Garmin Forerunner

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Garmin Forerunner is a Global Positioning System (GPS) device designed primarily for use by recreational road runners. It is designed as an accurate, precise method of measuring distance, speed, time, altitude, and pace, all of which can be important to athletes in training for races.

Three models of the Forerunner exist: the 101, the 201, and the 301. The 201 and 301 models include a docking station and software for uploading run track points to a personal computer, where a user can view a map of their run, see their progression over the course of the run in pace and altitude, and even apply the map of their run over a satellite image of the area where they ran.

In 2006 Garmin introduced versions 205 and 305, which are smaller and which use a much more sensitive GPS receiver chip, the SiRF III. What does this mean? It means that the 305's ability to both track, and maintain a lock on, your position is better than anything before it. A satellite acquisition is nearly instantaneous. A run through dense trees will not faze the unit either - tracking will remain true and steady. Performance on a bike is equally impressive.

1 Criticisms
2 History
3 Reviews
4 External links

[edit] Criticisms

This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources.
Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. (help, get involved!)
This article has been tagged since September 2006.

Since the Forerunner is based on GPS technology, it requires a relatively clear view of the sky to the satellites in order to function properly. Consequently, if a user wears their Garmin in an area with heavy tree cover or other blockage of the sky, the Forerunner may not record track points. In doing so, the readout of distance traveled may return a shorter value than the actual distance. Users from the Pacific Northwest have reported regularly encountering this problem. The inclusion of the SiRFstar III GPS microcontroller chip in the 205 and 305 models has largely eliminated such problems.

The Forerunner 101 is the only of the three versions to use disposable battery power (the others are rechargable). Consequently, battery life is limited to about four hours, which for long-distance runners (and marathon runners in particular) is usually not long enough to record an entire run. The Forerunners 201 and 301, however, have a battery life of approximately 15 hours.

[edit] History

Garmin registered the Forerunner name with the United States Patent and Trademark Office in August, 2001 [1] - many years before the product was introduced.