My 500 battery isn’t doing so well and I am thinking about what to replace it with.

Criteria are :

road bike use only.
needs to connect to Giant RideSense for cadence on one bike, and garmin cadence sensor on other one.
I don’t have any need for Strava and am unlikely to.
I need to see cadence as I am riding (I also have a Garmin 25, which won’t display this during a ride)
I have no need for navigation or mapping
I occasionally upload rides to Garmin Connect

Any thoughts ?

Not sure about connections you mention, but I’ve been using a Lezyne Super GPS, which is great. No mapping as such, but will connect to a smartphone if navigation needed. It comes with a nice cadence sensor and has a 20 hr+ battery life. It will also link to a phone allowing someone to track your ride – demanded by Mrs here so she knows where I go at 6am!

Garmin Edge 25 shows cadence. You sure you haven’t got the 20 which doesn’t? Or maybe you haven’t paired it to the cadence sensor correctly?

I don’t know if the Giant RideSense is Ant+ but if the 500 works then there should be no reason why the 25 doesn’t.

Lezyne Super GPS here too, latest firmware came out a couple of days ago v5.33 adding new features, plus the Ally V2 app got an update too (including making a multi-waypoint route, replacing the previous “get me from here to there” function).

https://www.lezyne.com/gpsroot/gps_downloads.php

Mine connects to my Polar H7 and Lidl (re-badged Wahoo) speed/cadence sensor without issue.

forza – interesting, it is a 25 and I can get cadence when I go to ride summary at end but can’t get in in a display field as I am riding..

Maybe I need to read the manual again !

Have you contacted Garmin. I got my 800 replaced with a refurb for about £60 when the battery started to go. Seemed much better than spending a fortune on a new one.

Getting your 500 replaced might be the most cost effective thing to do.

iainc – Member

forza – interesting, it is a 25 and I can get cadence when I go to ride summary at end but can’t get in in a display field as I am riding..

Maybe I need to read the manual again !

Manual not much help, try this:-

I replaced my 500 with a 520, was much better in every way than the 500.

But, I kinda came to the conclusion that it’s a fair bit of cash to use for what is basically just Strava logging for me, and it lies doing nothing for the rest of the week.

Stuck it on ebay, got what I paid for it and bought a vivoactive HR instead.

Which is all useless to the OP, as cadence, power and all that stuff means shit to me.

cheers all, will have a ponder.

I’d wondered about the same things and started a thread a day or two ago.

The social media/Strava stuff doesn’t interest me, and I did wonder if a 25 would meet my needs (but then I’m only interested in logging my rides rather than displaying data while I’m out.

^^^^^ yeah, it appears that I can change the screens on the 25 to get cadence, which I like on the road, so think I will be sorted with that. The 500 has worked well over the 5 yrs of so I have used it, so quite happy with it really. Seems that most of the current Garmin offering is either significantly more advanced or less so, with no direct equivalent to the 500.

I’m with you Ian. I have a Garmin 800 and am not interested in stuff like Strava, or linking to a smart phone. Just basic ride metrics does me and some occasional route following if I’m somewhere I don’t know too well.

I’m looking to get an Edge 25 as well because I use the 800 for running and just carry it in my hand which is not ideal. I can fit the Edge 25 to a wrist strap to get basic metrics when I run.

If you just want data

https://www.cyclesurgery.com/p/bryton-rider-20h-gps-computer-P6114055.html?colour=124

http://uk.wahoofitness.com/devices/bike-computers/elemnt-mini

Though you’d need to budget for an extra speed/cadence sensor (only comes with one).

OP I have a Garmin 500 doing nothing if of interest. If you’re still in Derby (if I’m remembering right) I could drop off or whatever… DM me if of interest?

Get a 520, and get on strava Iain, I know you say you’re no interested in KOMs n shit, and That’s cool, but….

You can set favourite segments on a 520 and it warns you when it’s approaching, you can set yourself against the KOM, or against your PR, and it tells you how far you are ahead or behind (only really works on road IMO, as I can’t look when I’m pinning a descent!) It’s a great motivation if you like to push it, and the fact you use cadence etc would suggest you like yer numbers on road rides.

Strava is very useful, just gets bad press from the usual whiners.

Love my 500, especially the HR graph. But I also have an 810 with bigger battery and form factor. The bluetooth sync is great when it works. The navigation and route following less reliable than breadcrumb trails on my 200.

I’d probably go for a 520 now it seems to have the nice 500 form factor and 810 operating system.

And Strava is a nice tool.