My 920Xt just quit working i went with a Fenix 5X sapphire.

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All I Wanted Was A Pepsi, Just One Pepsi

Team Zoot, Team Zoot Mid-Atlantic

I got a Vantage M about 9 months ago.
(Previously using a Garmin 910xt - 1st 910 was fine for about 4 years then died, so did the repair/overhaul/exchange replacement (about £80) that died fairly quickly (but just outside the 90 day warranty)... replaced.... next died soon, replaced, died...

So I got the Vantage M.

It does pretty much all I needed.
Optical HR is OK (but need to note all Optical HRs are not perfect esp. for intervals) so I use an existing Wahoo TickR chest strap that is bluetooth + Ant+.
The Vantage is only Bluetooth (no Ant+) if that bothers you (so a garmin ant+ chest strap device won't talk to it).

Battery life is good - stated 30 hrs and it seems a credible time - I did an XTRI and was out for 14.5 hrs and the battery was at 55% at the end.
Open water gps is better / more accurate than on the 910 or a 920 Ive also tried it with (sorry no comparison to 935 or 945).

The last s/w update gave the option to put the backlight on permanently during sport.

It does tri (and can configure for multiple events/ differences (doesnt have to just be S/B/R).

Swim measurements seem about the same on accuracy as on the Garmin. But for me the Vantage watch must be worn face-out on the wrist (it doesn't detect lengths if the watch face is turned to be on the inside of my wrist - i used to do that to protect the screen from getting scuffed on lane ropes, or hand clashes in open water swims, and as its also just easier for me to read whilst swimming if it's on the inside of my wrist). Maybe a non-issue for many.

The Polar Flow app / web site is to me at least far better than Garmin Connect.

There are a few elements where I'd prefer the Garmin data set on the watch (from the 910) eg the Vantage M only gives last lap for a few seconds, there's no way to set the last lap as one of the customised screens to be able to see permanently.
Also the swim diaplay is in distance by no option for the actual number of laps (sometimes I want to see the number of laps e.g. I've done 17 laps, not just 425m.
(That is a more of a pain when I'm in a quirky 36.3m pool and have to do some sumsin my head whilst swimming). Obvs not a big problem for a 25m or 25yd pool !
Can set the pool length to any distance in M or Yd.

Also on the garmin I can pause and still get the same info displayed. The Vantage reverts to a seperate paused screen, which isn't as helpful to me (this still shows time of day and HR).

Altitude us via gps not barometric on the M (it's barometric on the V).
But given the number of Garmin users who report the barometer failing across lots of garmin devices (910, 920, 935, and now 945 - same shiite across all of them) I'm not bothered about that loss of function (my 910 had a problem of the altitude showing 65,000 feet, then slowly falling to zero then reset to 65000 ft then fall etc etc - and it was a common fault, 2 buddies had the same fail).

Overall... happy with it. As you identify its under half the price of a 945 (wuick UK google search has a vantage M for £190 whilst a 945 is £460+). I can't see the value of more than doubling the spend for the 945 (I'm not arsed about being able to pay using the watch or listen to music off the watch etc so the extra bells and whistles on the 945 are totally a waste to me).

Frankly I would read DCR's reviews to see which you think fits your needs best.

With that said, the recovery metrics on my Polar Vantage are great. I've been wearing it alongside my Whoop most nights for a past 2 months and they track fairly well together. The Polar offers slightly deeper analysis. The UI on the Whoop is better.
The downside to the Polar is that it does not record historic recovery / sleep metrics. I currently screen shot them each morning and then enter into TP manually, which is less than ideal.

Additionally, because I do not wear the Polar throughout the day, (or for cycling workouts) it does not have complete information for my training status as it does not import from training peaks etc.

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The above poster has eschewed traditional employment and is currently undertaking the ill-conceived task of launching his own hardgoods company. Statements are not made on behalf of nor reflective of anything in any manner... unless they're good, then they count.
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The 735XT does about 90% of the 945 for a lot less money. That is the easy value decision if you like your 245 and the Garmin ecosystem. I had a 735XT and I have a 945. The 735XT was fantastic. I only jumped to the 945 because I got a jones for the latest gadgets. The screen is better and it has way better battery life. But for actual training and race function, they are almost identical.

I'm a 920XT user - what happened to yours?

The 945 is a solid option but super pricey. I also had the 935 and that was an excellent overall triathlon watch. The battery life was unbeatable. I bet you could shop around and find one for around $300. There's also been rumors for a while now that Wahoo is going to release their Element Rival watch. I'm guessing 935 type features with a 300-ish price point. But waiting for that watch might be a mistake. It's been 'about to drop' for years.

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YouTube

The Fenix 5 is $299 now ... pretty good deal

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https://www.strava.com/...tes/zachary_mckinney

Where is the F5 @ $300? $350 on Amazon (for me, US).

Fenix 5 for $299: https://mybikeshop.com/...ay-w-black-band.html for example.



