Regular gym activity is very important for staying healthy and fit. As you know, it’s only worth going gym or doing anything when you can measure how well you’re doing against your goal and to make life easier for you, this watch will keep track of you heart rate, tell you when you are working hard and also tell you when you need to re-hydrate yourself to keep the energy going.
Oregon Scientific’s SH201 Tap On Elite Heart Rate Monitor with Hydration Alert.
It includes a wireless heart rate strap, a chronograph and a little meter that tells you when you need a sip of water, however the part where it tells you about re-hydrating yourself is only a guide in our view. It is not just a watch you wear to gym and then put it away, it can also be used as everyday watch with the light weight strap although it can look too sporty for everyday use; there is also an alarm, back-light ,key pad lock, lap function and a water resistant body up to 50 meter.
Once you unbox the product, you’ll need to hold all 4 buttons simultaneously until the display illuminates in order to turn the watch on initially
The watch has a total of 4 buttons:
- backlight,
- start/stop,
- set
- mode.
Initial setup process is not straight forward so you will need to get the manual to figure out which button will do what since it is not obvious which button will increase/decrease values however, once you have figured those out, it becomes second nature as to what and how to use it during workout. During setup the watch will ask you for your height, weight, sex and age so it can determine your proper heart rate zone for red zone alerts and calculate your calories burned during a workout.
The watch has a tap on screen function which can be used to load the preset workout mode; the tap on screen function is not so easy as stated as you have to assert a bit of pressure using your finger tip. To save you the hassle, you can simply use the mode button to cycle through the functions and select your workout mode.
In the box you will find your wireless heart rate monitor which will be picked up by the watch once worn; the watch will show a heart symbol which indicates connectivity and communication between the watch and the heart rate monitor.
Once connected and working properly, your BPM will show up indicating your heart rate and starts to monitor your heart rate as you work out; the watch will also bee and flash a warning sign to indicate how hard you’re working so keep and eye out for this. The alert function also brings me to pointing out that if you had your headphones in your ears, you would not be able to ear it, maybe a vibrating function would have been a little more appropriate.
It has a good battery life however it is not rechargeable but you will find that it is easy to replace the battery yourself by opening the back cover. The hydration monitor I didn’t find too useful as it wasn’t accurate enough and after testing it on a professional football player I found it was just easier to grab a bottle of water when you feel dehydrated.
One main downsides for me is the ability to track my journey using a built in GPS but I suppose a watch with a GPS function would cost slightly more like the Garmin’s 310XT, but it’s all about what I would use it for mainly which in my case I would only use it in the Gym rather than cycling or running outdoors.
Conclusion:
It is very light in weight and great for monitoring your heart rate as well as Red zones but I think it would be more suited for purpose if it had a built in GPS, and a USB port for downloading my exercise information. It is an entry level device which performs well at it’s level and for those looking for just a personal hear rate monitor and wouldn’t do any analysis after training.
Pros:
Easy to use
Good information display
Backlight
Not expensive ( £69.99 in the UK )
Cons:
No GPS
No data download for post workout
Thanks to Oregon Scientific for letting us use this watch.
