Any way to adjust stride length?

[danwanna]

I've noticed the distance being pretty far off when running on a treadmill. Does anyone know if there is a way to adjust stride length on the Band? I've done this on previous devices and would like to do the same here.

 

[DroidUser42]

What mode are you using? Run or exercise? "Run" turns on the GPS. That's not going to work too well on a treadmill.

If there is any calibration, I'd think it would be based on a actual run and comparing GPS distance to steps.

 

[gadgetrants]

I've noticed the distance being pretty far off when running on a treadmill. Does anyone know if there is a way to adjust stride length on the Band? I've done this on previous devices and would like to do the same here.

Howdy guys (my first post!) -- I was pleasantly surprised to go on an indoor run (Run mode, GPS off) and within a few steps, see my distance start incrementing! I've since "reverse engineered" the guess that even with GPS turned off, while in Run mode the Band estimates distance traveled via the accelerometer (in other words, it uses the movement of the arm/wrist to estimate stride distance). This was corroborated in part by the FRUSTRATING fact that every time I held my arm still (while running) to check out the display my pace suddenly got slower.

Two things I noticed: (1) at a really slow pace (11 min/mile) the calibration was miraculously spot-on. But (2) as I sped up to an 8-minute pace all hell broke loose (it far underestimated my true pace).

Sadly, I see no current way on the device to modify the calibration (or as you wondered, change the default stride length). Of course, it doesn't take a PhD in biomechanics and kinesiology to imagine the following:

- for each runner, there is a regular relationship between your running speed, your stride length, and the motion of your arms
- this relationship probably has a regular (though not necessarily linear) pattern over a range of speeds

The "DUH" (smack-self-in-forehead moment) comes when you realize that GPS can be used to tune this function to the particular runner. In other words, you ship the Band with a generic arm-movement -> stride-length function, and then over (say) 10 or 20 runs, you tune the function to fit the actual owner based on their own specific body size and gait pattern.

It may be in fact exactly how the Band works and that it simply takes a few weeks of outdoor GPS-monitored runs before it "calibrates" (which might explain why it was amazingly accurate during my slow indoor run). It will be interesting to see if in fact Microsoft has engineered it that way. Otherwise, yeah I'd expect to see a firmware update where (like on my Garmin) you turn on calibration, run for a predetermined distance (like half a mile), stop, tell the device you just ran half a mile, and then it uses those data to estimate future runs.

EDIT: OK, please hold off on my Nobel-prize nomination....just realized this thread hits many of the points I raised: http://forums.windowscentral.com/microsoft-band/322065-accuracy-treadmill.html

-Matt

 

[gadgetrants]

Guess I'm just a little ahead of the times. LOL

http://forums.windowscentral.com/mi...-calibrate-your-microsoft-band-heres-how.html

-Matt

 

[danwanna]

Awesome, that's exactly what I was looking for! If it wasn't so damn cold out, I would go do it now.

 

[gadgetrants]

Dan don't pop the champagne corks quite yet -- my first few runs with the Band were outside, and my collective experience is that instead of calibrating the device through a range of speeds/paces, it only seemed to work well indoor at the same pace I'd run outside with GPS. It's as if the Band learned: "Wrist movement X maps to stride length Y," instead of learning a general X->Y function. I'd love to learn more about how the "calibration" process works but for now I'd advise either (a) taking several GPS-guided runs at different speeds, or (b) varying your speed during a few runs. Either way once the bomb cyclone passes please post back with your experience!

-Matt

 

[eyecrispy]

Dan don't pop the champagne corks quite yet -- my first few runs with the Band were outside, and my collective experience is that instead of calibrating the device through a range of speeds/paces, it only seemed to work well indoor at the same pace I'd run outside with GPS. It's as if the Band learned: "Wrist movement X maps to stride length Y," instead of learning a general X->Y function. I'd love to learn more about how the "calibration" process works but for now I'd advise either (a) taking several GPS-guided runs at different speeds, or (b) varying your speed during a few runs. Either way once the bomb cyclone passes please post back with your experience!

-Matt

Well that's not what I wanted to hear. I'm going to take my band on its first run in a bit. My 7 yr old wants to come so it'll be a nice sloooow run. I'll report back.

 

[gadgetrants]

Well that's not what I wanted to hear. I'm going to take my band on its first run in a bit. My 7 yr old wants to come so it'll be a nice sloooow run. I'll report back.

Maybe throw in a few short sprints to mix things up? LOL Hope your run in near-freezing temps goes well!

FWIW: my first outing with GPS was a 2-mile walk, and then ironically I did the same route later that day at a slow run. Since then the distance estimates on my indoor runs have all been off when I go any faster than I did on the first day. I can't say going slow at first biased the calibration -- or that it isn't constantly tuning the wrist-movement -> stride-estimate function with new GPS data, but it looks possible. I'll be eager to see what MS reveals on their first firmware update.

-Matt

 

[eyecrispy]

My daughter ended up not going with me. I did just over 4 miles. Had Runkeeper going on my iPhone and it said I did 4.5 miles while my Band said I did 4.6. The Band was nicer I will try a few more to see if they get even closer. GPS locked within seconds so that was nice.

