[Closed] Garmin Fenix 3 HR, Fenix 5 or 935

645 is out in the next few days I think and looks bloody nice - I’ve been agonising for a few months now about which one of these watches to get. About the best review site is dcrainmaker’s - he really goes into the bones of every one of these out there. I’d like the 645M (M standing for “Music”) but at £399, it’s a bit steep!

I know DC Rainmaker well - been following him for years and yes I've seen the 645. It does look very nice and is it's certainly an option but yes the M is too close in price to the 935/Fenix 5.

And there's still the Fenix 3 at a very good price.

Hmm - may wait for Ray's full review of the 645 and decide from there.

I did consider the Vivoactive 3 but don't like the very limited activity history.

I’ve got a 235 and never once looked at the activity history on the device. Once it’s offloaded to connect/Strava who wants to look at it on a piddling screen.

If I upgrade my 235, it’ll be for a 5s. The standard 5 is too big for my wrists.

How do you find the 235 as an all round activity tracker / sports watch JB?

Where have you seen the fenix 3 hr at that price? Was about to press go on a Vivoactive 3 but at that price may go for a fenix!

Cheers
Phil

Pretty much spot on, 90% of the features of the fenix, half the price, 2/3 the weight. Will do nearly 10hrs of GPS and HR or ~10 days of general activity tracking

firmware at the start was a bit flaky but last couple of iterations have been pretty stable.

@Phil - Millets online...

I've just bought a 235, and if i'm honest I'm not that impressed with it. It's screen is dark, menus  fiddly to use, battery life is shocking (in comparison to my old FR10, and Garmin Connect is still woefully shit. takes an age sometimes to find a satellite  Won't reliably connect via bluetooth to my phone, I have to discard it and add it new each time, software won't update...and on and on

Probs my last Garmin product I think.

Hmm – may wait for Ray’s full review of the 645 and decide from there.

There’s one on there!

I have the Fenix 3 HR and my wife has a 235. The two don’t really compare as the Fenix 3 is better display, much faster and more featured. It is however a lot bigger too and unless you have wrist big enough for it then it’s going to look pretty stupid on you.

If if you want to use a wrist based HR monitor and do rowing, cycling or other exercises that require constant flexing of the wrist they’re not that accurate and better off using a belt.

Jam bo, the benefit of being able to recall a past activity is that you can use it to pace yourself next time you do the same activity.

<p style="background-attachment: scroll; background-clip: border-box; background-color: transparent; background-image: none; background-origin: padding-box; background-position-x: 0%; background-position-y: 0%; background-repeat: repeat; background-size: auto; border-image-outset: 0; border-image-repeat: stretch; border-image-slice: 100%; border-image-source: none; border-image-width: 1; color: #444444; font-family: &quot; helvetica neue&quot;,&quot;helvetica&quot;,helvetica,arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 14.4px; orphans: 2; outline-color: invert; outline-style: none; outline-width: 0px; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; vertical-align: baseline; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; padding: 0px; margin: 16px 0px 16px 0px; border: 0px none #444444;">There’s one on there!</p>

That's only the initial hands-on not his super in-depth one unfortunately.

Not sure how helpful this is, but...

I bought a used Garmin 3 around a year ago for £130 off ebay - since then I've been tempted by the 5, the vivoactive 3 and other variants, but have always been put off by bad reviews of firmware issues, stability etc.

The Fenix 3 for me is just about perfect. Several of my colleagues have bought Apple Watch, or other variants of smart watches - they are nice but hard work, daily charge etc.  The single downside of the Fenix 3 I can see is size. I'm 6'1" with fairly large wrists so for me it's not actually a problem and I'm happy with this.

I guess in summary I would suggest to buy a Fenix 3 and wait it out until technology advances. I don't think think that the Fenix 5 is much of an advance. Buy a 3 then skip a generation.

Had the original Fenix3 non HR for nearly three years, got a little bonus in work last month so splurged out on the Fenix5X, looking around for a Sapphire glass 5 (after living with a screen scratch for years on the 3) and finding that with a deal at Blacks/Millets there was no difference on price between the 5X and the 5 Sapphire.

Its the same size as the 3 but packs in a hell of a lot more functionality and battery life. Ditched the maps on it as I use the Talkytoaster ones instead which come with a lot more detail and contours.

As previously stated the DC Rainmaker review is worth a read.

I get the impression Garmin are drip feeding updates to the consumer. I mean the 645 can take a mem card and play music. Surely the next step would be able to stream music with a sim card? Storing music on sdcard is already getting a little old hat.
My 735 was updated fairly quickly to the 935 which will no doubt be updated to a 645 equiv. pretty soon. I dont think the extra features of the latest are worth it IMO. OHR (although pretty carp indoors/sweaty) and bluetooth was the last update that was worth it.
Next there will be boost wrist straps 🙂

I don't think the 645 can take SD cards. The plain 645 has no music capabilities (other than controlling a phone app). The 645M has 3.5GB of useable storage. Not seen anywhere about an SD card and would make water proofing a pain.

I went from the original non-HR Fenix 3 to a 5 this year. The main reason I changed was for the 24x7 HR monitoring, most of the other changes are improvements but nothing big enough to justify changing. A better battery is nice, but unless you're doing 20hr events you won't notice it. (Not sure what the battery life is like on the 3HR thought...) The screen's higher res and shows emoticons in telephone notifications, but again it's not a deal breaker. And so on for other bits and pieces.

So if you've got the cash the 5 is nicer than the 3HR, but not hugely so.

I upgraded from a 235 to the Fenix 3 , again from Millets ( don’t forget quidco ).

from the 235 it’s a massive upgrade for me , i specifically wanted the altimeter for my fell / trail running .

its a big chunky watch, but I like it and does what I need it too. I’ve had a Suunto Ambit in the past and I find it more user friendly , and a nice upgrade from the 235.

Yeah sorry, not sd card, not sure what I was thinking! but the same music playback local storage ability. Useful until you remember how much better streamed music is

I went from an apple watch to the 5 and can honestly say the 5 is a great watch.

Make sure you check out all the deals online and remember Go Outdoors will do deal match and 10% off so I got mine for just over £400.

I went from a 3 non HR to a 5 (middle size) as I didn't want to have to wear an HR strap any more & my girlfriends 5S was just a bit slicker than my old 3.

I actually went via a Vivoactive 3 which nearly did everything I wanted, but not quite, and the fatal issue of it felt like a Fisher Price toy coming from a Fenix. Total crap.

Being slightly smaller is nice, when I have to wear a shirt for work, the HR bit is great for the most part but it doesn't like super active stuff like squash, too much movement I think.

All in so far, it's great. As I've got a friend who works for Garmin I get a hefty discount anyway so costs aren't really a concern.

i would go for the Fenix, just for the ruggedness IMO.

Thanks all. I've ordered the Vivoactive 3 for now just because at £230 if it does what I want then cool.

However having owned numerous Garmins before I fear that it'll be slightly compromised just to stop it being better than some higher end devices so will have to see.

A Vivoactive 3 in a Fenix shell would probably be ideal for the majority of people.

Lose the touch screen for buttons, and being in something that feels more robust than a £20 Casio & they would sell truck loads.

Having looked at the 645 is just looks like Vivoactive 3 with a few extra features. Maybe the 935 is a decent compromise between the two.