JohnJ80

Garmin does not have a good track record on stability of the product on introduction, typically seeming like they introduce a beta level product. My experience has been to wait a year on their bike computers.

Agree with most of this. This would be my choice. FWIW, I thought I was having battery issue with my Karoo 2 (K2) so I did a "kitchen table" ride where I let it run until the battery was depleted. Display was at around 30% brightness, some graphical displays (which typically are more battery intensive), and a full suit of sensors that it should have been searching for. Battery life was 13 hours which seems pretty good to me. The fuel gauge display was a bit wonky, but the actual battery capacity was solid and decent. The provided foot and mounting is better than Garmin's qtr turn although they also have an adaptor so you can use that too.

Troul 

how did you keep it actively engaged? Most bicycle computers auto shutdown after a hour or two of no movement activity.

JohnJ80

turn off auto pause.

the Karoo will shut off after no activity if no ride is started and auto pause is off.

Seattle Forrest

1040 details have leaked ahead of its launch this week. Same screen resolution as the 1030+ no doubt to meet the battery goals. Makes the sale an even better deal I think.

Competition is good for us as cyclists and consumers. The #1 thing everybody says about the Karoo is that the screen is amazing, especially for maps.

rm -rf

The 1030 touch screen is quite primitive on the map page. Touch works great for switching screens, for setting or modifying the data fields, and for starting, switching, or stopping navigation. But maps don't do pinch zooming, and need a touch to display the "+" and "-" zooms, and to switch into "drag to move the map" mode. I rarely interact with the map page, it's just too annoying.

Things I really like: very long battery life, even with the backlight. Reasonable touch operation with gloves on (but not ski glove thicknesses). A useful map popup for turns since I don't often leave the map showing. (this does occasionally miss a "turn" where the named road makes a 90 degree turn, but there's another road heading straight ahead at the curve -- that's not a "turn".)

The "Climb Pro" popup is annoying and not too useful to me. Instead, I enabled the Elevation screen, and it's set to 200 feet & 0.5 mile increments. So I can see the previous .5 mile and the next 1.5 mile ahead, and maybe 800 feet of max elevation gain within that distance. It's so nice to see if the climb is steeper at the bottom or the top, and how far up I am. And what's coming after the crest -- more rolling climbing, a downhill, or what. I can estimate the grade pretty easily now, seeing the difference between 5%, 8%, 10%, 12%... on the approaching slope.

NoWhammies

Having done several rides with the 1030+ now, I have to say I like the computer. The larger screen definitely helps for my poor eyesight. Also I appreciate, and I did not think I would, is the touch screen. Going back to Mrs. NoWhammies 530, I find pushing the buttons to move through screens kind of annoying. I much prefer being able to swipe left/right. At the time of purchase I thought I would not like the touch screen, after having a poor user experience with my Forerunner 405s. And yes, I realize they are two different GPS units. Still, fool me once...

Anyway. Will be interesting to see what DC Rainmaker has to say when he reviews the 1040.

pdlamb

FWIW, I got a 530 with pushbuttons to replace an 800 on which a portion of the touch screen stopped working. The smaller size fits the cockpit on one bike better than the 1030. The 530 is now my choice in rain, or possible rain, and sweaty rides because water hitting the touchscreen sends it off into Neverland, and my wet fingers often can't get it back. Sure, I can lock the screen, but that's never the first thing I think about when the rain starts. So that's two strikes against the touch screen, but OTOH, that lovely big 1030 screen...

cuevélo

It's here:

https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2022/06/...th-review.html

Seattle Forrest

$750 for a 1040 Solar! 🤯 🤪

Steve B.

45 hours battery life. Hammerhead should wake up and do something with the K2 which has about 1/3 that. Combined with solar, this becomes a very useful unit for a cross country tourist or a double century ride.

Seattle Forrest

Beyond a certain point, is 45 hours really better than 450? They're both more than most people will ever need.

You can get a 1040 for $600 so I guess nobody has to buy it.

Doesn't make sense to me, but I hope people like it.

Koyote

Hah! Went to the product page, and found my old friend Ashton in the promotional video.

I'm not in the market for a $750 computer...Can't imagine I'd ever need 45 hrs of battery life, or even the 35 hrs offered by the non-solar version. But I suppose some people will want it.

Badger6

Basically, doing math based on a personal use case of the K2, it’s more like 1/7.

Badger6

The battery life is neat. The training metrics are more interesting.

Koyote

Agreed. I'm not into the more sophisticated training data, but it's great for those who use the info.

