Holux, any experiences?

veronese68

Not a posh whore, a GPS tracker/computer thingy.
Has anyone got any experience of these? Somebody mentioned one, possibly Mudcow.
I'm thinking of buying a GP245 GPS logger to replace my old cycle computer that has died. It looks as though you can upload files to a pc, then presumably onto Strava if necessary.
It has a battery life of 28hours per charge so would easily track any all day rides, or a weeks riding. Much cheaper than a Garmin. I've seen them for £35.

davis

Hmm. I wouldn't.

The MTK chipset is pretty nifty, but that particular model doesn't log what I'd call enough data. The 200000 datapoints is enough for ~2.5 weeks' continuous logging (i.e. plenty) but it reduces the amount of data logged. It apparently doesn't log fix quality in any case. That looks like a deliberately hamstrung piece of kit. I'll have a poke around.

In general though, Holux are good. You need a screen, 'cos you're looking to replace a computer, right?
And, the obvious question: do you have a smartphone?

mudcow007

Veronese68 wrote:

Not a posh whore, a GPS tracker/computer thingy.
Has anyone got any experience of these? Somebody mentioned one, possibly Mudcow.
I'm thinking of buying a GP245 GPS logger to replace my old cycle computer that has died. It looks as though you can upload files to a pc, then presumably onto Strava if necessary.
It has a battery life of 28hours per charge so would easily track any all day rides, or a weeks riding. Much cheaper than a Garmin. I've seen them for £35.

ive got a GPSport 245 thingy

its cool, battery lasts for ages, ive never uploaded to strava but i think its possible

the only thing i have done is hooked it up to Holux's own software (Ez Tour) which downloads all the routes from the device to show where/ how fast you have been going

its nifty, if you have seen it for £35 id personally buy it

veronese68

I have a smartphone which is fine for the occasional shortish ride. Battery life is not good enough for my occasional very long ride.
That has a screen that shows various things, speed, time, compass, and other things. There is a better one, but it's more money. It just seems that at simple computer money it's a bargain, I can't spend nigh on £100 on what is really a toy.
I saw the figure of 200,000 waypoints, but it's hard to visualise. Does this mean that the longer you have it running the longer the gap between measurements? So a shorter interval between uploads will give a smoother track.
Mudcow, how easy is their software?
It was the GPSport 245 I was looking at. The £35 is on Ebay from the far east (beyond Belgium) it's available in the UK for £55 here. Considering the £13 carriage from the orient that makes the UK option seem sensible.
Thanks for the advice so far.

mudcow007

you can set the log to be anything from 1sec to 60mins or distant so the 200,000 way points have been a-ok for me. Ive had mine for over 12months now - if you do over the 200,000 you can overwrite or stop the record (this has never happened with me over 4,000 miles)

there is another model with built in HRM but its florescent yellow (if you swing that way)

**touches wood** i've never had any issues with my including being caught in heavy rain/ snow an hail

davis

Veronese68 wrote:

I have a smartphone which is fine for the occasional shortish ride. Battery life is not good enough for my occasional very long ride.

Add-on battery packs are available, and might be useful for more situations that just riding. They might be cheap, too.

I saw the figure of 200,000 waypoints, but it's hard to visualise. Does this mean that the longer you have it running the longer the gap between measurements? So a shorter interval between uploads will give a smoother track.

Don't worry about it. I'm being a GPS geek. There are 86400 seconds in a week, so that'd be able to store ~2.5 weeks' data at 1Hz. You should definitely set it at 1Hz, and be done with it.
(Edit). Erm, no there aren't. 86400 seconds in a day. D'oh. Memory fail. Therefore it can store ~55 hours' data.


The only thing I'm dubious about is what data it actually logs. Frankly time/date, position and velocity will probably be plenty for your purposes. That model doesn't log the quality of the position (more or less how many satellites it can "see"), but I really *hope* it'd store velocity.

