Essentials for your Garmin home screen

bernithebiker

Was curious what everyone puts on their 1st, main Garmin* screen in case I'm missing anything useful.

Here's mine (on a 510);

Gear Position (yeah baby!), just need to learn to stop looking down at the cassette now
Speed - kind of essential really
HR - essential for gauging effort
Compass - essential for not getting lost and/or wind direction
Time of Day - so as to not to anger the missus
Distance - essential for those Strava challenges

Gear Position took the place of Elapsed Time, but I'm missing it, so I need to go up to 7 fields.

My mate only has 3 fields but he's shortsighted.........

2nd screen is all heart stuff, 3rd mostly elevation and averages, 4th gear and battery





*other good GPS devices are available......

slowbike

speed, lap speed
cadence, heart rate
lap distance, 3s power
gradient, temperature
lap time, time of day

I have a screen set up for general pottering (not often used) and another for TTing (focusing on power & hr)

ddraver

On the roadie

Cadence
Speed
Distance - HR Zone
Time - Grade

On the MTB

Speed
Distance
time - HR Zone
Elevation - Grade

NeXXus

Speed Hr Cadence Distance Time. Elevation/averages/odo + more on screen 2.

Less fields = bigger and easier to see info.

This is on an Edge 1000 though

markhewitt1978

bernithebiker wrote:

Was curious what everyone puts on their 1st, main Garmin* screen in case I'm missing anything useful.

Here's mine (on a 510);

Gear Position (yeah baby!), just need to learn to stop looking down at the cassette now
Speed - kind of essential really
HR - essential for gauging effort
Compass - essential for not getting lost and/or wind direction
Time of Day - so as to not to anger the missus
Distance - essential for those Strava challenges

Gear Position took the place of Elapsed Time, but I'm missing it, so I need to go up to 7 fields.
My mate only has 3 fields but he's shortsighted.........
2nd screen is all heart stuff, 3rd mostly elevation and averages, 4th gear and battery

*other good GPS devices are available......

I don't have one - yet, but bare minimum for me would be

Time of day - Amazing how many cycle computers you can't have that on the screen with everything else.
Distance
Heart Rate
Cadence

That's about it really. I would disagree that speed is essential, you've got a pretty good idea that you're going slow or going fast the actual number is more of a 'ooh that's interesting' metric than anything useful.

thegreatdivide

Speed
Distance
Gradient
HR
Cadence
TOD

I don't get that Di2 gear thing. The only time I look at the cassette is on a climb when I'm praying for an extra cog.

iron-clover

I have 4 screens on mine depending on what I'm doing- general riding, hills/ info of interest, racing and a summary screen.

'Home' screen:
SPEED
HR
Cadence : Time (of day)

Racing screen:
HR!!!
Speed
Lap time

maltloaf_df

Edge 800

This is my usual screen when on a normal ride

Elapsed time - Current Speed
Total Distance - Average Speed
Calories - Heading
Grade % - Total Ascent
Heart Rate (actual) - Cadence (actual)

I do also have a more simplified screen when I'm chasing average speeds etc. (auto lap set to 1 mile)

Current Lap Average Speed
Current Lap Distance
Heart Rate (actual)
Last Lap Average Speed - Actual Speed

dyrlac

On my 500: Elapsed, speed, distance, cadence, time of day, compass; autolap every km which just flashes the elapsed time. Only look at HR after the fact. Laughed about the gear indicator above, but then realised that when I'm riding the best bike, I really miss the Sora shifter indicators.

bernithebiker

I found that I was always checking my cassette to see what gear I was in, maybe just a bad habit, but the indicator solves it.

I think if you suddenly asked most riders to guess what gear they were in, about 50% would get it right, 25% be 1 gear off, and 25% more than 2 gears off.

If you're racing and an attack brews up, it's useful to know your gear, so as to pre-empt a potential front shift.

tartysurfer

Cadence then HR and Speed (all current not avg.) on a Garmin 500 with 10km auto lap. Cadence and HR is for me, I lead some rides, so find speed a good way to gauge if we are on the target avg., seems easier knowing what we need on flats and climbs, rather than chase a moving average. Time and distance, well they will be what they will be.

chris_bass

maltloaf_df wrote:

Edge 800

This is my usual screen when on a normal ride

Elapsed time - Current Speed
Total Distance - Average Speed
Calories - Heading
Grade % - Total Ascent
Heart Rate (actual) - Cadence (actual)

I do also have a more simplified screen when I'm chasing average speeds etc. (auto lap set to 1 mile)

Current Lap Average Speed
Current Lap Distance
Heart Rate (actual)
Last Lap Average Speed - Actual Speed

As a word of caution, calories is basically just a made up number.

markhewitt1978

Chris Bass wrote:

As a word of caution, calories is basically just a made up number.

Even then it's a number I would use after a ride to compare it with others. Not something I'd need to see while I'm on the bike

chris_bass

markhewitt1978 wrote:

Chris Bass wrote:

As a word of caution, calories is basically just a made up number.

