Why isn't my Band 2 counting the floors I climbed correctly?

[BlueCube4]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

My Band 2 recorded a record setting 153 floors yesterday. I actually walked up 19-20 flights of steps.

Today, at 3:45 pm, I'm up to 103 floors; I know I walked up 11 floors so far today.

I was initially complaining about a low floor count; now it's at the other extreme. I think MS tweaked the algorithm to register floor counts whenever there is arm movement and changes in barometric pressure. Unfortunately that picks up wind gusts while I'm walking, weather changes (causing barometric pressure changes) while i'm moving around in the office, and the times I drive my car over hills.

Anyone else seeing extremely high floor counts recently?

 

[poit57]

Mine has not varied significantly in the nearly three weeks I've had my Band 2. I probably climb 2 to 4 floors per day, but like I said on page 1 of this thread, the floors at my work place are approximately 30 stair steps. Sometimes this is counted as 1 floor and sometimes 2. The Band usually counts from 4 to 8 floors climbed per day. I've had up to 4 additional floors counted while running a 2 mile route with an estimated elevation gain of 45 feet.

Windy days have not seemed to affect the floor count very much if at all for me.

 

[BlueCube4]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

I ended the day with 215 Floors on my Band 2 (vs ~ 20 floors actual). Looks like I got ~ 50 floors while running on my treadmill around 9 pm (I had the B2 set for Exercise).

 

[badbandit]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

the floor counter is a bad joke and i think this is very poor from MS.

today i climbed 10 floors and the band is showing 1 floor. the 1 floor was counted during a short bike ride

seems as if they have implemented a random counter instead of a baromter and some logic.

 

[HanTing Lee]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

The answer is right there in the official Microsoft Health Blog(Up or Down, Stairs are Better Than Walking | Microsoft Health Blog) and official site in FB.
"Microsoft Band has a built-in barometer that can count the number of flights of stairs you?ve climbed and descended."
"A flight of stairs (1 floor) is 10 feet of elevation."
If you ask the official Answer Desk, you might get this wrong answer: "In my knowledge, it counts the steps on the stairs."

So, I've walked up and down my stairs a few more times since my original post, and wow, I've climbed 1 floor....... I'm hoping it's not a defective barometer.

In my opinion, I can't agree with you more, since I thought these might be the algorithm problem for insuring the situation then update counts. For steps tracking, new counts would be triggered at least 10 steps, then it shows immediately and updates numbers for next each 2-step. But for both steps and floors tracking, they even sometimes compensate the last data missed earlier to the new action. For floors tracking, it really takes us a period of time to update counts.

WAG: For quick estimation, a floor is 10 feet.

Yes, you are right! And the other answers just were solved above by official sites.

I'm thinking it's floor count can be thrown off by changes in weather. If the pressure is rising or falling and you're walking at the same time - it can't tell the difference between elevation and weather.

It knew what you are worried about but actually Barometer detects the difference, Δh by Δ(atmospheric pressure) , for especially floors tracking, unless you go upstairs and downstairs whole day long. Basically, Floors tracking and Total Gain/Loss in Run should be referenced and calculated by your starting point height/pressure.

And here are my issues: There are different Total Gain/Loss showing in my Dashboard between my Band 1 and Band 2, of course, with different account.

Then I asked official Answer Desk, in their opinion, the numbers of Band 1 was more accurate than Band 2. Last time, I just had another jogged and went through an arch bridge for elevation 9m and a tiny hill for elevation 13m but the result showed 12/11 in chart/text. The most important of all, the Total Gain/Loss shouldn't be only 13/-12!


Have you ever tried to use Run tracking indoors without opening GPS? For my only one test earlier, Barometer counted correctly for Total loss 9m, since I just went downstairs for 3 floors but it didn't count the max and min elevations, which they both are showing "--". I hope I should continue testing my both Band 1 and Band 2, however I had already asked for replacements successfully for many issues, especially for pairing and resetting.

 

[DroidUser42]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

It knew what you are worried about but actually Barometer detects the difference, Δh by Δ(atmospheric pressure) , for especially floors tracking, unless you go upstairs and downstairs whole day long.

Yes, but it's looking for changes while walking (I'd hope). So if the weather is changing while walking, it can't tell the difference between weather and stairs.

There are different Total Gain/Loss showing in my Dashboard between my Band 1 and Band 2, of course, with different account.

Eh? I wouldn't think Band 1 could do elevation, unless it's part of a GPS run - in that case, it's either from the map of the route, or the GPS elevation (which can be quite a ways off).

 

[HanTing Lee]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

Eh? I wouldn't think Band 1 could do elevation, unless it's part of a GPS run - in that case, it's either from the map of the route, or the GPS elevation (which can be quite a ways off).

I don't want to judge you with that thing and I do understand you, because I also thought about the same thing about it. I agree with you while the official Answer Desk gave me some answers that the Barometer shouldn't be influenced obviously.

