Replacement for an edge 530?

[Serge_K]

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[acino]

I recommend Karoo 3. I am very happy with Karoo 2, and now after several years with Garmin, my wife switched to Karoo 3.

Pros:
- very customizable, including all screens, climb pro, lap screen or workout screen. You can also fully customize appearance of maps via xml file (e.g. I significantly increased contrast, distinguished paved/unpaved surfaces, and added drinking water/toilet/atm icons)
- very good and clear display, and modern UI
- can handle power meters, di2/etap shifting (I am not sure about er9 though, but I guess?), radars (including chinese brands)
- never any issues with syncing routes/rides; the ride automatically uploads to strava/invervals before I take my shoes off. On the contrary, syncing rides/courses used to be a repeated issue for my wife's Garmin, prompting several reinstalls.
- you can sync/send route from a link or gpx file using your phone. You long-press the link and "share it" via the Karoo app and it just sends it to your account and Karoo. Very simple and super handy when bikepacking trips goes wrong and you have to conjure a route on your phone while standing at a train station and somehow load it into your computer
- you can load any android app onto it, including spotify
- receives actual updates every 2 weeks

Cons:
- 12-15 hours of battery which can be an issue for some
- the top drawer (like on your phone) is a bit laggy of Karoo 2 but much much better on Karoo 3

Here it can be usually/often bought for 300 euro, but I understand it may be outside of what you are willing to spend on this. Love the device and fully recommend, though.

[pushpush]

Inline comments below. Bolded for readability.

Do your ride road exclusively, or do you also mtb? The integration of trailforks data with garmin (exclusively garmin) is a massive differentiator. For a hot minute I considered a Karoo3 but the inability to integrate the trailforks map data was a show stopper. If you don't care about offroad/trail riding and you don't care about long rides (10+ hrs), then the Karoo3 is also a worthy contender.

For reference, i've been happy with the 530, but never loved it.
- Navigation was always underwhelming (I missed turns so many times)

---- This is semi problematic for all devices IME.

- climb pro is nice, however i could never have on the climb pro screen fields i actually cared about (like power)

---- See comment below

- map / navigation screen was nice, however i could never edit that screen to display fields i actually wanted to see (like power)

---- See comment below

- I had bad experiences with touch screen so i picked it for the physical buttons.

---- The Edge 840 is a great device. It has a decent touch screen AND buttons. I've moved on to a 1050 myself because the screen is easier for me to read, but it lacks physical buttons. Unknown if the imminent 850 will have buttons or not.

- I like that i could get my ltwoo er9 to display data (battery charge and which gear i'm in, mostly)

---- Edge devices can definitely do this for Di2 and AXS. I believe this will work for ltwoo if you use the di2 datafields. https://chinertown.com/index.php?topic=4242.450

If i buy a newer garmin:
- Is it now possible to edit the map / navigation screen / do a split screen with the data i want, like power?
- Is it now possible to edit the climb pro screen / do a split screen with the data i want, like power?
These 2 things would be fairly decent reasons to upgrade, in my mind.

---- On the 1050 (and presumably in the near future with the 850) you can add data fields to the climb and nav screens. I never tried on my 840 because the screen was already too small/busy with information. There are even some great prebuilt datafields available on the connectiq store to make this easier. There are a number of variations, but take a look at this for an example. https://apps.garmin.com/apps/30fdcbb5-a0f2-4832-9157-b7dcd81e7a0f -- no affiliation, but I use this and am happy.

- are there killer features i am missing? (a lot of new features i dont need, like solar and what not).

---- solar isn't a big value add. I had a 1040 solar and got rid of it. The killer features now are the actual screen tech. Brightness and resolution. If you don't care too much about that, there isn't much from the latest greatest that will matter to you. Batteries have improved but with those better screens the energy requirements increased. Net result is that duration is about the same.


I bought a IGPSPORT BSC200 for a friend who wanted something very basic and he says it freezes sometimes, he's not too happy about it.

---- half the price and 10x the frustration is never worth it.

Thanks!

[cramy]

currently garmin is runing an offer in france, if you buy a 1040 they reimburse you 100€, worth the check.

example
https://www.materiel-velo.com/1872554-compteur-velo-gps-garmin-edge-1040.html

[pushpush]

currently garmin is runing an offer in france, if you buy a 1040 they reimburse you 100€, worth the check.

example
https://www.materiel-velo.com/1872554-compteur-velo-gps-garmin-edge-1040.html

I still recommend the 840, but I would not buy a 1040. If you are going to accept the size and weight of the larger device you might as well benefit from the much improved software UI available on the 1050. Don't get me wrong, it is still crap Garmin UI, but it is a lot better.

