I've had it for a mere two days, but so far - i'm liking it. Essentially it's a band with an accelerometer in it, which tracks the amount of "nike fuel", calories and steps you take throughout the day. It also functions as a watch, and has an incredibly neat display (100 white LED's & 20 color LED's) that projects through the black band. It has a rechargeable battery (the clasp is actually a USB connection which when plugged in recharges through any powered USB port IE: a computer, or an andriod or iphone charger). The device has bluetooth and can sync with apple products to update the Nike + website, or you can plug it into your computer to see a wide array of data (how active you are by hour, etc) how your data compares to others in your age group (based on the nike + community) etc. You also set goals, which you can monitor on the device (it has a neat red, orange, yellow, green bar showing progress) and acts as a great motivational device. Example - I spent about 40 minutes on an elliptical today, then the rest of the day got ahead of me and when I next checked the time on my band (5-6 hours later) I noticed the bar was in the orange - and I was well behind where I wanted to be for the day. I put the laptop down, and took the dogs for a long walk and low and behold I was right where I wanted to be.
While i'm not convinced it accurately measures calories, or the steps taken are surgically precise - I do subscribe to the whole "nike fuel" concept... which at first I figured was largely worthless. Since the device is on your wrist, clearly it cannot be as effective at counting steps as a waist mounted pedometer - so the "fuel" concept instead measures activity. If you're watching TV - clearly the three axis accelerometer isn't going to register much, if anything. If you do certain tasks, you'll register proportionally more fuel than others (remember it's wrist mounted, so if you're on a stationary bike and your arms aren't moving at all, you're not going to burn much, if any nike fuel), however it seems to register a little low on actual exercise (running, elliptical, swimming, etc) so all in all it seems to even itself out pretty well. Again, I don't think it's incredibly precise, but in my mere two days (my opinion could change) of using it, it seems to be pretty spot on - and Nike seems to have done their homework in that when you setup the device (takes just a minute or two) you enter in your heights and weight, which changes how it calculates fuel, etc - and playing with the inputs a bit, it does seem to make a substantial difference. When i'm not doing much, I don't burn much fuel, when I am active, i'm burning fuel - and it's a great motivational aid.
An average day is considered 2,000 fuel points. An active day is considered 3,000 and an incredibly active day is 4,000+. I've left it on the default 2,000 setting and so far both days i've exceeded the "average" - yesterday I got 3,380 fuel points and today i'm at 2,718 of right now. I think it's pretty spot on, based on my activity level. I ran 3 miles yesterday, and walked another 5 throughout the day - i'd say I was pretty active. Today, working from home - I was less active, but still put in a 40 minute work out and a 2.5 mile brisk walk to help get to my current number. Normally on a Friday, I wouldn't would do a quick work out, and no walk/run... probably 1,500 fuel points tops. The mere fact that this little band makes it FUN to be more active, and the nike+ website (you get access once you buy a device) does an exceptional job of showing you data, motivating you and congratulating you when you do well (the band will show all sorts of neat animations when you attain your goal) - so far i'm impressed. The design is also exceptional - it's really well built, then aluminum clasp is Apple quality and all it takes is one push of a button to light up the display (to show time, calories burned, steps, or nike fuel burned) and everyone in eye shot will immediately say "that's incredibly cool - what is it?"
So far the only downer i've experienced is battery life. It's supposed to last up to 4 days, with some folks claiming they get a week out of theirs. At 2 days, mine needs a charge and while it isn't that big of a deal (I have to charge my phone, laptop, ipad daily already) it is one more thing you have to think about, and opposed to most watches which last years on a single battery - it's a bit of a bummer.
All in all though, for $149 - so far, i'm impressed.
Anyone else have/use the Nike+ band? Would be interested in your impressions, especially if you've had one for awhile.
