The Garmin Edge 500 Thread

[gumgardner]

I went with the US National grid. It was correct.

I gotta say, this is the nicest bike computer I've ever used. Easy, accurate and looks great. I'm happy now that my Polar computer broke

[mcrdave]

Hi,

Mine takes at least a couple of minutes from turning on to connecting to satellites. Is this normal?

Just wondered,

thanks

[mrfish]

Yes, normal. It's trying to use timing differences from signals from satellites orbiting the earth to pin down your position. So there's a lot of simultaneous equation solving going on to get a fix, then after that it can update very quickly, no doubt using some shortcuts. Thus if you switch it off, then on again within an hour or something, it restarts very quickly. It's also quicker to re-fix if you keep still so that it's not trying to work out where it is while moving as that increases the error of the fix.

Personally I'm very pleased with my Edge 500. I figured out how to upload courses to it from bikeroutetoaster.com recently and found that I could use it to do 35 mile routes on back lanes I'd never used before without getting lost or riding more than 400 metres on a main road! For that it's worth the purchase price alone as I could never be bothered to do that with a map as I would be checking turns every 5 minutes and questioning my sanity after 3 right turns in a row.

It even has turn indicators, i.e. in 200m turn right... It's not as good as car sat nav, but perfect for training in a new location or doing a sportif ride. Also even if you have no course pre-loaded you can look at the course map and see where you've been so that you can get back to the start. Also you can repeat exactly the same route and compare times etc... So now I know our tandem is much slower overall on rides, but only because I ride much harder on my own. It's aboiut as fast on the flat for much less effort. No surprise, but nice to know.

If you need more than this, probably better to look for a new hobby like orienteering, MTBing or rambling.

[LionelB]

Enjoying my new Edge 500. Some weird behavior with Garmin connect though.

I have only a power meter installed (Powertap). No speed or cadence.

Garmin connect is reporting a cadence graph on every ride though

Any idea?

[jmilliron]

Your PT provides a cadence estimate to the Garmin. I guess it judges by the dead spot in your pedal stroke. The average is actually really accurate.

[MrAK]

Your PT provides a cadence estimate to the Garmin. I guess it judges by the dead spot in your pedal stroke. The average is actually really accurate.

It has to report cadence as that's how power is calculated. I also found it very accurate.

[LionelB]

Cool. Thanks for the feedback. I did not realize that. Turns out that I thought this was pretty accurate but had no idea how it was done!

[mayhem]

Cadence has nothing to do with the power calculation. Wheel rotation does.

Cadence is calculated by the power peaks in your pedal stroke. Peak power is ~2x avg power per stroke so it's pretty easy to pick out although it's limited to 40-120 rpm with the Powertap (or was with the LYC/Cervo)

[MrAK]

Cadence has nothing to do with the power calculation. Wheel rotation does.

Ah yes - Powertap - my bad. Too used to SRM / Quarq.

[LionelB]

Another Garmin connect question. ONce you have downloaded an activity there is there any way to extract the original .fit file ?

[rgkicksbutt]

Nope, only a .tcx file, AFAIK

[LionelB]

Garmin confirmed to me that GTC cannot create workout with power zones. They recommended to create the workout directly on the device which is a real pain.

Is there any non garmin SW that can be used to create workout with power zone and download them into the Edge 500?

[rgkicksbutt]

Interesting, I can

[GZA]

Nope, only a .tcx file, AFAIK

I think you can just grab it straight of the CPU via Windows Explorer or similar.

[LionelB]

Interesting, I can

what sw is that GTC?