Today I will talk about personal testing of the Canyon CNS-SB41BG fitness bracelet, I will tell you in detail about all its functions, I will give the pros and cons. I have never used such devices before, so I have nothing to compare with, but I will be as objective as possible and will not hide the shortcomings.
Appearance and usability
The bracelet is available in two color options - black-green and black-gray. I got the first one. In the box, the bracelet looks like this:
And already unpacked:
It looks good on the hand, this is the merit of the green color. Gray, it seems to me, would not look so advantageous:
Overall, the bracelet fits comfortably. The hand under it does not sweat without physical exertion. The case itself is made of metal and plastic, and the strap is made of silicone.
Screen size - 0.96 inches, resolution 160x80. Information is displayed in a user-friendly interface, the brightness is good, but it's a pity that you can't change it - you can't see it very clearly in the sun.
The fitness bracelet has IP68 protection, which allows you to take a shower with it, go to the pool or swim in the sea. And this is really so, when it gets into the water, it calmly continues to work.
USB charging, short enough which is not always convenient. And the principle of recharging itself is also necessary - you need to match 3 electrodes on the charger and the case. At the same time, they can easily slip off, which is why a couple of times my bracelet did not fully charge. The bracelet itself charges quickly, 2-5 hours is enough, depending on the degree of discharge. At the same time, if you do not turn on heart rate monitoring for a long time, the charge is easily enough for at least 5 days.
General functionality
The bracelet has only one touch button, the screen is not a touchscreen. One press means switching further through the menu, holding - selection of this menu or exit to the main one. Dealing with the functionality turned out to be quite simple, it took about 10 minutes, and this in the absence of detailed instructions (which, if desired, can be downloaded from the manufacturer's website).
CNS-SB41BG works in tandem with a phone, and its OS is not important, there are applications for both Android and iOS. After installing the application, the user parameters are set:
Next, you need to connect with the bracelet using Bluetooth and add it to the connected devices.
In the future, the bracelet automatically transmits data to the phone when Bluetooth is on. However, it is not necessary to keep them very close. The instructions say that you can turn off Bluetooth for the watch in order to save battery, but I still could not find how to do this.
The main screen shows the following:
- current weather (data is taken from the phone, respectively, if the phone is far away, the weather will not be relevant);
- time;
- Bluetooth icon;
- charging indicator;
- day of the week;
- date.
By holding the button, you can change the appearance of the main screen, there are three of them:
Thus, you can make the screen look like a regular clock.
The main screen itself appears when you hold down the button (about 2-3 seconds) or when you raise your hand and turn the watch to your face (gesture sensor). In this case, the second option works about 9 times out of 10 - it all depends on the position of the hand. Among the shortcomings here is the short display time of information on the screen, it fades out rather quickly, and this period cannot be adjusted.
A single press of the touch button from the main menu switches to other items. Sequentially appear:
- Steps;
- distance;
- calories;
- sleep;
- pulse;
- exercises;
- messages;
- next menu.
Let's consider them in more detail.
Steps
This menu displays the number of steps taken per day:
It resets itself, like all other similar items, at 12 at night.
This information is also displayed on the main screen of the application, you can also see there how many percent of the daily value (which we set in the user settings) is completed:
To measure the number of steps, the watch has a built-in pedometer, it is also a pedometer. When walking / running, it works quite accurately, even if you do not wave your arms, for example, when walking on a treadmill, I hold the handles in front of me, but steps were counted in full. However, you should be careful for those people who, when working, perform any actions with their hands, the pedometer can count them as steps. In this case, it is better to take off the bracelet while you are working and wear it only during activity.
The statistics displays the number of steps by days and weeks, their sum and the average number:
When the required daily rate is passed, the bracelet will inform you about this and display the message: "Excellent, you are the best!"
Distance covered
This menu displays the distance traveled:
The watch does not have a GPS tracker, so the calculations are made using a formula based on steps and user data. Compared to the readings on the treadmill, this is fairly accurate.
Unfortunately, for some reason this indicator is not displayed in the application. Therefore, the statistics on the average distance traveled cannot be viewed.
Calories
This menu displays the calories burned per day:
They are also calculated according to certain formulas based on user activity and data. However, for people who would like to understand in this way how many calories they spend per day, this method will not work. Apparently, only calories spent during the period of activity are taken into account, and our body spends them even at rest. Therefore, for such purposes, it is better to use formulas based on height, weight, age, percentage of fat and daily activity ratio.
Calories, like distance, are not transferred to my applications, although there are fields for this there, but always by zero (you can see in the screenshot the statistics on steps for a week).
