Can Activity tracker automatically differentiate between walking and cycling, on 735

It doesn't work like the Basis Peak. To record an activity as a run you have to select it on the watch and start and stop it yourself.

It's a bit more sophisticated than a Basis Peak.

By just wearing it, you're missing out on a lot of the advanced functionality this watch has. You need to learn more about it. There are plenty of resources you can use to learn about the 735XT. DC Rainmaker is one of the best reviewer of sports technology (he's actually probably the best out there). Then there's always the user manual.

I am coming the Basis Peak world where the activity tracker automatically detects and logs walking, running, and cycling. On the 735XT, the activity tracking picks up steps just fine, but after uploading to GC, I am not seeing any differentiation in the graph between walking, running and cycling or other exercise. Note, I know I can explicitly enable tracking for running and other exercises from the watch, I am looking for auto detection of those things when I don't explicitly select them on the watch.

Is this even a possibility on the 735XT or on the backend after the data has been uploaded to GC?

If you're looking for that kind of automatic functionality on a Garmin, you might be interested in something like the vivoactive HR.

If you're looking for that kind of automatic functionality on a Garmin, you might be interested in something like the vivoactive HR.

While the va-hr has "MoveIQ", all it does is mark things in your calendar (no recording of an activity) and tends to be quite confused about what you are doing (you're get "swimming" when you plant shrubs, for example!) I have a va-hr and turned MoveIQ off..... I start an activity when I'm doing an activity.

ROTFL, more sophisticated eh, the Peak, will auto detect activities and also allows me to manually start and stop an activity and then go back and reclassify it from the web interface, I'm not quite sure how you would say the 735XT is more sophisticated than that (from a health/activity tracker point of view), maybe I am missing something, can you expand further?

As to the manual, given the rapid number of firmware updates just this year alone, I am not sure that the user manual is the best way to go. Notwithstanding all the customization I see people doing via IQ.

As to DCRainmaker, I spend several hours a month reading his technical goodness ;-)

As to the advanced functionality, I am aware of many of those features, that was not my question which is about effective automatic activity/health tracking in addition to the standard and special Garmin advanced features.

It doesn't work like the Basis Peak. To record an activity as a run you have to select it on the watch and start and stop it yourself.

It's a bit more sophisticated than a Basis Peak.

By just wearing it, you're missing out on a lot of the advanced functionality this watch has. You need to learn more about it. There are plenty of resources you can use to learn about the 735XT. DC Rainmaker is one of the best reviewer of sports technology (he's actually probably the best out there). Then there's always the user manual.

Good to know Jim, I think I'll keep looking for a non-garmin replacement health/fitness tracker then. I had originally hoped that replacing my FR225 with a 735XT would eventually allow me to replace most of the functions of the Basis Peak with a single device, the 24/7 HRM is not bad, same for Sleep tracking. I have seen mixed comments here in the forums and online about MoveIQ issues, so I am not surprised. The Peak is actually QUITE good at detecting activity and properly classifying it for the activities it automatically detects.

So I guess my question now is, is there a good WATERPROOF Garmin health/fitness tracker with Optical HRM and with accurate activity autodetection that I can use alongside my 735XT?

While the va-hr has "MoveIQ", all it does is mark things in your calendar (no recording of an activity) and tends to be quite confused about what you are doing (you're get "swimming" when you plant shrubs, for example!) I have a va-hr and turned MoveIQ off..... I start an activity when I'm doing an activity.

Why, because it's useful information,especially when compared over time. I use the start/stop of the recording feature in the Garmin when I am training, just like I run an app on my phone that does similar tracking during training. These are things I've been doing for years, so that's nothing new in relation to using the 735 or my previous 225. What's new is being able to see how that training affects day to day activities, too much, too little, affect on sleep etc. I've been using the Basis devices for the past 2 years so have lots of data to look at and compare, some of it's kinda boring and some of it's quite fascinating, especially when you get a result you don't expect, both in a positive and negative light. That then feeds back into how I do my training. It comes down to more usable info is good in my books. I also collect data like blood pressure and other metrics too.

In a nutshell, once you get used to this rich data set, it's hard to unlearn/let go of that.

Does that make sense?

Out of interest, why are you concerned about auto detection of activities?

I can't speak for everybody of course but personally I almost always make a specific point of going for a run or going for a bike ride so would always want to "start" that activity with zero time on the stopwatch and press Stop on the timer when done. I always viewed the activity tracker (so in low power mode) on these Garmin devices just for random walking about during the day.

If you never bother to "record" activities then the 735 is a very overpriced pure activity tracker and not fit for your purpose I would suggest.

> I use the start/stop of the recording feature in the Garmin when I am training

I guess what I was confused about is whether you also run and cycle when you are not training per se and so may benefit from auto detection in such situations?

Tim, I agree... I doubt ANY device can auto detect the difference between "going for a walk" and "going for a hike" (I do seem to record a bunch of Hiking! :) ). Why do I want it to "guess", when I KNOW what I'm doing, and can quite simply tell the watch.

Low end devices might try, but it's no more than a guess and a general category...

I'll have to respectfully disagree from experience. The Basis Peak is VERY good at distinguishing between walking, running and cycling, and personally that's mostly what I care about from a day to day perspective, when I am NOT explicitly training. I think those are useful metrics when tied together with heart rate. Also great for impromptu exercise when you don't have your Garmin device on as below.

When I go for a training run or other explict exercise experience, I also have on my Garmin (first a FR225 and now the 735) and I start and stop it at the start and stop of the training.

It's clear that the device I want doesn't exist from Garmin or seemingly anyone else for that matter, so I'll just drop it and hope Santa shows up with something later this year ;-)