Garmin Forerunner 405 Wireless GPS-Enabled Sport Watch with USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor (Black)
by Garmin
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Garmin Forerunner 405 Wireless GPS-Enabled Sport Watch with USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor (Black)
Customer Review: Motivating
Summary: 4 Stars
I've been using the 405 since December. A few observations:
1) It's not small by watch standards, but insanely small by GPS standards. I recommend checking one out at a store to see for yourself. You won't even notice it when running. This is a big plus -- You don't want to look like you're heading to a Star Trek convention when jogging.
2) The watch has a touch sensitive bezel (the ring around the face) which is a bit temperamental. It works, but not as easily or as obviously as two more buttons could have been.
3) The GPS is really accurate. The tracks will easily show which side of the street you ran on.
4) The GPS locks on quickly. This is a big deal and Garmin did a fine job here. Nobody wants to stand around in a 39 degree rainstorm waiting on their gear.
5) The Garmin Training Center software that comes with the 305 and 405 is mostly lame and has annoying bugs. It will keep basic statistics and draw graphs of your pace, altitude, heart-rate, and a few other bits. The stats are useful - I like hitting each 100 mile increment for the year. The cool feature is the ability to see your path in Google earth. Fun, but you obviously won't keep using it for the same old routes.
6) Absolutely get the heart-rate monitor option. It's my first experience with a heart rate monitor and I found it insightful to gauge the physical stress from jogging with heart rate. Up hills and down hills show up loud and clear in your heart-rate.
For reasons I can't quite put my finger on, the 405 is an extra motivation for me to get out there. That counts for something.
One final bit: My wife dropped mine and put a dent in the bezel. After that, the screen was permanently blank. I'm not sure if this means they're overly delicate, but I'm taking extra care just in case.
I'll add a well earned plug for REI, who replaced my dropped and broken 405 with zero hassle. I didn't even miss a jog!
Customer Review: Huge Disappointment
Summary: 2 Stars
If you are a runner prone to sweating, running in the dark (early morning or late evening) or like easy to read displays than this in NOT the watch for you.
- Bezel is either too sensitive or not sensitive enough - meaning it picks up unintentional touches taking you off the screen you want or it often fails to recognize deliperate touches on the bezel (especially when wet with sweat). Because you either have to "one touch" or "touch and hold" to get to main screens - sometimes the watch doesn't know the difference between the two selections and you end up trying to figure it out literally, on the run -which is overwhelming frustrating and dangerous.
- Poor display, too small - the read out is so small it's difficult to read (looking at the watch in a store or online doesn't do it justice....remember you'll be moving while trying to read the screen and the read out is too small to accomodate for this. Thus it renders the watch virtually useless until you zdownload your information while sncying after the workout.
- Only monitors 3 things at once - If you are runing and want to see time, pace and distance then you'll need to forgo the heartrate. Or if you want the heartrate then you need to forgo one of the others. Thus interval training is a problem with this watch.
- Light - in order to see the light you need to unlock the bezel "on the run" which isn't a huge hassel but chances are during the course of unlocking it, while running, you or a piece of your clothing inadvertantly touch the bezel and it will take you off the screen you want while trying to turn the light on. Long and short of it - if you want to keep the screen, you need to lock the bezel - if you try to unlock the bexel so you can turn on the light, you will more than likely lose the screen you want.
I would not recommend this watch to anyone. Get the 305!