I returned Polar Vantage M after less than 2 weeks:
- It was missing 50%+ of my pool meters
- I found the UI clunky and missing things I got used to while using 920xt (info on rest screen during the swim for example)
- Wrist HR was bizarro even in situations where it should have been ok (8min/mile+ jogging)
- Sleeping data and HR was nonsense and was missing completely most of the time.

Hoping Coros Apex will be more reliable, but can't share any info yet. Ordered on Clever Training, it took 2 weeks to ship - holiday rush backorder I guess - and when it was "delivered" according to the USPS tracking, it was nowhere to be found. CT told me to file a claim with USPS first before they do something about it urgh.

It was refurbished model my wife got me for Christmas three years ago. On Christmas day this year the bluetooth quit working, then over the weekend Garmin Connect could not find it. So now it is just a basic watch. My Fenix 5x arrives tomorrow.

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All I Wanted Was A Pepsi, Just One Pepsi

Team Zoot, Team Zoot Mid-Atlantic

Would the 735 last for an entire Ironman, 11+ hours?

Weird timing. Over the last few months my 920XT has stopped recording altitude, has started dropping my HR, has started taking 6 hours to transfer workouts via Bluetooth, etc.

I am also thinking of moving to the Fenix series. How did you settle on the 5X versus the 5X plus or the 6? I'm leaning heavily towards the 5X Plus.

If you don't mind the copycat nature of the device and some limitations in the advanced metrics, the Coros Pace might be worth a look. A 735XT knockoff, it has super long run time. I don't have one, but am thinking about it. DCRainmaker has only a First Look, not a complete review and this does not show up in his comparison charts. But $200 on Amazon!

You've probably already done this, but if not, you might try a factory reset. My 920XT was doing some wonky things out of the blue about 6 weeks ago - one clue was that every activity would get uploaded to GC as usual, but then deleted from the watch. Weird. I did a factory reset and it's all good again. If you want to try this, connect the 920XT to the computer via USB 1st and make a copy of the entire device. If the factory reset works, you'll be able to restore your custom settings, CIQ, courses, etc. from the backup.

Possibly to probably (in the 11-12 hr range) with everything but the essentials turned off (ANT+ only, bluetooth off, GPS only, optical HRM off). Battery isn't bad, but all the extras are definite power drains. DCR does a good analysis on his review - https://www.dcrainmaker.com/...-sports-battery-life. That is under the easiest GPS conditions - static on a roof - with a new device, so I'd take those as the absolute upper limit (open water swim GPS is probably particularly more taxing because of the need for constant re-acquisition/more processing power to make sense of the data).

Are there any articles out there comparing the different Garmin offerings? 5, 5x, 5 plus, 6, instinct, sapphire edition? The price ranges seem large for what seem like minimal differences.

I am coming from a dumb version Garmin 110 though, it barely makes it through a long run now, looking to move into the smart watch market, but could care less whether the watch pairs with my phone and sends me texts and other pointless information. Will the $300 Garmin 5 do just about everything the new $800 offering does or am I missing something.

Thanks.

Probably yes, but it would be on the bubble. I never did a full IM with mine, but battery after a 5-1/2 hour HIM was around 50%. Garmin quotes 14 hours in their specs, but you lose life from gadget connectivity (I use an external HRM & power meter) and features, like lap notifications (little blips of vibration & screen backlight) and GPS & GLONASS. Plus, unless you pull it off the charger at race start, you will probably really start about 5% down for use between the charger to race start.

DCRainmaker does a great job in both his reviews and then with his dynamic product comparison tool:

https://www.dcrainmaker.com/...67,72457,97965,91361

The generalization is that the Fenix watches share the same guts with their corresponding 9xx watches. The differences are the case materials and screen sizes. For example, the Fenix 5 is technically equivalent to the 935, and the Fenix 6 is technically equivalent to the 945. The Instinct is not a multisport watch. They added features between generations of hardware, that you can see in his table.

Thanks. The comparison chart and corresponding reviews are very helpful and may possibly justify the need for a watch to tell me more than how fast, or slow, I am going.

Is the fenix 5 a good replacement for the 920xt?

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Gone with the wind

Instagram: palmtreestriathlon

I ended up buying the Fenix 5 for $299 and really like it so far after a week.

I made the jump from a 910xt but my guess is it would be much better than the 920 also.

I have a very nice 920xt I'm selling, I'm going back to the 310. I have $130 in it send me a pm if interested,it's very snazzy

I’ve decided to move from the Garmin ecosystem for the time being. I got my hands on a Vantage V and have just started playing around with it. The Polar flow app/webpage are very nice and might let me save money by not having to use TrainingPeaks. Right now I’m in the phase of unlearning the Garmin interface and trying to figure out the way Polar stuff works. So far things seem good. There’s a few things I have not figured out with Polar yet but I probably had the same issues with Garmin back when I stared with their wearable stuff

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USAT Level 1 Coach
Team Next Level
http://goteamnltri.com/

Does the Tickr not cause your Vantage M to use its cadence to estimate distance and pace over the GPS function when the tickr is connected?