Garmin Forerunner 201 GPS Speedometer

The Garmin Forerunner 201 comes with a serial interface and free software to download your walk and run data to your computer. The instructions are lacking - nowhere did it show you HOW to plug in the serial cable to the Forerunner. The answer was vaguely implied - you place the Forerunner in its recharger cradle and halfway down the cord is a port to plug the serial cable into. Download the Logbook program from the Garmin site and install it. Now you can download the data from your Forerunner 201.

The Logbook software is first generation and I hope significant improvements are made soon. The biggest "duh" is there is no Print feature. The second biggest is there is no way to save anything other than as XML - and few of us know what to do with XML. I ended up using Print Screen to capture the spiffy maps and charts the program produces, as there was no other way. Earth to Garmin - at least give us a "Pro" version we can pay to upgrade to that has exportable charts and data to Excel and, for heaven's sake, a Print feature.

History
The History window displays your workout data by week, day, and lap with numbers for Start time, total distance, total time, average pace, average speed, and calories.

You can switch between the speed graph and the pace graph - and use the View mode to switch between miles and kilometers.

Selecting any one session. At the tope is the date, start time, total distance, total time, total calories, average pace, and average speed. In the Notes section you can add notes about the walk or run.

Below that, your speed and pace are charted out over the distance of your walk or run. There can be some odd spikes if you don't have it set to Auto Pause for stops and for times when there was a loss of the satellite signal due to obstructions.

How I love this! Your map from the map mode is displayed. Again, it doesn't have a street map or topo map to match. But for those of us who are designing walking routes, this automatic mapping makes our job much easier, and it is just fun to review. What's lacking - in order to save this wonderful little map, you have to do "Print Screen" and then paste it into a graphics program like Photoshop or Paint.

Wow! Your Forerunner is recording altitude data, and this charts out the hill profile of your walk or run. Clicking on any place on the chart gives you crosshairs that display the distance from the start and the altitude of that point. This is something I plan to use as a trailmaster. Again, the only present way to use this chart is to do "Print Screen" and paste it into a graphics program to save it.

Bottom Line
The Garmin Forerunner 201 and the Logbook interface make this an ideal training aid for walkers and runners. The price is also significantly lower than the Timex Speed + Distance Monitor or the FitSense Speedometer. The features surpass any I have seen in other units. Things to improve: The software is brand new and should see upgrades in coming months - it is sorely in need of some basic features such as "Print" and saving to file formats other than XML. But that the Forerunner comes with the serial interface and free software is way ahead of the competitors. There is no component heart rate monitor, which would make it perfect. Of all the speedometers on the market, this is the one to buy in a heartbeat.

Bugs The download can choke and freeze on too much data. Delete old runs once downloaded.