 

[RiftPoint]

I took mine out for a run on Sunday, doing about 6.6mi in about an hour at a 9min 17sec pace which tracked fairly close to my Caledos runner app which gave me a distance of 6.7 and a 9min 10sec pace.
Then I took it for a treadmill run this morning and it was way off... I ran for 15min on the treadmill and did about 1.8 miles at an average pace of ~7min 40sec. The band tracked me at a 9min 20sec (+/- 10sec) pace average for the actual running period... Almost a 2min/mile difference! So either the treadmill is dead wrong, or they have some more tweaking to do...
I still like the band, it's at least giving me a reference point, and it seems to me that most of these issues will be more of a software/calibration issue than a hardware problem... For now I might just treadmill run with it on exercise mode for the heart rate function.

 

[eyecrispy]

I took mine out for a run on Sunday, doing about 6.6mi in about an hour at a 9min 17sec pace which tracked fairly close to my Caledos runner app which gave me a distance of 6.7 and a 9min 10sec pace.
Then I took it for a treadmill run this morning and it was way off... I ran for 15min on the treadmill and did about 1.8 miles at an average pace of ~7min 40sec. The band tracked me at a 9min 20sec (+/- 10sec) pace average for the actual running period... Almost a 2min/mile difference! So either the treadmill is dead wrong, or they have some more tweaking to do...
I still like the band, it's at least giving me a reference point, and it seems to me that most of these issues will be more of a software/calibration issue than a hardware problem... For now I might just treadmill run with it on exercise mode for the heart rate function.

Treadmill runs are hit or miss for me as well. I reported in a thread somewhere that if you don't change your speed, it seems to be very very close to what the treadmill reports. If you change your pace, it starts doing strange things. The other day, I was actually speeding up on the treadmill after a warmup mile and the band showed me as slowing down (significantly). My Up24 isn't accurate on treadmill runs either, so I'm used to that, but at least it shows how many steps I took during the run. The Band doesn't show that in the workout summary, even though it has the information.

 

[gadgetrants]

Cool...this corroborates my experience as well. Today at the end of my leisurely indoor-track run, I moved the pace from 11 min up to around 9:30 (intuitively based on my "thousands" of miles of indoor time!), but the Band begrudgingly moved only so far as 10:45. Based on my long rant posted above and what we've learned about "calibrating" the Band via GPS since, I'm pretty confident this is a problem that a firmware update can solve! Whether we ever see that update is another question.

-Matt

 

[RiftPoint]

Cool...this corroborates my experience as well. Today at the end of my leisurely indoor-track run, I moved the pace from 11 min up to around 9:30 (intuitively based on my "thousands" of miles of indoor time!), but the Band begrudgingly moved only so far as 10:45. Based on my long rant posted above and what we've learned about "calibrating" the Band via GPS since, I'm pretty confident this is a problem that a firmware update can solve! Whether we ever see that update is another question.

-Matt

It seems like this is something that the band dose overall... It's quite conservative in reacting to sudden changes and things that seem "odd" to it's calibration. If I find the time I should go try and "calibrate" it on a faster run and seen if I can teach it that faster is acceptable. Considering they're still trying to get this device into consumer hands I'm hoping that an update is coming in the next month or so.

 

[gadgetrants]

It seems like this is something that the band dose overall... It's quite conservative in reacting to sudden changes and things that seem "odd" to it's calibration. If I find the time I should go try and "calibrate" it on a faster run and seen if I can teach it that faster is acceptable. Considering they're still trying to get this device into consumer hands I'm hoping that an update is coming in the next month or so.

Based on what I've read here I'm a bit more pessimistic on the update schedule...my expectations are set low, like February 2015 low. Hopefully you're right!

However, I'm not sure about your "sudden change" theory, insofar as the following anecdote:

- when walking without any activity mode turned on, if I hold my arm still and look at the Band, I can see my steps incrementing (presumably distance too) -- that's awesome (it's clearly still sensing the up/down motion of my hips and legs even if my arm is stationary)!

- when jogging with Running mode engaged, if I hold my arm still the pace display quickly plummets...er, I mean, gets slower and slower, and only gradually catches up as I move my arm naturally again

So what I'm guessing is that the two heuristics/algorithms used to estimate speed/distance are different during normal walking versus running. And that makes sense. What's a shame, though, that whatever cue is used while walking with a stationary arm that detects I am still moving is not engaged accurately while running.

Maybe this is a moot point. Like you note, I'm much more interested in correct estimation of running across a range of speeds.

​-Matt

 

[RiftPoint]

Based on what I've read here I'm a bit more pessimistic on the update schedule...my expectations are set low, like February 2015 low. Hopefully you're right!

However, I'm not sure about your "sudden change" theory, insofar as the following anecdote:

- when walking without any activity mode turned on, if I hold my arm still and look at the Band, I can see my steps incrementing (presumably distance too) -- that's awesome (it's clearly still sensing the up/down motion of my hips and legs even if my arm is stationary)!

- when jogging with Running mode engaged, if I hold my arm still the pace display quickly plummets...er, I mean, gets slower and slower, and only gradually catches up as I move my arm naturally again

So what I'm guessing is that the two heuristics/algorithms used to estimate speed/distance are different during normal walking versus running. And that makes sense. What's a shame, though, that whatever cue is used while walking with a stationary arm that detects I am still moving is not engaged accurately while running.

Maybe this is a moot point. Like you note, I'm much more interested in correct estimation of running across a range of speeds.

​-Matt

Sorry, I was referring to the fact that it does it for both HR and steps, not that it does it all the time...

As to step vs run? There's a lot more jostling going on in your arm when you're running, so the band needs to filter out the noisier signal environment.