Ladies, and Gentlemen,



I am the less than proud owner of Look/Polar power pedals, and a CS600X. After having spent a significant amount of time setting up both the pedals, and the head unit, reading all the available product support information on the pedals, and the head unit, and having spoken to a representative of Look, as well as your customer service representative, I've come to the conclusion that your system is virtually worthless, in great measure due to the inadequacy of the head unit.



I've used the system on two seperate rides and have yet to get complete data. On the first ride, I did get data recorded for 39 minutes of a 3 and a half hour ride. That power data appears to be accurate, correlating it to speed and perceived effort. However, there's no explanation for what happened to the other 3 hours.



The second time I used it was a ride of 7 hours. Half way through the ride the unit warned that memory was low, and the "rec" icon began to flash. I assumed I would at least have data to that point. When I down loaded the data, I got 13.8 miles of a 121 mile ride, with data that was obviously corrupt (average watts 687, max watts 29,000). yet the head unit itself showed 121 miles, and average and max power that made sense, (185, 487 respectively)



Given that the power data appears accurately in real time on the display, the problem does not appear to be in the power meter itself, but in the polar head unit or software.



Everything about the CS600X is redicuously antiquated, or inadequate for training with power. The tiny hieroglyphics for a display that have be decipehered may have been state of the art circa 1997, but pale compared to a Garmin. The decision tree for working your way through the controls is far from intuitive. The lack of ability to customize the display is also frustrating.



Most notably, the inability to display basic power data makes it sub optimal for pacing intervals. A screen that showed 3 sec power (for smoothing,) and average lap power is completely lacking.



The memory time is also grossly inadequate. Apparently, 3 and 1/2 hours is not unusual according to your customer service rep at the 2 second recording interval. Yet, a 2 second recording interval is already too long to get good power data. ( A Garmin 500 will hold months of power data by comparison at 1 second recording intervals)



The infrared download system, is extremely finnicky, and even if you can get it to work, it is slow, requires precise close allignment, and a seperate piece of equipment. Is Polar not familiar with a micro usb port?



Having the GPS sensor as a seperate unit is unacceptable. It's one more piece of equipment, and one more battery, to keep up with.



The Polar training software is also anitquated, not designed for training with power, and pales in comparision to Cycling Peaks WKO+ or Power Agent.



Your customer support is also basically non existentent. I spent 30 minutes on hold to reach a representative who knew less about the Power Pedals than I do, and who struggled to communicate in any depth in English.



I could go on, but I think you get the basic point. I own a powertap, as well as 2 Quarqs. The only reason I considered your system is that I need a power meter for a tandem, and a pedal based system is one of the few viable answers. I cannot imagine that anyone without such a specific need would ever consider your system, given the severe limitations of the head unit. In my humble opinion, Polar doomed this venture to failure by going with a proprietary sytem, and not using Ant+.



Please tell me that you are going to make a low powered bluetooth firmware upgrade for these pedals, which would allow use of a 3rd party head unit, or that Polar is going to market a head unit actually designed to work with a power meter.



Sincerely,



Merlinextraligh

Ouch.

So you don't like it?

For anyone who may still be considering the Polar Power System: The biggest flaw in their system is it is not ANT+ compatible. It uses Polar's WIND interface and requires a Polar Computer. A CS600 or, I'm pretty sure, the CS500. The CS500 has a larger screen, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't support the left-right balance for power measurement. A company such as Polar uses a private interface because they want to use the power meter to drive their bike computer sales -- if you want their pedal based power meter, you also have to use their computer.

... and burn.

Sorry to hear about your experience. I had a Polar cyclocomputer once, which turned out to be an overpriced POS, so I can't say I'm surprised. Quarq + Garmin FTW.

You should probably send, or at least copy, that letter to Look rather than Polar. It sounds like Look held up there end of the partnership but Polar didn't. Look is the company providing the power meter technology so it would be in their interest (and not Polar's) to add Ant+ support.

Do I recall correctly that you got it at Competitive? Plan on taking advantage of their return policy?

Small hijack, I just got Brim Brothers questionnaire. Anyone else looking at their cleat based system. Deal breaker for me would be compatibility with my pedals.

I've sent it to polar and Look.

The Look rep, who uses the pedals himself, while trying not to betray the party line,basically said I don't disagree regarding the head unit.

Yes. I talked to them, and they said I can send it back now, or play with a bit more.
either they'll take it back no questions asked.

So they're very accommodating.

Informative letter. Thanks.

feel better?

Two good things here for me. One is I'm glad I didn't get the Look/Polar unit. The other is this confirmed my trust in Competitive Cyclist. They are a good company.

I'd swap to Speedplay for that, pending price. Answered it yesterday.

Thank god you didnt get it from ebay

It's not like this is the first time Polar has done a PM. They had that stupid chain-based system. One might think they'd learn from their mistakes, but nope. The decision to use WIND instead of ANT+ was the first clue to that effect.

Merlin,
Good to read that CC will honour their return policy for the defective pedals. I wish Look could get the system to work correctly myself. I think the concept of suing the pedals as the input point is a good one, just that their execution is poor. I doubt you purchased the system without a lot of research, the poor results must be a disappointment to you. I like your letter and manner you adressed this problem, including here. If you would please keep us posted on the outcome of this issue.

Bill

Merlin, I think you probably had an idea it would be like this going into it and it's impressive that you tried anyway - that's what I call an open mind.

Personally, I don't know why Look even bothered to do this. Why you would limit your product offering to such a tiny market segment is beyond me. Seriously. WIND? Lets go ahead and exclude the MASSIVE installed base of Garmin owners AND smartphone owners.

I did. I knew the head unit was the weak link, particularly based on DC Rainmaker's review.

I really wanted these to work, and I think I underestimated how much the Polar head unit sucks, and overestimated my tolerance for futzing it with it.

I'm still hoping I can get this thing to work. If I can get accurate data for at least 4 hours or so, that's useable in trainining peaks, I may keep it, particularly with the hope of the bluetooth upgrade.

I'm thinking as I learn to manipulate the head unit settings, clean out memory before every ride, and get the infrared download dialed in, it will overcome some of the problems I'm experiencing.

All that said, I'd take a Quarq and a Garmin over this every day. Heck, I'd take my old wired PT over this.

Unless you've got a special reason you want a pedal based system, I just don't see why anyone would bother.

Heck, you can move a Quark from bike to bike as fast or faster than you can swap these pedals, given the need to allign the pedals with a special tool, and zip tie the transmitting unit.

I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for any Bluetooth upgrade.

If Polar were inclined to go that way, they've had many oppotunities in the past.

I'd hate to send them back to Competitive Cyclist and have them stuck with what appears to be a white elephant, but if that doesn't happen there's no way Polar will ever be forced to grow a brain....

I hereby nominate MerlinExtraLight for inclusion in the 2013 First World Problems Rant Championships. Do I hear a second? All in favor say "aye". All opposed say "nay"! Motion carries!

My guess is that the finances swung the deal. Look saw that pedal based PMs were on the way and didn't want to be caught out. At the same time, they didn't have the electronics background and didn't want to cover all of the startup costs on their own. Enter Polar who was watching Garmin eat their lunch, especially after their first failure at a PM. So the partnership happens on condition that WIND is the protocol so that Polar can recover head unit market from Garmin.

Oh I hear ya... just... would have been a lot smarter of Polar and Look to use a less proprietary format. As it is now, nobody wants a Polar head unit because you can't use it with any aftermarket power meter they might already have or want, and nobody wants a Look power-based pedal because nobody has/wants a Polar head unit.

It's pair of products that nobody wants.