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| After a promising beginning, things went downhill. |
The first strike was when I did the Gents Race back in April. Supposedly you were capable of having turn-by-turn directions with the Karoo 2. Well, I got the device to upload the route ahead of the event, and I figured I was good to go. However; the device did not work as I expected and the route would not load. In fact, the head malfunctioned and I ended up turning it off. Here's a bit of what I wrote about that experience last April concerning the issues Ihad.
"I tried starting it as we rolled out of town, but it wasn't very intuitive to use (in my opinion) and so the Gents Race course I had would not start. I bailed on that and tried to just start a ride. The ride screen would come up, start compiling data briefly, then the screen would go blank. Meanwhile the thing was randomly barking out turn prompts (with the screen totally dark) and I got frustrated and just canned any notions of using it for the time being."
That experience soured me so badly on the computer that I put it on my desk and forgot about it until recently. The Hall of Fame Ride would be a good reason to use it again, right? So, I went to Strava, where N.Y. Roll had the route, and tried to upload the file for the ride to my Hammerhead. Nope! Gotta be a Strava account holder for that! Well, I don't want to open a Strava account for any reason, so I copied the route by hand over to Ride With GPS which I do have an account on and which is linked to the Hammerhead dashboard.
No problem, right? Wrong! I had to go through all the Hammerhead prompts and it still wouldn't work. I finally figured out you have to restart the computer you are using to get the file to upload. Yeah....thanks for not telling me that, Hammerhead! Well, now, THAT should have done it, because Hammerhead claims that you do not have to do anything else. Your route, once uploaded to your dashboard, will automatically be found on your Karoo 2. Right?
WRONG. No route for you! Despite trying all the tricks, nothing would show up on my Karoo 2 head. I spent three to four hours on this and nothing to show for it.
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| I remembered liking this page. It was gone in June- couldn't find it. |
Well, that was gone in June. Was it an update that took it away? Did I somehow erase that page? I don't know, but what I did have to work with was garbage. I did not like anything about the readouts, and I had not edited anything.
Then I had Mrs. Guitar Ted look into my problem. She was able to determine that the unit was having issues staying tethered via Bluetooth to the computer, and this perhaps was why my route was not getting uploaded to the Karoo 2 head. NOTE: This is the same computer I used back in April when the route for the Gents Race did auto-upload. After spending about 45 minutes trying different things, she gave up and suggested that perhaps the Karoo 2 has a bad chip.
I also had Hammerhead sponsored athlete Amanda Nauman chime in via Twitter asking about my problem and once described to her, she was at a loss as to why the dashboard and head unit weren't communicating with each other as well. She suggested I contact Hammerhead, and so I have sent them a query as of Monday this week.
So, the Hammerhead Karoo 2 has been a very frustrating, very disappointing experience. Initially it was seemingly easy to set up, but turn-by-turn navigation did not work, uploading route files was problematic, or not possible at all, and the dashboard was overly complex. The entire experience was maddeningly empty and devoid of any accomplishment or sense of knowing you knew how to make it work. I'm not sure if Hammerhead's recent sale to SRAM has anything to do with this, but I am extremely disappointed in what I have now. My old Lezyne Super GPS was a thousand times easier to use, but it did not support turn-by-turn navigation without it being tethered to a phone, which, at that point, I may just as well use a phone app.
More soon....
Note: Hammerhead did not know I was reviewing this and I was not paid, nor bribed for this review.
7 comments:
Sounds like a rather unfortunate and frustrating situation.
It could be a combination of factors with a faulty unit quite possible as a primary cause. When you think about what this tech is doing though - accurately tracking activity over every type of terrain in often extreme conditions (lots of vibrations, direction changes, temperature extremes etc.) it's remarkable how robust GPS units generally are.
Post the SRAM acquisition of Hammerhead I also heard Shimano insisted on their Di2 integrations being removed from the software and who knows what sort of knock-on effect that might have to the software?
For me, I find it helpful to turn on any GPS and let it find satellites first before moving anywhere, particularly if I am some distance from where I last used the unit. Literally letting it get its bearings. In your case, both rides sound like they were starting from somewhere other than your house and while rolling and while trying to start a route. Maybe all that is also a factor.
I don't happen to use Hammerhead, and rarely use turn by turn mapping (more a case my old Garmin doesn't have the capability to present it clearly than anything else, and I ride local anyway). But most folks at some time or other have bemoaned their GPS computer software, which is often the weakest link in the chain.
I have logged thousands of miles via my Garmin but don't have to rely on it. I am not endorsing Garmin either, whose own software can be very frustrating!
For mapping or navigation in unfamiliar areas the requirements of GPS computers become more of an issue, especially once these units start requiring phone syncs to leverage phone features (like the Stages units). I think you are then becoming overly reliant on a data/phone signal being available.
To me it all sounds primarily to be a software problem here, with the potential that the unit itself may be faulty. I would be hoping for some support from Hammerhead to work out whats going on.
Good luck! These things cost too much to bin without exploring every option.
Matt
I know little about Hammerhead units, other than they are supposed to be easier to use in general. Doesn't seem to be the case! When I have issues with my Garmin I will check for updates. Ususally that solves any issues I may have. Not sure if Hammerhead has updates or I seem to remember reading they update automatically?
People complain about all the gps units (Garmin, Wahoo, Hammerhead...). I've started with Gamin and luckily have had very few issues. I've been curious in trying other brands but I know how to work with Garmin without much thinking. It would be hard for me to switch now.
Good Luck!
@MuddyMatt - This from your comment, "These things cost too much to bin without exploring every option." - That means a lot to me that you wrote that, and I agree. Time to be a bit sober minded here and give it some more effort......
@ben - Yes, Hammerhead does automatic updates. I have gotten several since last April. I agree with you that most GPS units for cycling seem to have their flaws. I would submit that in my experience, the Lezyne GPS unit I used to use was dead reliable. It wasn't trying to do as much as the ones we are talking about from Garmin, Wahoo, or Hammerhead, but my Lezyne was really pretty good. Maybe now I am spoiled....
Long time Karoo user here. It typically takes me 10 seconds tops to load a new route onto mine, so I'm baffled by the difficulties you are experiencing.
However, do I understand correctly that you are connecting yours to your (home?) computer using Bluetooth? If so, that would explain all your problems right there. You can connect it to your phone via Bluetooth if you really want to receive text message alerts on your GPS. No? I thought not! What you want/need to do is to connect your Karoo to your wifi network.
P.S. My "Historical Elevation" screen is still there and working in the same manner as previously, so I would expect your to be also. Do you have multiple profiles defined, by any chance? One with that screen and one without?
@Fear rothar - I think you've hit the nail on the head. I went to N.Y. Roll's house today and we got the thing working- FINALLY - after a lot of horsing around with getting back into my profile/account.
I'm happy that I "think" we've figured out my issues. I'm REALLY not happy that this information is not front and center on a Karoo 2 set up instructional, and I'm REALLY not happy about the UI at this time regarding how many times I've had to run circles around trying to get logged into their device.
More soon......
@Fear rothar - Just an FYI that I saw the comment and a thank you for that Irish lesson! :>)
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