Review: BodyMedia Fit LINK - Part 1

(for those who have already read Part 1, you can flip back to Part 2...)



I am going to introduce you to the BodyMedia Fit - Link Armband which I bought on Jan.30th from the BodyMedia Fit website with a 15% discount using the promotional code available to me as a user of MyFitnessPal (it expires Feb.28th and you can see the info here:
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/apps/show/10).

There are a few gadgets out there which can be worn as a way to measure what rate you burn calories at, and it was the review of someone in the BodyBuilding.com forums which convinced me that this would be the more accurate approach since it measures more things than the others.  Here's a link to the Features & Benefits page on their website:
http://www.bodymedia.com/all_day.html


Here is my experience so far:


1. I placed my order online and received the item about 5 days later via UPS. As I live in Canada, I was expecting to have to pay customs fees, but I didn't!

2. Unfortunately their website is not that intuitive and if I had known what difficulty I would have trying to pay for the subscription to the online Activity Manager (which captures the data and reports it for you, and also communicates with MyFitnessPal), then I would have added it to the shopping cart initially. Since I bought right from their website, I get 3 months free on the subscription which will start billing at $6.95/month in May. Not too exorbitant considering it's $4.86 for a Starbucks Chai Latte. Just sayin'.

3. Again, since the Manual and the QuickStart manual which come with the packaging are not very comprehensive, I found myself having to call their customer service hotline, which by the way is only available 9am-5pm EST. Otherwise, you need to email them for any issues.  Between the booklets and two phone calls to Customer Service, I have made the process much easier for anyone reading this who is considering buying one:

• charge the armband for 3 hrs using the USB cable connected to your computer

• pay for the subscription and activate your armband for that subscription using the info on page 8 of the user manual 

• from their website, download the BodyMedia Sync application (in this step, I do not mean the Android or iPhone app, that comes later) by clicking on "Getting Started" and stepping through that process. This will install the BodyMedia Sync application on your home computer where you need to have it so that when you plug it in with the USB cable, your data will be captured and then communicated to the Activity Manager you access on their website.

• on your cell phone, ensure that you have activated your Bluetooth so that it can discover devices 

• press the grey button on the plastic interface of the gadget and watch that it pairs properly with your cell phone. If you activated your subscription, it should show something like "RC's Armband" where "RC" are my initials...yours would have your initials. THIS WILL ONLY APPEAR THIS WAY IF YOU SUBSCRIBED AND ACTIVATED FIRST. If you make the error of not subscribing, but trying to get one of the steps out of the way by pairing your gadget with your cell phone, it will say "BodyMedia Fit Armband" and will not be able to communicate the data from the armband to your BodyMedia app. You'll have to go through all the trouble of unpairing the armband, then pairing it again after you subscribed & activated, then log in to the app and watch that it starts doing what it needs to.

• What BodyMedia App? The one you need to download for Android or iPhone. Once you've done that and you know you successfully 'paired' your gadget with your cell phone, log into the app and watch in the bottom right hand corner for "Waiting.....Linking....Linked" . Once it's linked, your data should begin updating periodically.

• However, if you want to get the data from your gadget to the Activity Manager you access through the BodyMedia website, your cell phone will not do that for you (they're working on improving the technology for future prototypes). You will need to take the Armband "off body" and connect it to your computer via USB. You should have the Activity Manager open and ready for data to sync when you're doing this.

• MyFitnessPal Users - you will notice that an estimated potential calorie deficit was already added from what you input during the set up process of the BMF Activity Manager.  Don't go scarfing down calories just yet....you still need time to see how these applications and the gadget will all interface

(this is the part I am at now and I will report on that in the next few days).


I have been wearing the armband all day, it's been very comfortable. I have changed clothing and it hasn't slid down my arm or anything. I've checked my phone a couple of times to see that it has kept track and communicated with my phone as to how many steps I've taken today and estimates of calories etc. It still needs to log a whole night of sleep, so I'm heading to bed wearing it.

At maximum, it should be "on body" for no more than 23 hours so that it can send data properly (I suppose).