Even then it's a number I would use after a ride to compare it with others. Not something I'd need to see while I'm on the bike

Yeah, me too, I have a look after a ride but don't pay much attention to it, I have heard of people basing diets and things around it which is not a great idea!

If i don't have my heart rate monitor on the calories it says I burn is something like 1000 an hour which would mean i'd need an average heart rate of about 250 bpm (based on what it says when i am wearing it)

maltloaf_df

My calories display is more of an(other) encouragement effort, as in today I want to exceed x calories burned. I know it's a largely arbitrary number but I like it.

triban

edge 500:

Speed (top half of screen)
Avg. speed
Distance
Elevation gain
Heart rate - which i haven't used at all in 12 months, should really change it to something else

i wouldn't want to know what time it was, i think that would have a negative impact on the relaxation aspect for me.

slowbike

triban wrote:

i wouldn't want to know what time it was, i think that would have a negative impact on the relaxation aspect for me.

Depends really - 2 thoughts -
a) although not time pressured I usually know when my wife will be returning from one of her rides so can time my return accordingly.
b) during a commute it can help if I've taken an alternative route as I know if I've got time to put an extra loop in or not ...

I could look at my watch - but with enough display boxes on the computer it's easy to put on there.

markhewitt1978

triban wrote:

i wouldn't want to know what time it was, i think that would have a negative impact on the relaxation aspect for me.

Depends, if you have all day to do whatever you want, then that's fine. For the rest of us, we have promises to be back for lunch etc.

Dippydog3

bernithebiker wrote:

Was curious what everyone puts on their 1st, main Garmin* screen in case I'm missing anything useful.

Here's mine (on a 510);

Gear Position (yeah baby!), just need to learn to stop looking down at the cassette now
Speed - kind of essential really
HR - essential for gauging effort
Compass - essential for not getting lost and/or wind direction
Time of Day - so as to not to anger the missus
Distance - essential for those Strava challenges
Gear Position took the place of Elapsed Time, but I'm missing it, so I need to go up to 7 fields.
My mate only has 3 fields but he's shortsighted.........
2nd screen is all heart stuff, 3rd mostly elevation and averages, 4th gear and battery
*other good GPS devices are available......

Gear. No, no Di2.
Speed. No, couldnt care less.
HR. Yes.
Compass. No.
Time. No.
Distance. Yes.
and......
Cadence

eddiefiola

Edge 1000

Power 3s Ave
Speed
Distance | Heart rate
Avg Speed | Cadence
Power 30s Ave | Time

Same on Screen 2 but for Laps

Bar Shaker

Cadence
Speed
HR
HR Zone
Av Speed
Cassette gear
Di2 battery level

mugensi

Speed.
Distance. Duration.
Cadence. Slope.

Dippydog3

I am interested at to why so many like speed displayed.

I never look at mine. Its a function of slope, wind, effort, heart rate etc. Doesnt really mean anything to me. For the same effort I may bevgoing 10kph or 60kph. Why bother looking?

iPete

Power 3 second avg.
Speed (rarely look at this)
Cadence
Temperature
Time of day when commuting or duration if racing.

FatTed

On Power up "please return to FatTed with phone number"

On Home screen
Power 3s average
HR
Cadence

bobmcstuff

On an 810:
Outdoor:
Speed
Distance
Time Elapsed
Cadence
HR
I can see the argument for having time of day but I tend to plan when I'm going to be back before I go (for the misses' benefit) so based on elapsed time and distance it's pretty easy to judge whether I'm on track.

Indoor I just have:
Total time
Lap time
HR
Cadence

markhewitt1978

Dippydog3 wrote:

I am interested at to why so many like speed displayed.

I never look at mine. Its a function of slope, wind, effort, heart rate etc. Doesnt really mean anything to me. For the same effort I may bevgoing 10kph or 60kph. Why bother looking?

Force of habit I guess because all cycle computers since they first came about have speed as the biggest displayed number, and speed is the biggest display when driving a car, so people are used to wanting to know what their speed is.

wongataa

Dippydog3 wrote:

I am interested at to why so many like speed displayed.

Because they are interested in knowing how fast they are going most likely. That's the reason I have speed displayed on mine.

I have on my main screen:
Current speed
Trip Distance
Average speed
Cadence
Heart rate

Bar Shaker

Out of interest, am I the only person who wears a watch when riding?

supermurph09

Dippydog3 wrote:

I am interested at to why so many like speed displayed.

I never look at mine. Its a function of slope, wind, effort, heart rate etc. Doesnt really mean anything to me. For the same effort I may bevgoing 10kph or 60kph. Why bother looking?

The only reason I have speed on mine is for when I'm going downhill to reaffirm when I need to dab the brakes.

Power
Cadence
Elapsed Time
Distance
Speed

bernithebiker

Bar Shaker wrote:

Out of interest, am I the only person who wears a watch when riding?

Maybe, I haven't worn a watch for years.

When you have a phone, computer, Garmin, do you really need one?

I find it quite liberating not to wear one....!