Sleep
This menu displays the total sleep duration:
Falling asleep and waking up are recorded using an accelerometer and heart rate monitor. You do not need to turn on anything, you just go to bed, and in the morning the bracelet displays information on sleep. When transferring data to the application, you can also see the time of falling asleep, waking up, phases of deep and REM sleep:
The data is normally transferred to the application, however, when a new week arrives, for some reason I lost the chart for the previous one, only the average indicators remained:
At the same time, it can be noted that sleep tracking is not entirely correct. For example, during the whole week my awakening was recorded in the period from 07:00 to 07:10, and although I often wake up at this time, after that I sleep for another 2-3 hours, and quite deeply, as I dream. The bracelet does not fix this. He also did not record daytime sleep for an hour. As a result, according to the application, my average sleep is only 4 and a half hours, although in fact it is about 7.
Heart rate monitor
The current heart rate is displayed here:
When the menu is turned on, the bracelet needs 10-20 seconds to start measuring. A heart rate monitor is used, the operation of which is based on the method of infrared photoplethysmography. For correct operation, it is desirable that the sensor on the back of the case fits snugly against the wrist.
If you turn it on for a long enough time, for example, during a 2-hour workout, it drains the battery much faster. The indicators are generally correct, the discrepancy with the heart rate monitor built into cardiovascular equipment is on average + -5 beats, which is insignificant. Of the minuses - sometimes the bracelet suddenly shows a sharp drop in heart rate by 30-40 beats and then returns to the current value (although in fact there is no such drop, it would be sensitive during monotonous low-intensity work, and the heart rate monitor of cardio equipment did not show this). I also tried to monitor the pulse during strength training - there were a little strange indicators. For example, at the beginning of the approach, the pulse was 110, at the end - 80, although in theory it should only increase.
Also, you cannot set the limits of the acceptable heart rate, as in some professional heart rate monitors.
The heart rate data itself was also not transmitted and saved in the application. The maximum that is there is the current heart rate when the menu on the watch is on and Bluetooth is on on the phone:
But he does not save this data either, the statistics are completely empty:
You can also enable heart rate measurements in the application every 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 or 60 minutes for any period of time:
If the application is open, you can see the result of the last measurement. But these data are also not saved to statistics.
As a result, this sensor is only suitable for monitoring the heart rate at rest or when walking / jogging and other similar loads.
Exercises
In this section, you can take individual measurements for steps, calories and heart rate. They will be summed up in the daily rate, but they can be viewed separately. This is necessary, for example, if you want to see how much you spent on a run, but you are reluctant to calculate steps and other data from the total. Also, this data is stored in the "activity" in the application (though, again, not all, more on that below).
There are three types of exercise: walking, running, hiking.
To access these submenus, you need to hold down the touch button on the main menu "Exercises". To start training, you need to select one of the three modes and hold the button again. As a result, four screens will be available, which display the training time, the number of steps, calories and heart rate (it's a pity that there is no distance):
To end the workout, you need to hold down the button again for a couple of seconds. In this case, the bracelet will give the already familiar message to us: "Excellent, you are the best!"
The statistics can be viewed in the appendix:
Unfortunately, only the time and the number of steps are displayed here, calories and heart rate are not visible (0 for steps in this screenshot for those workouts where they really were not, this is not an error).
Other functions
Phone notifications
In the application settings, you can enable receiving notifications from the phone about calls, SMS or other events from certain applications:
When a notification is received, a part of it will appear on the watch screen (it is usually not completely included) and a vibration will appear. Then the received notifications can be viewed in the "Messages" menu:
Vkontakte is missing in the list of applications.
Find your phone and watch
If your phone has Bluetooth enabled and is nearby, you can find it by going to the Next menu:
And then “Find my phone”:
The phone will vibrate and beep.
A reverse search is also possible from the app.
Remote camera control
In the application, you can enable remote control of the phone camera from the bracelet. To take a picture, you just need to press the touch button. The submenu itself is also located under the Next menu.
Warm-up reminder
In the app, you can enable a warm-up reminder. For example, so that every hour at work you receive a notification, and you get distracted for 5 minutes and do a warm-up.
Alarm clock
Also, in the application, you can set 5 different alarms for any days of the week or one-time:
Outcome
In general, this fitness bracelet performs well its main functions - tracking activity and heart rate. Unfortunately, not all data are measured correctly, but this is not a professional pulmeter, and its price is very low. Also, not all data is saved in the application, but these are rather claims to the application itself, I hope this will be fixed.
You can buy a bracelet in online stores, for example, here - https://www.dns-shop.ru/product/176d02f634d41b80/fitnes-braslet-canyon-cns-sb41bg-remesok-zelenyj/