A nice side benefit is that the looong battery life will put pressure on other mfrs to up their battery life, too.

Badger6

The training metrics are the key. I might be almost 50, but I am not ready to accept I am aging (even though I am), and Garmin is providing an ecosystem that enables me maximizing my efforts. No other device natively does that. The battery life is neat, but it isn’t a selling point for people who never ride more than 3-4 hours a day.

NoWhammies

Yeah, the 1040 has landed. In my part of the world (Canada) the 1040 non-solar is $100 more then the 1030+ on sale. Not sure if $100 justifies the new gear.

I gave DC Rainmakers review a quick read. Sounds like the 1040 UI is a complete rebuild. So the features that are introduced into the 1040 will not be making their way to the 1030/1030+. I tend to like all of the health and fitness metrics that Garmin collects. One of the things I like the most about my Forerunner 745 is the load status bar that bottom of the main screen. The graph gives me a good idea if I am in my training zone, over training, etc. The additional metrics of the 1040 might be interesting. Although I thought to get the most out of the metrics you had to ride a preloaded route. I rarely load routes into my Garmin.

I don't know. Is the non-solar 1040 a worthy upgrade to the 1030+? Worth $100? I'll have to give the review a deeper read.

Seattle Forrest

Your 1030+ has this feature on steroids. 🙂 It gives you your training load as well as "training load focus" which helps you fill in gaps if you're not following a structured plan. If you go for a run with your 745 your 1030+ training load will reflect that. It looks like the one fitness metric the 1040 has that yours doesn't is "stamina."

Personally I think it's more fun to have the latest watch with all the best features instead of the latest Edge. 955 Solar is the same price as the 1040, or $100 less without solar. I think it has every health, fitness, and training metric the 1040 has and some the Edge doesn't.

gecho

The only features that caught my eye were the GNSS gps, faster cpu, improved fonts and USB-C. I do a lot of OSM mapping with my Garmin so I like a nice clean gps trace.

NoWhammies

I agree with Seattle Forrest on having the newest watch. I probably would gain more from the watch than the new bike computer TBH. Trouble is, my 745 is only a year old to me and works just fine. I have a hard time justifying either the 255 or 955, as much as I might want the latest and greatest.

Seattle Forrest

In that case if you're within the return period and would rather have the improvements in the '40 including battery and GPS, spend the extra $100.

My Fenix 7 is getting a bunch of cool features they never promised me. I bought it for the stuff it could already do, but it's getting everything in the 955. 🙂 The 1030+ is done getting new features but the 1040 will probably continue to improve.

Steve B.

K2 battery life is stated at 7-14 hrs. If my usage is typical, I get 10 hrs. typically, it would be 25% of the battery life of a solar 1040. Im not in the market to buy as I also have a perfectly functional 1030 which still get 20 hrs. and thats plenty for my needs, even on a 4 day tour,

Still, it makes me wonder what Hammerhead will do to improve the Karoo 2 as that 7-14 is certainly going to make some folks pony up the $750. Its currently a hot topic on the Karoo 2 FB page.

Badger6

No reason to doubt your use case, though my n=2 (me using one for about a week, and a friend of mine who does long distance endurance events) says 6-7 is about all you can expect without external charging (which can be done on the move while the device is recording). I bet it is a hot topic, because a dead device doesn’t record anything…and the reality is that the battery and OS of the Hammerhead will need an upgrade to get more life out of a charge.

Steve B.

Hub hub I've read is the higher definition screen of the K2 is partly responsible for the mediocre battery life. Garmin seems to have avoided that by not going to a matching screen quality on the 1040, instead doing a good enough screen that seems to help the battery (all speculation on my part). I've no clue what HH will do, as my experience is battery life does not get better with OS updates, seems to get slightly worse. I've seen as poor as 6 hrs. on the K2, then it comes back, I've also seen 14 hrs., but that didn't last. I use a Di2 connection as well as a speed sensor, and this is JRA, no navigation, which seems to cut battery life by maybe 20-25%. Battery life is a funny topic as in my opinion, most folks are perfectly fine with 8-10 hrs. I would suspect typical users are not doing double centuries, thus can take the time to charge overnight. I do know I would take my 1030 with me on a 7 day Bon Ton Roulet ride this July as the 20 hrs. means charge every 2-3 days, not overnight, which is easier to manage. I would also take my 1030 on self supported bike tours, same reason.

Bald Paul

If all you are really looking for is extended battery time on your 1030+, do what I did and buy this:
Garmin Charge™ Power Pack
Works with an out-front mount.