To prevent the screen from getting ruined I put a special little cover on it. This hasn’t stopped it from working or made it less sensitive, but has protected it from scratches and drops of deck stain etc.
The band didn’t last very long before it broke, luckily replacement bands are cheap and easy to find. I got one with lots of little holes so my sweat can get out and sunlight can reach more of my skin.
I recharge it once a week or thereabouts, which is easy to do. When the battery runs low it sends me an email.
My Fitbit charge 4 has some features that I like, and some that I dislike.
Some features I like are that it measures my heart rate and oinks at me when my heart rate is high for too long, it tells the time like a normal watch, it acts as a pedometer counting my steps and estimating the distance walked, it can roughly tell me how long I sleep each night, and it emails me each week to let me know how that week compared to the previous week.
Some features that I dislike are that it has a ‘stalking’ function where it can track my every step using an intrusive GPS, it has a ‘constant irritation’ function where it can alert me every time I receive an email, a 'threatening email' function where it sends me increasingly threatening emails telling me to recharge as the battery level goes down, and some ‘eye strain/meditation’ functions that tell you to watch some tiny dots for two minutes to calm yourself.
I am happy to say that most of the functions I dislike, such as the stalking function and the constant irritation function, can easily be turned off. I can also put it on ‘sleep’ or ‘do not disturb’ which prevents it from oinking or lighting up when I don’t want it to. It still emails me about the battery going flat, I guess this could be useful but I find it irritating.
 |
| Fitbit charge 4 |
Some features I like are that it measures my heart rate and oinks at me when my heart rate is high for too long, it tells the time like a normal watch, it acts as a pedometer counting my steps and estimating the distance walked, it can roughly tell me how long I sleep each night, and it emails me each week to let me know how that week compared to the previous week.
Some features that I dislike are that it has a ‘stalking’ function where it can track my every step using an intrusive GPS, it has a ‘constant irritation’ function where it can alert me every time I receive an email, a 'threatening email' function where it sends me increasingly threatening emails telling me to recharge as the battery level goes down, and some ‘eye strain/meditation’ functions that tell you to watch some tiny dots for two minutes to calm yourself.
I am happy to say that most of the functions I dislike, such as the stalking function and the constant irritation function, can easily be turned off. I can also put it on ‘sleep’ or ‘do not disturb’ which prevents it from oinking or lighting up when I don’t want it to. It still emails me about the battery going flat, I guess this could be useful but I find it irritating.
Overall it has a lot more features that I like than those that I dislike.
The heart rate monitor has its down sides, but overall I think it is good. It quickly and reasonably accurately tells me what my heart rate is in beats per minute. If my heart skips a beat, or beats twice, the Fitbit somehow ignores this and evens them out. It draws a little graph of my heart rate across the day, but my heart rate needs to be at that level for more than a certain amount of time otherwise it is not included. I have had plenty of times where I wake at night and my Fitbit tells me my heart rate is 140+ beats per minute, only to check the graph in the morning and find no mention of anything over 110 which is rather frustrating.
If my heart rate is above some number that it decides is in the ‘fat burning zone’ it will oink at me and encourage me to keep going, presumably it thinks I am exercising at these times. This number changes from day to day due to some algorithm it has. Sadly my heart often races for no reason, so this oinking often happens while I am just sitting still, or even when I am sleeping, so the encouragement serves more as a reminder to concentrate on my heart and slow it down rather than encouragement to exercise.
 |
| screenshot of Fitbit heart rate |
The heart rate monitor also tells me what my average resting heart rate is across each day. This is completely inaccurate and should be ignored. For the above screen shot it told me that my resting heart rate was 77 over that day. I was resting for the majority of that day and my heart rate only once dropped below 78 once for a very brief moment during the entire day.
As you can see, my average resting heart rate would have been a lot higher than 77 that day.
The heart rate monitor also tells me I am super fit for my age, which I am not. I assume the algorithms are aimed at fatter people and even though I have entered my height and weigh the algorithms cannot work for skinny people such as myself. This is one of the many reasons why skinny fat people like me need to train differently.
The watch tells me the time and the date, and is easy to see. Other than that I have no real comment, it is a watch that does what a watch should do. I think it can also act as a stop watch. It estimates how many calories you have burned, which is meaningless because in my opinion no one should ever count calories.
The pedometer tells me when I have not walked enough steps each hour, or not enough each day, and I think I can change the number of steps that is considered enough. The pedometer is not overly accurate, to be honest it isn’t too bad and I don’t think any pedometers are ever completely accurate. An example of its inaccuracy is that I have been woken at night by the kids calling out for help, I have walked all the way up and down the hall as well as into another room to wash my hands, all to have it only record 9 steps. I have had other times where me rocking back and forth has been recorded as hundreds of steps. It seems a little inconsistent, but over a day I think it evens out near enough for my purposes.
The function designed to tell me how much I sleep isn’t accurate and doesn’t tell me anything that I don’t already know. I know when I sleep, and I know when I am awake. I put it on sensitive mode that is meant to be more accurate, yet sometimes I can get up, get dressed, eat breakfast, and be at work (working from home) for half an hour before it records me as even being awake. As long as you take it as a trend rather than an accurate number of minutes or hours slept then I think it is useful enough.
 |
| Fitbit charge 4 with cover and new band |
The watch tells me the time and the date, and is easy to see. Other than that I have no real comment, it is a watch that does what a watch should do. I think it can also act as a stop watch. It estimates how many calories you have burned, which is meaningless because in my opinion no one should ever count calories.
The pedometer tells me when I have not walked enough steps each hour, or not enough each day, and I think I can change the number of steps that is considered enough. The pedometer is not overly accurate, to be honest it isn’t too bad and I don’t think any pedometers are ever completely accurate. An example of its inaccuracy is that I have been woken at night by the kids calling out for help, I have walked all the way up and down the hall as well as into another room to wash my hands, all to have it only record 9 steps. I have had other times where me rocking back and forth has been recorded as hundreds of steps. It seems a little inconsistent, but over a day I think it evens out near enough for my purposes.
The function designed to tell me how much I sleep isn’t accurate and doesn’t tell me anything that I don’t already know. I know when I sleep, and I know when I am awake. I put it on sensitive mode that is meant to be more accurate, yet sometimes I can get up, get dressed, eat breakfast, and be at work (working from home) for half an hour before it records me as even being awake. As long as you take it as a trend rather than an accurate number of minutes or hours slept then I think it is useful enough.
The Fitbit makes graphs for all kinds of things. I like graphs, so I like how it does this.
I think if I paid extra I could get more graphs, more stats on health related things, and access to training videos etc.
My verdict
Do I like my Fitbit charge 4 watch: Yes
Do I need a Fitbit or similar: No
Which brand is the best: I have no idea. There are a few different brands that make a similar product. This suits my needs really well, but you may need it to do other things that this one doesn’t do.
Are they worth the money: Probably not if you buy one new. Second hand they are cheaper than a watch so I think they are worth the money. I wear mine pretty much all day every day. I use it as a watch and I find the heart rate monitor very useful.
No comments:
Post a Comment