Ask HN: Good Fitness Band? I recently got the flu and was thinking it would be interesting to have a graph of my body temperature, which made me consider buying a fitness band. Are there any that HN likes? |
Ask HN: Good Fitness Band? I recently got the flu and was thinking it would be interesting to have a graph of my body temperature, which made me consider buying a fitness band. Are there any that HN likes? |
In the end I resorted to storing all the data in the Health App and using an app[1] to export the data as a CSV file and push it to my server. The benefit of using this approach is that then the actual device does not matter and you can use whatever fitness tracker you want.
If you are on android, you can use apps like Gadgetbridge[2] and FitoTrack[3] to achieve something similar with some of the Chinese bands. But, I am not sure about how to auto export
[0] https://korniichuk.medium.com/export-xiaomi-data-87f7e284b37... [1] https://www.healthexportapp.com [2] https://gadgetbridge.org [3] https://codeberg.org/jannis/FitoTrack
- No internet access / sign up / data syncing to the cloud is required (ideally it wouldn't exist at all). The ideal would be connecting the device directly to a computer via USB or bluetooth and pulling the data / logs off of it directly.
Combined with open data access / reverse engineering this would be very powerful. Basically I want a band where it is impossible for anyone besides me to get access to my data (without physically stealing the band or hacking my computer).
And they offered fancy features for the time such as VO2max or EPOC.
I wonder if any of their models still work well without apps?
Something to look at is https://github.com/jimmykane/quantified-self
What exactly are you looking for WRT your body temperature? Because for most fitness wearables, you just going to be able to log deltas. Kind of a solution looking for a problem at this point.
Overall, you should have well-defined goals before you purchase because a device that can log a bunch of body telemetry gets boring pretty quickly without solid goals.
...so I was wondering if this could lead to rough diagnostic method using a temperature sensing fitness wearable.
It's comfortable, has good enough battery life, is easy to use, and so on.
My biggest disappointment with this band is the sleep tracking (which was also a failing with my previous FitBit). I have to get up at 7:30 to feed my cat, then I go back to bed for an hour or so. Both my old and my new FitBit record 7:30 as the end of my sleep period; they ignore the sleep time after 7:30. I'm also not convinced that a band you wear on your wrist can accurately track REM sleep.
I use the FitBit app for some other features and controls, but I have no idea about "Open data access, reverse engineered APIs, 3rd party data analysis apps".
All in all, I'm happy with my FitBit Charge 5, and I think it's a good value for its price.
I upgraded to a Charge 5 from Charge 4, even though I happen to own an iWatch as well. Big mistake.
Charge 5 is happy to beep sms (morse code) from time to time when my cell phone picks up text messages. In the day time, that's fine, buf 4am in the fucking morning? There's no damned way to turn it off.
I am not aware of a skin temperature reading on it, though it does do an EKG-like reading, just like the iWatch. No clue whether it will phone 911 if my ticker gets funky; iWatch is known to do that.
I think I'd rather go back to a Charge 4, if only to get rid of text messages. I really don't need them - especially in the middle of the night.
I went abroad for a semester to a country where getting stuff mailed was a PITA. Turns out I lost my whoop charger in my quarantine hotel. Support sent a new charger but to actually mail it was close to impossible.
Now I use an Apple Watch. If I lose the charger basically any city on Earth has a store selling apple products (doesn't have to be a real Apple Store) and I get can a new charger in the same day.
