We’ve just got our hands on a Ciclosport HAC 4 Titanium all-in-one bike computer and HRM and it looks very impressive. There are 57 functions to play with – which sounds like a lot with only five buttons to switch between them – and a large display that shows two functions at a time. There’s also the option of downloading all the information to a PC (but not a Mac – boo!) so that you can get some impressive looking graphs to show just how hard – or not – you’ve been training.
We particularly like the altimeter and variometer (tells you current gradient) functions – we’ve coped a long time without them but it is interesting information to have. We also like the handlebar mount, which is simple but effective and allows you to remove the computer and use it as a wrist watch for running or going to the gym. So far we don’t really like the fact that you can’t see current speed and HR at the same time – we’ve come from using a HRM and a bike computer so we’re used to having both bits of information available to us and we reckon it’s useful to see both at the same time.
Here’s the low-down on exactly what it does:
Heart rate monitor with current HR, average HR, max HR, upper/lower limits, recovery HR with audible signal
Altimeter with current height, daily altitude increase/decrease, total altitude increasing/decreasing, max altitude reached, home altitude.
Bike computer functions with current speed, average speed, max speed, daily kilometres, total kilometres, daily riding time, total riding time, time/distance comparison (sec.), auto start/stop, current ascent/descent (%) average ascent/descent (%).
Variometer functions including: current rise/descent, maximum rise, maximum descent, average rise, average descent, number of ascents, number of descents.
Performance functions including current watts, average watts and maximum watts. Watch, stopwatch and countdown functions are also present
We’ll be back with a full review when we’ve had a good play with it but it looks pretty impressive so far.