It's a good price. Assuming it stores the velocity then I think it'll serve you well. According to some random page on t'internet it does do velocity (it makes mention of the GPVTG string).

mudcow007

one thing to note is it struggles to measure height/ climbs etc an can be a bit erratic - i think alot of GPS devices suffer this though

id like to use my smartphone to use strava but i would sooner smash a £50 computer than a £300 iphone

veronese68

Thanks again. Sounds like it's plenty for me. I'll wait until after my birthday (next week) to check nobody buys me the wrong thing though. Additional batteries and a mount for my iPhone would cost more than the Holux thingy.
Mudcow you should be able to upload to Strava as the Holux says it supports .gpx files which I believe work with Strava.
Davis, as a self confessed GPS geek, what's this thing I've heard that if you leave a GPS unit on your desk and tracking for a while it sort of calibrates itself and that makes it more accurate? I was also told you should do this every couple of weeks to maintain the accuracy. Any truth to it?

SimonAH

Don't buy one of the.ones that Voldemort hid bits of.his soul inside.

veronese68

SimonAH wrote:

Don't buy one of the.ones that Voldemort hid bits of.his soul inside.

Have you been at the 'shrooms again? I think I probably deserve a "whooosh", apologies if I'm being thick.

EKE_38BPM

Veronese68 wrote:

Thanks again. Sounds like it's plenty for me. I'll wait until after my birthday (next week) to check nobody buys me the wrong thing though. Additional batteries and a mount for my iPhone would cost more than the Holux thingy.
Mudcow you should be able to upload to Strava as the Holux says it supports .gpx files which I believe work with Strava.
Davis, as a self confessed GPS geek, what's this thing I've heard that if you leave a GPS unit on your desk and tracking for a while it sort of calibrates itself and that makes it more accurate? I was also told you should do this every couple of weeks to maintain the accuracy. Any truth to it?

I think that if you do that and the GPS says it has moved, then there has been an earthquake/tectonic plate shift. In the Japanese (or was it the Boxing Day) tsunami, one tectonic plate moved vertically 100 metres (which explains the massive tsunami) and earthquakes definitely move the plates around. Either that or your GPS is a bit pants.

SimonAH

Sorry, probably being too obscure for what was a weak joke anyway, Holux / Horcrux,

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_ ... rry_Potter

davis

Veronese68 wrote:

Davis, as a self confessed GPS geek, what's this thing I've heard that if you leave a GPS unit on your desk and tracking for a while it sort of calibrates itself and that makes it more accurate? I was also told you should do this every couple of weeks to maintain the accuracy. Any truth to it?

Ah. That is, as Plato used to say, "cobblers".

There is some small truth to the fact that it {edit: "it" being keeping it still with a good view of the sky; your desk probably isn't outside!} will make it slightly easier for it get its initial lock... e.g. it'll grab the latest almanac from the first satellite it sees, use that to start searching for the rest, get a good lock off e.g. 5+, then discard the ones that are producing spurious results. That process now takes about 30 seconds, and in the case of one of those MTK chipset jobbies is really pretty bloody impressive.

Basically, once it's got a blinky light that says "position fixed/locked" then off you toddle.

Yukirin

anyone got experience of the route planner on the gpsport 260? Would it be able to navigate me around the surrey lanes from an uploaded gpx file? Or do I really need to be looking for something with maps like the bryton? Or hold out until I can afford a garmin?

whitebait01

I've got a 260Pro. Haven't tried the route planning but the logging is great.

Locks quickly (although can take a minute or two when leaving work with all the tall buildings around).

The Holux software's pretty good and shows you cadence and HR data. I export the data from it as a .gpx to upload to strava. It seems to strip the HR and cadence when converting to GPX, but the actual location/speed logging is fine. I've got it set to log once a second and I think I end up with around a month of logs on it at a time. It overwrites itself when it fills up but I think that option can be switched off. The apparent inability to export HR/cadence data means I rarely bother using HRM or cadence sensors and in hindsight would probably just get the normal 260, or the 245 maybe. Good bit of kit though, been using it since last October and it's not once let me down.

buricl

whitebait01 wrote:

The Holux software's pretty good and shows you cadence and HR data. I export the data from it as a .gpx to upload to strava. It seems to strip the HR and cadence when converting to GPX, but the actual location/speed logging is fine.

HR and cadence data are not stripped. They are written in format not recognized by Strava. It is possible to modify exported gpx file to make these data visible to Strava. See my post in other thread.