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Customer Review: Could be improved
Summary: 3 Stars
The warnings don't seem to function properly. I used the practice software to create my jogging workouts for distances and pace zones. When I first start my run, the 405 alerted me that I needed to 'speed up' and shortly thereafter alerted me that I was 'within my zone'. That's that last I heard from it. Even when I would slow below my defined pace zone while ascending a hill or exceed the pace zone when descending a hill, the 405 was silent. No audible alert or visual message was given to speed up or slow down as the case may have been. I wrote to Garmin and we walked through all the settings that I had gone through to establish my Pace Zones and create a new 'advanced' workout. We all agreed that the 405 should be alerting me when outside the defined zone for the workout. They concluded they would have to escalate my problem to their engineering group to see if we were missing something. I've used the Forerunner 305 in the past. It is an excellent GPS enabled sports watch/HRM. Sorry I didn't stick with the 305 when I bought a new foot-pod based/HRM. But I didn't and after a year of waiting and after saving the big bucks for the new and exciting Forerunner 405, I couldn't wait to get back to the GPS-based training world. How disappointed I am to realize that I spent major dollars on a tool that has some serious flaws. I like Garmin, but I am really surprised that this went to market with the many user-reported flaws that are out there. Shame on me for not reading them first! I'm boxing up the 405 and sending it back for a 100% refund tomorrow. Yes - I just ordered a NEW 305 to replace this sleek! The disapoinments: the 405 doesn't respond to wet (can you say sweaty) fingers! That bites! And the motionbased user forum has several user complaints about screen malfunctions, etc when the unit gets wet from a rain, etc. Never had that problem with the 305.
Customer Review: Excellent when it works - Frustrating when it doesn't
Summary: 1 Stars
The touch sensitive bezel is the downfall of this watch.
it completely stops functioning when the slights bit damp/wet - like at the end of any workout. I've also had multiple experiences when not only the bezel is non-functional, but also the 2 buttons don't function when damp - which is surprising because these should be mechanical.
The Buttons are used among other things to stop/stop/lap and lock/unlock the bezel.
While running, the data is great HR monitor accurate and sensitive, pace and GPS functions just fine. The auto-lap feature is particularly useful. The configurable display fields are handy for different activities (I wore the watch on a bike trip and you can configure the display to show things like grade etc..). Multiple displays are handy , but you tend to configure one for each activity and leave it set to that display.
A Huge Huge downside is the lack of Mac compatibility. I purchased the watch in May, was told by the store that it was compatible. I found out later it wasn't and a Mac connectivity program was promised for November. The latest word is Jan 09 - it can't be that hard to do.
Battery life initially sucked - updated firmware have improved this - with the original firmware , I got 4 hours of GPS/HR function and then it died - in the middle of a Marathon.
knowing what I know now - I would not get this watch or recommend it - you don't want to worry about not being able to stop your watch or look at the results at the end of a workout.
The watch has also completely locked up on me - although now I know how to reset it - hold both buttons down for 6+ seconds and follow the instructions on the face.
for Mac users - until they come out with the Mac "ANT" software - you can't upload your data to your computer , or update the firmware , unless you borrow someone's PC or go to a Garmin store.
Customer Review: Spectacular way to track your fitness
Summary: 5 Stars
I purchased this last week, and have used it for a couple runs and a nice long walk. So far, it's a spectacular device that has helped me tune my runs, average my times, and track my fitness with data to back it up. It's huge to be able to track run distances, paces, AND heart rate all simultaneously in order to best improve my routines.
The good:
- The heart rate monitor and Ant+ devices synced up on the first try without any problems at all. This is huge, as it seems Bluetooth and related technologies always have trouble marrying.
- It works even in the city, with buildings around. I used it on a run through downtown yesterday, and it kept my exact track. Pretty accurate with large buildings at every angle.
- Simple to read face, and easy to switch between views. It's currently set up to read heart rate on one screen and pace/distance/time on the other. One small tap and it changes. Great!
- Wearable outside of running! I can't stress this enough - though it is a little bulky, it looks NORMAL! You can wear it as a daily watch and not feel like some kind of freak with a huge sports watch / Dick Tracy cameraphone watch.
- Works even when I sweat. Contrary to several other reviewers, I've not had a problem using the bezel even when I sweat. I sweat like a horse, so if I don't have the problem, I'm surprised others do.
The bad:
- The charger is a bit cruddy- it can be a pain to make sure the holes line up perfectly.
- Carrying a charger and a separate stick for computer connections is kind of a pain - I'd love to see them combine the two
Overall, I give the Forerunner 405 very high marks. It has made me WANT to go out and run, which is key for a lot of folks. I can track my goals online and work to meet them. I love it.