First off, I will admit that I am an idiot for waiting this long to deal with this.
I’ve had my Polar RS200 for about 1.5 years and I use it pretty heavily. A few weeks ago it flashed a low battery warning. I clicked OK and haven’t seen the warning since. (The manual says that this might happen in cold conditions, but it wasn’t cold when I saw it.) It’s worked fine ever since and hasn’t shown “low battery” again. I’m racing at LP this Sunday and am worried that part-way through the race it’s going to decide to just die.
What’s your experience with the low battery warnings? I would expect that if the battery was actually low, it would be warning me more often or that little half-full battery thing would be on the screen. Obviously, I could just get a new one, but I’m trying to avoid that for now.
You “should” be fine. If you are really worried -any good jeweler can replace the battery. I sent mine into a Polar repair center. Turn around…about 10 days. If you have the option…maybe change the HR recording time to 15 secs (or more). It may save a little juice. FWIW - I think my low battery signal was on for 2+ weeks.
I dunno about any good jeweler being able to replace the battery. I had the same exact problem a few years back and went to a few jewelers and about every drug store I could think of to find the battery. It is a VERY RARE battery that seems to be for polar only. That being said, my watch read low battery for quite some time and I was okay. I have the 625 - if the only thing thing you are really concerned about is heart rate you could buy the cheapest polar and then sell it, besides, in IM, you shouldn’t be too concerned with anything but heart rate and time - the distance is laid out for you and the speed is what it is.
You should be fine. I saw mine flash once like you mentioned, ignored it and then after a few weeks it indicated low battery all the time but continued to work fine for a couple weeks until I sent it away.
Also, I think that someone posted from Polar that they were going to be in LP this week so I bet that they could accomplish a battery change or at least give you reassurance that it will be ok. I would advise against having someone other than polar change the battery, I am 0 for 2 trying to get that done right. Both time it seems perfect until I went for a swim.
You actually can’t change the recording time on the RS200. The 200 uses a lot less battery and memory because it records less frequently and less data than the 625 or 725.
If you send the watch back to Polar you won’t get it back in time for Placid. Polar does have authorized repair centers though. I would check for one of those either near you or near placid and see if you can get rapid turnaround.
My guess is your battery is low and while you may well be fine, it’s one of those days where you’d rather not leave things to chance.
Mine gave the ‘low battery’ warning the day before IM. Not knowing whether it would last through the race, I decided to take a quick trip to Batteries Plus and they replaced it in about 5 minutes. Not very expensive either. I have the 720i