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Who has a Garmin 800?

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Road Cycling “It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle.” -- Ernest Hemingway

Who has a Garmin 800?

Old 01-31-11, 05:51 AM
  #1  
TnBama
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Who has a Garmin 800?

Do you like it?
Is it worth the money?
How is Garmin connect working?
Do you get good contour mapping on your screen?

Care to give us a review?

Thanks!
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Old 01-31-11, 08:20 AM
  #2  
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I have an Edge 700.

Two people whom i ride with have the 800....one completely loves it, the other one completely hates it, has offered a couple of times to trade me for the 700, which is what he had. I love the 700, and i've messed around with the 800, but not enought to where i can tell you an opinion.

i would try and go mess around with one so that you can get an opinion on both, I went for the 700 because at the time it made a little more sense to me to get it, and according to my source whom/where i bought it from, the 800 had a few knicks they were still trying to figure out.

hope that works.
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Old 01-31-11, 08:53 AM
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I would read this guy's review, he does great ones:

https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2010/08/g...irst-look.html

You should also look at the garmin forums, they have one dedicated to the 800. Keep in mind that those seem to attract people with problems.

I have a 500 and love it, and am considering an 800.
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Old 01-31-11, 08:56 AM
  #4  
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+1 on surfing around the garmin forums. It really alerts you to all the downsides of the 800.
https://forums.garmin.com/
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Old 01-31-11, 11:52 AM
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I went from a 305 to a 800. I like it, worth the money, hard to say. I like the bigger screen, but it's not as clear as it should be. Touch screen is neutral, it works as it should but not a big deal. The maps are occasionally useful. The positives for me were, it was on sale, ANT+, and works great.
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Old 01-31-11, 12:39 PM
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The touch screen is great. It isn't anywhere near as crappy as some of Garmin's other products I've used. Knock on wood... It's not reliable as an odometer - I rode 10,000 miles last Saturday because Garmin didn't feel like programming in a sanity check against the data stream - but it's better. Some of the data it gives you is nice to have, and the maps are handy if you leave your comfort zone and head out into neighboring suburbs.

Is it worth the money? Depends what you're looking for, and what the money's worth to you.
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Old 01-31-11, 01:38 PM
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Do you like it?
Yes I do
Is it worth the money?
IMHO, I think it is.
How is Garmin connect working?
Works fine.
Do you get good contour mapping on your screen?
Contour mapping? Are you referring to like, the geographical elevation contour maps? I don't have those on mine, I have just the street maps.

I do like my 800 in that the touchscreen works great. The fact that it is color is definitely a bonus also. Having come from a 500, I can see how the 500 is great for most people, but the 800 is what I like just because of the touchscreen functionality... that and the street navigation. I have only had two issues -

Sometimes if I use it to navigate somewhere, turn it off, then turn it back on before reaching the destination, the view will stay locked (i.e., instead of the map rotating so that the arrow is always pointing forward, the map will not rotate. I have to stop navigation and start it again to fix it. Happens very rarely though).

When reviewing activities, the current activity in progress reports a 0mph for the average/max speed (one of them, I forget which one). It won't change from 0 until I end/reset the timer.

Again these are minor quibbles. The 800 runs great, the battery lasts a long time, and I still love the touchscreen.

Last edited by acaurora; 01-31-11 at 01:41 PM.
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Old 01-31-11, 02:44 PM
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Ahem...clarification i have the garmin edge 705....and not the 700...
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Old 01-31-11, 02:58 PM
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I just bought the 800 not long ago.

Worth the money? Yes

It was an upgrade from a polar cs600, and am loving it right now, it can calibrate your speed from the gps capabilities which i like. A LOT more accurate than the speed sensor.

But in short,
it does everything id like it to, it does everything well its built for. So if you're looking to buy one, buy it.
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Old 01-31-11, 03:09 PM
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"It's not reliable as an odometer"


Loads of technology in an expensive bike computer but it can't reliably tell you how far you went??? Something is wrong with this picture.
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Old 01-31-11, 03:11 PM
  #11  
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Originally Posted by swak
I just bought the 800 not long ago.

Worth the money? Yes

It was an upgrade from a polar cs600, and am loving it right now, it can calibrate your speed from the gps capabilities which i like. A LOT more accurate than the speed sensor.

But in short,
it does everything id like it to, it does everything well its built for. So if you're looking to buy one, buy it.
i would have to say the speed sensor is definitely more accurate than the gps, even if the unit is away from interruptions.
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Old 01-31-11, 06:32 PM
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Originally Posted by jrobe
"It's not reliable as an odometer"


Loads of technology in an expensive bike computer but it can't reliably tell you how far you went??? Something is wrong with this picture.
To be fair ... most of the time it can tell you how far you went. At the end of a ride, there's at least a 99 % chance it'll give you the right answer. But if you use the thing as an odometer, like "I've had my bike four months and put 1,800 miles on it" kind of odometer, it's going to crap out sooner or later. One day I rode my bike to China and back, across the Pacific twice, without realizing I'd left the neighborhood. I pulled an average of several thousand miles per hour that day.

The GPS system is prone to this kind of error ... but what's supposed to make the Edge good is the software they built around the GPS. It would be pretty easy for them to write some code that says "this latest data doesn't make any sense at all, and seems like a common error, so let's ignore it and use dead reckoning until everything works again a second or two later." Instead, though, it trusts the data verbatim, and if you use the odometer to plan maintenance ( like a chain lube every 100 miles instead of when it gets creaky ) it's a bad idea.
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Old 02-01-11, 03:20 AM
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Do you like it?

Yes. After nearly buying a 705 for about 2 years i finally plumbed for the 800 upon release. after a couple of months use i love it.

Is it worth the money?

In my opinion yes. I recently moved to a new area, like riding long distances, have a terrible sense of direction and am a stats freak so i suits all my needs.

How is Garmin connect working?
no problems whatsoever. I also track all my workouts usin an excel spread sheet so i can see things like monthly mileage etc. I also like connect for sharing rides ad analysis routes, elevations etc

Do you get good contour mapping on your screen?
I use the city navigator mapping so no. however there is a different bundle available that includes contour mapping.

Care to give us a review?

sure, here is my review of the 800.
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