So it begins.
I will have mine Fenix 5 on Saturday and will start doing comparisons to an Ambit 3 Peak. I don't have an F3 to directly compare to as of now.
Anyone have an F3 and F5 to compare?
I would go so far to say that I can ignore his assessments for the following reasons:
From Fellnr's methodology,
"I ran the same route repeatedly"
I don't run the same route repeatedly and neither do most people. I don't run HIS route and I don't run at HIS location. My watch certainly doesn't use the same satellites that he uses.
"The course is challenging for GPS, with lots of twists, tree cover, power lines, turn arounds and goes under a bridge"
Challenges in one location will be different based a number of factors: latitude, time of day, how you wear the watch, GLONASS, surrounding structures...etc.
"I believe that it's reasonably representative of real-world conditions"
I don't
"probably less challenging than running in the city with skyscrapers."
How can he make this assumption if he hasn't tested GPS in other locations?
Basically, this test is ironclad for anyone running this route over and over again and represents n=1. To try and apply universally is poor science at best.
Smart recording only differs from every-second in how it records the data to the FIT file. Either way, a GPS location is calculated once a second and the watch calculates distance and pace from GPS data plus, probably, accelerometer/gyro data, and the total distance is the same whether you use smart recording or not. It is not smart locating. The only time a Garmin GPS computes location less than once a second is in Ultratrac mode.
Smart recording is a total red herring for overall distance as displayed on the watch and in Garmin Connect (which is directly reported from the watch, not recalculated).
That is a pretty good track, though, and if they all looked like that, this thread would probably be a lot shorter :)
Smart recording only differs from every-second in how it records the data to the FIT file. Either way, a GPS location is calculated once a second and the watch calculates distance and pace from GPS data plus, probably, accelerometer/gyro data, and the total distance is the same whether you use smart recording or not. It is not smart locating. The only time a Garmin GPS computes location less than once a second is in Ultratrac mode.
Smart recording is a total red herring for overall distance as displayed on the watch and in Garmin Connect (which is directly reported from the watch, not recalculated).
That is a pretty good track, though, and if they all looked like that, this thread would probably be a lot shorter :)
Satellites have fly patterns. You'll be using some of the satellites he uses to test at different times; welcome to 2017 and science!
You could apply those questions to any form of GPS watch test, to be honest! Show me a better 'one man band' using some form of consistent process - no jazzy website with fancy referral links everywhere, that simply acts as another marketing tool, and we can reference your website instead. How about that?
Comments like yours are uneducated. Would be nice to have an 'educated' filter on this forum, tbh.
I believe you are right re SMART recording. I also think SMART gives a smoother pace, or am I wrong?
Here is another track which was quite good https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1678176029 (also SMART, no GLONASS)
