I have diligently and faithfully used the Nike Plus Sportband exercise device from July 15, 2008 until today (September 24, 2008) and have posted my findings below. Bottom line: my device steadily decomposed before my eyes.

Uses:
Fir those unfamiliar with the Nike Plus Sportband, it is designed to monitor and log you runs with distance, pace, and calorie data. It is actually a USB stick as well, allowing for quick uploads of your data to Nike's flash only website.  (review continued below...)

Live eBay Results:

I have logged over 40 runs with the Nike Sportband and have ran well over 200 miles with it strapped to my wrist.

Observations:

When I purchased the sportband (retails for $59) I was hopeful that it would log and record my runs in order to give me some motivations. I have to say, the device works flawlessly for recording your distance. There is a fancy chip that lies in your sneaker which communicates with the watch and provides the data.

One of the first problems I encountered with the watch is the display itself. Perhaps Nike wanted a low power consumption screen. However, the display is often impossible to read even in daylight! While moving at a fast clip it takes real concentration to go forward and actually read your data.

I have to say, after about a month of solid running I noticed my display started to decompose! The best way I can describe what happened is that imagine an Etch A Sketch losing it's dark sand. Either from sweat, moisture, or just movement, my display is now almost completely unreasonable because the LCD display has almost peeled away completely. . I will upload a picture of this to better describe what has happened. Bottom line- I can no longer read 2/3 of the display and my watch has been rendered next to useless. I still run with it recording my data in order to upload to the Nike site.

Software:

Basically, the watch does not ship with any software at all. Other than a simple device driver for your computer there is absolutely no stand alone software. This presents a valid problem. If you have a slower computer or simply want to check your run data on a portable device such as an iPhone, iPod Touch of Blackberry, the lack of Flash support on these devices will make it impossible for you to check this. I find the site has many other problems as well.

First, I tried for 2-3 weeks to export my run data. Forget it. I even contacted Nike directly and they told me this was impossible. Nike owns your run data and it exists in a crappy flash based system that will not even let you copy and paste data. Next, the run data can not be fixed or edited at all. For example, in one of my most challenging runs I had to complete 9 miles in order to complete an online goal in training for a 10k race. I had ran exactly 8.99 of my goal. To my horror, the crappy Nike site is not giving me any credit for this run and actually thinks it did not run this day. This is a basic software fix that Nike continues to ignore.

On the positive side, Nike does have great free training programs which I must admit have kept me fully motivated. I just think that a few software fixed are in order.

After almost three months of use the device is almost completely destroyed. For a new runner ( which I was 3 months ago) I think the Nike Sportband is the cheapest way to record your run data. However, for anyone who is more serious, stay clear away from this toy. It has a combination of cheap build quality, poor display, and inflexible software. I have been doing my research and for about $150 dollars I will purchase a quality Garmin Forerunner 50 which operates the same way as the Nike Sportband but has stand alone software which allows exporting data and will stand the test of time on a runners wrist.

I hope this honest review can help someone understand what this product is really like. On the postive side it does have a 1 year warranty against defects so lee your receipt handy if you do buy the Sportband!

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 25th, 2008 at 2:32 pm and is filed under Ronz Gear Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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