Band and Motion core when pushing a stroller

mcheiron

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Hi,

My wife and I did an interesting test. I pushed a stroller while she walked next to us. I got 3500 steps on the band, 5000 after sync with my Lumia 930, motion core with frequent places turned on. She got 10,000 steps on her Fitbit.

I got 2.8 miles, she a bit over 5 miles.

Is anybody experiencing the same? I do understand that the arm motion with the stroller is restricted and therefore the band should be less accurate. But the phone and band should be rather working well together.

Any idea how to improve accuracy?

Thanks
 

mcheiron

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I just checked. It should have been 3.2 miles. So the combination of band and motion core was not too far off, bit the band by itself pushing the stroller would have been.

I wonder if anybody has the same band-stroller experience, which seems fairly inaccurate by itself when pushing a stroller and maybe a solution for an improvement.

Thanks.
 

kenjancef

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Did you "calibrate" the Band? Was it your first walk with it, GPS On, and all that? That might make a difference. I got my Band in January, and being it was not outdoor running weather, my first run was on a treadmill. It showed me at a 10 minute pace when I was actually running 8:30 pace. Now that I have done 8-10 outdoor runs with GPS, it tracks my run WAY better now, maybe .02 miles off from MapMyRun.
 

poit57

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As kenjancef said, calibrating your Band with GPS on and normal arm motions while walking/jogging/running is a good first step to get an accurate reading.

As for the motion sense readings combined with the Band, the setting in the Microsoft Health app basically says that the phone's data is supposed to fill in the gaps when you're not using the Band. It seems that the phone is also able to fill in the gaps when the Band has a break in the step count.while the phone is still tracking. I rarely walk around with my phone while the Band is not on my wrist, but I still get a small amount of extra steps added to my dashboard that do not show up on my Band.

If your hand is stationary on the stroller handle, I don't think the Band alone is going to be very accurate in tracking your steps.

I wore a Fitbit Flex for about a week after I received the one that came with my Lumia 830. I noticed that there was usually a pretting big discrepancy between its step counter and the Band's. I wonder how accurate your wife's Fitbit was in measuring the distance of your walk. Is it saying that the distance of her 10,000 steps was within range of the actual distance of your walk, or does it show that she walked a much farther distance? Maybe the accuracy of the Fitbit should be in question.
 

EMitchell

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I used to use a Fitbit, and it seems to me the accuracy in step count is better with the MS band - it's more sensitive to smaller movements. But I did notice with each of them that when doing something that held the arm fairly stationary - like riding a bike or pushing a stroller - the actual steps didn't register on either band. My wife noticed it as well with her Fitbit, and started looping it through her shoe laces rather than on her wrist, even when just going for a walk. The counts were more accurate than when on her wrist.
 

mcheiron

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Thanks to all for your great answers. I do think that the fitbit is less accurate than the band-Lumia combo. I think my wife can adjust her step length to adjust that.

You talked about calibration. How can I do that when just walking? I am not a runner but bike everyday and walk quite a bit. Should I just turn the run mode on when walking?

Thanks
 

DroidUser42

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Assuming you're walking outdoors, just enter run mode and turn on the GPS. Not only will that calibrate your stride for when the GPS is off, it will give an accurate measurement of your walk.
 

jmerrey

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I noticed when I mow the lawn, steps don't register when I have the Band on my wrist. I tried an experiment and put the Band in the pocket of my t-shirt and it registered steps. Weird.
 

DroidUser42

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I noticed when I mow the lawn, steps don't register when I have the Band on my wrist. I tried an experiment and put the Band in the pocket of my t-shirt and it registered steps. Weird.
Not weird. "You" go up and down as you walk. Your hand goes with the handle of the lawn mower. While there's still a little motion from your steps, it's probably getting drowned out by the bouncing of the lawnmower.
 

grumtrias

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Not exactly the same, but similar observations... Sometimes I do 30km bike rides back and forth to work. For each of those rides i hit the bike tile and everything on band registers OK (distance, HR, calories etc..). however, i have my phone with me in my back pocket and it does register about 6K steps while band is in biking mode for each of the 30km legs... this is clearly a bug that needs fixing in my opinion..
 

mcheiron

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Not exactly the same, but similar observations... Sometimes I do 30km bike rides back and forth to work. For each of those rides i hit the bike tile and everything on band registers OK (distance, HR, calories etc..). however, i have my phone with me in my back pocket and it does register about 6K steps while band is in biking mode for each of the 30km legs... this is clearly a bug that needs fixing in my opinion..

Rather funny since I just wanted to write the same thing which I found during my rides to work. Not quite sure why it does that since the synching should take care of it, especially since there was a user defined input and definition of a motion for a certain time.
 

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