Sorry for confusing all of you. It should be something different between the Truths and the answers from the official Answer Desk.
I found the answer, Microsoft Band 2 hasn't been allowed to use Barometer to track the Max/Min elevation (absolute height) yet, at least not for now, since elevation are collected from GPS's z-axis. But where Barometer is used to? It counts total Gain/Loss and is used to Floors tracking.


The red circles mean I jogged when the GPS was not locked, and the results show "when there is no GPS, there is no elevations."


https://youtu.be/JEN9PiI4dMs
These were the Run test which showed the result when I went downstairs for 3 floors(from 4F to 1F) for making sure that Barometer should work somethings in the Run tracking without GPS. We can tell that it only tracked Total Loss accurately (9m) but not tracked for current elevation. )

 

[BlueCube4]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

I'm about to switch back to my Fitbit Surge. Achieving my daily step and stairs count goals was very motivating for me. Last Christmas I was at a party and realized at 11:55 PM I was two stairs counts below my goal. I was motivated to walk up and down the stairs twice before midnight. I never missed a run on the treadmill because that was a major contributor to achieving my step count.

My Band 2's step and stairs count is so inaccurate, that I am no longer motivated to push myself to achieve those goals; so I may soon power off the Band 2 and start wearing the Surge again.

 

[Teeceman]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

The answer is right there in the official Microsoft Health Blog(Up or Down, Stairs are Better Than Walking | Microsoft Health Blog) and official site in FB.
"Microsoft Band has a built-in barometer that can count the number of flights of stairs you’ve climbed and descended."

This is interesting, the Microsoft Health Blog states that the band counts stairs up and down, my band has never counted any stairs that are descending, I wonder if this makes mine defective can anyone confirm their band tracks climbing up and down stairs.

 

[DroidUser42]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

I wonder if this makes mine defective can anyone confirm their band tracks climbing up and down stairs.

Scrolling up to post #47, it does show altitude gain and loss - for a run. I'm not sure if there's a way to see stairs descended or not.

 

[Teeceman]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

Cheers DU42, I noticed that during a run, but the Microsoft Health posted above clearly states it is suppose to count stairs descended.
"Microsoft Band has a built-in barometer that can count the number of flights of stairs you’ve climbed and descended."
Think I will wait for the next firmware update before I considered getting it replaced.

 

[DroidUser42]

As far as the problem of accurately counting stairs - I'm sure one issue the designer faced was trying to measure pressure differences due to change in altitude and changes due to weather. My guess is they included logic to only record changes that happened during walking. (Escalators don't count!)

But given the Step Count Issues thread, maybe the problem is the band isn't sensing steps as you go up stairs. You might want to test this theory by noticing how you hold your Band arm when climbing stairs. Do you:

• Let your band arm hang/swing freely?
• Do you hold the handrail but move along in spurts (almost like you were pulling your self along using the handrail.)
• Run your Band hand over the rail at a steady speed - not really holding onto it, but just ready to grab if you need it.

My thought is that the first method see most likely to see that you are walking. The last method is least likely to register as walking.

 

[Captain_Eric]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

Today was a big update (music and activity). Does anyone know if it fixed this problem with the altimeter? And the inaccurate heart rate monitor with high activity?

 

[MrSchmuck]

Haha, bursted out laughing, it sounds like you found my floors too

 

[TennisGuy45]

This is not working correctly for me.

This morning I walked down 7 flights of stairs and my band only registered 1.

 

[gwinegarden]

Re: Not sure Band 2 is counting floors climbed correctly

elevation maybe?

Possibly the weather. Rising or falling barometric pressure.

 

[poit57]

I usually only do about 8 floors per day if you count up and down, but my Band usually averages counting about double that number. This doesn't bother me as my stairs climbed is fairly insignificant to my daily step count. I just revisited this page because I noticed yesterday that my Band stopped counting floors completely. I'm not sure why the change because it has been a week and a half since I've installed any sort of updates tot he Health app or to the Band's firmware.

 

[poit57]

After a week of the Band not counting any floors climbed, I decided to perform a factory reset. It successfully counted the 1 floor I climbed when I arrived at work this morning.

 

[cj-m]

ah well...I ran a 13 miler...on a flat a road as can be (Nassau, Bahamas) and on my return to the port I discovered that I had magically climbed 117 floors while running on the flattest road imaginable.
then another run from Miami Cruise Port Terminal to Brickell area...apparently there are 430 floors that I run up while bumbling around Miami Circle

 

[InsGadget]

ah well...I ran a 13 miler...on a flat a road as can be (Nassau, Bahamas) and on my return to the port I discovered that I had magically climbed 117 floors while running on the flattest road imaginable.
then another run from Miami Cruise Port Terminal to Brickell area...apparently there are 430 floors that I run up while bumbling around Miami Circle

I've noticed that extremely low elevations can mess with altimeters. Could be what's going on here.