Gear: Kurt Kinetic Wireless Powercomputer

  I've had the Kurt Kinetic fluid trainer since about May, and then I bought the Kurt Kinetic Wireless Powercomputer a couple months ago. But I haven't used either of them until last week. When I first got it, I screwed around with it a bit just to see how it works and to see what to expect. Now that I've had five or six rides with it, and I think I'm ready to write a review. So here it goes.

BLUF: The only reason I'm keeping it is because it gives me a consistent power reading, although that reading might be off a bit it is consistent. Other than that power reading, the thing works as advertised, but it's not very user friendly. It is advertised as WIRELESS, but it requires a wire for cadence.....so not exactly as advertised concerning that. I can only recommend this to someone who wants a computer that provides consistent power readings without worrying that it is a computed data point rather than measured.

Setup: Setup was easy for some parts and hard for other things. First, I got to use the magnets from my previous bike computer, which was obviously nice. There's a lot of extra wire available, which is good or bad depending on your own needs. I'm tempted to cut and splice a foot out, but I haven't made that decision yet. The biggest issue with setup is that you have to change the orientation of the mount ninety degrees...a huge annoyance but easy enough to do...what kind of company doesn't fix that in production?

Feel:  The bike computer feels light and cheap plastic. I'm nervous about clicking through the buttons because it seems like they're going to break. We'll see if this durability issue is warranted down the road.

Use: The display reads out ok, but the information available sucks.  All the reviews I read about this before buying the gear talked about this issue....believe all the negative comments you read about the lack of thought put into how information and stats are displayed.  I can see the speed nice and big, but quite small right below/beside it is the heart rate. When I'm hitting a hard Sufferfest! interval and trying to keep up a high heart rate, I need that heart rate to be BIG and READABLE...not the case here. The overall time of the ride is shown all the time, which I personally don't really need and consider it a waste of space.

I have to cycle through the bottom portion of the screen to see in quite small text the watts, avg speed, cadence, temperature (who cares what the exact temperature is?!), and a few other things. What I want is to see in big type the speed, cadence, and heart rate. Everything else, like average cadence, average heart, and such, can be cycled through in small text after the ride. So, I'm not a big of how information is displayed.

Wireless Interference:  When I first tried the computer, the readings were wildly erratic, from 2mph to 75mph or something crazy like that. Every data point was acting crazy. I checked the magnets, and they were all good. Then I read the manual (gasp! I know...crazy!), and it said that there can be interference from  magnetic forces. My laptop computer is magnetic. I moved it a couple feet away from the bike computer, and presto! all the problems were solved. Lesson: keep your laptop at least a couple feet away from the bike computer monitor.   So how do I watch the awesome Sufferfest! videos? I watch them on my Droid X phone only about two feet away from the bike computer, and all is good.

Power Reading: Other reviews talked about the power reading being quite realistic and close to power meters that measure the power rather than compute the power. If you don't know, the Kurt Kinetic power computer computes the wattage via math formulas that are calibrated with the fluid trainer.  I simply like knowing that I have another objective, consistent data point to measure and compare.  This is truly the poor man's power meter.

Heart Rate Strap: This strap feels much bulkier than my Timex Ironman strap, but once I get going it makes no difference, and I basically forget that it's there. I don't necessarily like the strap, but I don't dislike it either. If I noticed it during the ride, then I would dislike it, but that is not the case here.

Please understand that I don't think my issues with this bike computer in any way relate to the fluid trainer from Kurt Kinetic. That thing is SWEEETT! I think the problem is that a trainer company tried to make a bike computer, resulting in a usable product but definitely not an awesome product.