Naperville Runner wrote:
My personal opinion is that using your GPS to play music is stupid so I wouldn't go for that feature.
Just curious why you feel this way. Most people I know love the fact that Garmins play music. Is it because you don't want to listen to music, or because you have your phone anyway?
Naperville Runner wrote:At one point the lower end Garmin's had older technology / less reliable wrist based HRM's but Garmin is very good about trickling down technology so that is probably not the case anymore
Actually, Garmin has frequently introduced its newest tech on lower end models first. It kind of just depends where in the release cycle the watches are. Many buyers of the higher end Fenix watches get pretty upset when an entry or mid level watch comes out with features or tech not on their $800 watch.
But it's true that the HRMs are better now. It's been mostly incremental improvements all along. Garmin is on its third generation of the Elevate sensor, but there have also been significant software improvements that improved accuracy. Now it's at the point where it's mostly right, most of the time, for most users. Still, if you're someone who is really into heart rate training, then you're going to want an external HRM. Doesn't have to be a strap, though. The upper arm monitors work very, very well.
The thing about the Fenix series is it has SO many features. Nobody uses all of them, but lots of people find that there's one thing about it that they just have to have. I was mostly pretty happy with my Fenix 6 sapphire except for the weight. I'd be pretty happy with a Vivo 4 or 245 as well. The only thing I'd miss is once in a blue moon I use navigation on the Fenix 6 (usually a very long bike ride with lots of turns that I mapped out in advance). And the smaller running watches don't have the battery life for a day of backcountry skiing. But, again, that's a 1-2x/year kind of thing.