sells an external battery pack that extends that time, and it may be enough for a 24 hour race, probably not for a 500 mile race, though. On the Garmin web site forums someone mentioned this power pack https://www.gomadic.com/garmin-edge-8...-extender.html (which can use rechargeable batteries or standard alkalines) and said that it can be plugged into the unit while you use it, thereby extending the time past the 15 hours. That may be a solution for longer events of more than 24 hours.

2. The Edge 800 can use a microSD card, and I am not sure if the data will get saved to the memory card, if you have one. I have a 4 GB card, and I am using half of it for maps (that I got for free from https://www.openstreetmap.org/). If the power data can be saved on the memory card (not sure if it is the case, I don't have a PowerTap), you may be able to record nearly unlimited data.

3. You can load a route and get turn by turn directions. I have used https://ridewithgps.com to create routes, and loaded them to the Garmin to do turn by turn directions.

NoRacer

There's this charger, too:

https://www.amazon.com/Motorola-98782.../dp/B000JLL14E

The gomadic definitely seems like the better choice as long as the cable remains intact.

maha

I was able to figure out how to make a cable that charges the 800 while in use.