[pavlo.k]

+1 for the Karoo 3.
I switched to it from the Edge 530, which I hated from day one.
The Karoo had some bugs initially, but they roll out updates regularly, actually fix the things people complain about, and introduce features users want.
The screen is pretty awesome, though it does take a toll on the battery.
It was also quite affordable — I paid around €350 in December 2024, and at that price, it was a steal.

[kbernstein]

I am computer bipolar. I've had over 10 as I always think the grass is greener on others.
The 530 sits firmly at the bottom of my ranking, I hated it then and it must be even more outdated now. If you must stick to garmin the edge explore 2 is imo the best bang for buck, everything was great for me except missing structured workouts.
Haven't had the karoo 3 (450e... cool sram tax) but the karoo 1 i brieftly had was no better than a rugged smartphone. You can probably get an equally powerful 4inch phone with better battery and ant+ support for maybe a third of the price, and run whatever software
As for chinese units, I really like my IGS630 atm. It's what the garmin 540 should have been I think. Nothing special but decent at everything. For the same money I wouldn't even look at magene anymore. If you have more money I would absolutely trust the newer IGPSport units as I'm resisting the call for consumerism on the BiNavi

[pavlo.k]

So, we have 2 votes for the Karoo 3, and votes for newer garmin devices.
But how does one get a karoo 3 for 300 eur? that's probably more than i'd like to spend on a bike computer, but either way i'm seeing prices higher than that?

I bough it on bikeinn but the price is much higher now.

[mysterio]

I'll add my 2 cents:

My journey went like this: Garmin edge 705 -> Wahoo elemnt bolt -> Hammerhead Karoo 2 -> iGPSport BSC300

Currently I am running the igpsport and karoo 2, a coin flip usually chooses the device. Karoo 2 is great while riding, i like it for the visuals and eccentric colors as it breaks the standard color scheme everyone else uses. The climb pro feature is also pretty great but as you mentioned with your garmin, it isn't very customizable, so I usually rely on it solely for the profile of the climb. Otherwise it is an irritatingly slow device, from boot up to configuring and setting things up it is not good. The top drawer is also extremely slow which is sub optimal while riding to say the least. Oh and the battery life is the worst out of all of my and my riding buddies' experience.

I bought the igpsport a couple of weeks ago because of the battery concerns of the karoo and for the price it is great. I wish it had more field options and customizability, but honestly if you're not super particular about your setup, it should mostly cover your needs. The setup is quite finicky though as the translations are not great and the menus in the app are hard to find sometimes. It also doesn't have the climb pro feature i don't think, maybe other igpsport computers do? And as far as I can see, there is no upcoming elevation graph display, which is the only thing I am actually missing on it. I grabbed it for ~80 eur and do not regret it at all. Haven't experienced any freezing or bugs yet, but keep in mind that I haven't been testing it for long.

As for your requirements the igpsport bsc300 (I might be wrong on some points, if I am someone please correct me): I am not sure about calibrating a power meter, climb pro is missing, I've synced data to intervals.icu via strava or direct file import and it works, I am not sure there is a direct sync option though.

[Daviddavieboy]

For reference, i've been happy with the 530, but never loved it.
- Navigation was always underwhelming (I missed turns so many times)
- climb pro is nice, however i could never have on the climb pro screen fields i actually cared about (like power)
- map / navigation screen was nice, however i could never edit that screen to display fields i actually wanted to see (like power)
- I do like the form factor.
- I had bad experiences with touch screen so i picked it for the physical buttons.
- I like that i could get my ltwoo er9 to display data (battery charge and which gear i'm in, mostly)

If i buy a newer garmin:
- Is it now possible to edit the map / navigation screen / do a split screen with the data i want, like power?
- Is it now possible to edit the climb pro screen / do a split screen with the data i want, like power?
These 2 things would be fairly decent reasons to upgrade, in my mind.
- are there killer features i am missing? (a lot of new features i dont need, like solar and what not).


Thanks!

 I bought a 1050 this summer. The price was a bit of a had pill to swallow but I sold my other 3 devices to ease the pain. The factory software was crap but after updating has been solid for me.

 The screens are very customizable especially with the apps that can be installed for data pages and I like the increased size and brightness that my old eyes can see when it is sunny out. Any data available on the device can be added to the map or climb pro screens including having the map, climp pro AND individual data on the same screen.  The photo has been my main data page for a few months now.

[kbernstein]

IGPSport users: do you use a power meter? Can you calibrate it via the device? Does power data "work"?
GPLlama did an opening video of the IGS800, then in the comments of the video it seems he got disappointed and never made the follow up video he promised (IGPsport slow to respond to queries, map contrast problems, speaker location problem, no recording of gearing info, power data is also a little off due to some recording problems, and compass problems). Because of all this, i could be tempted by the 630S, but the IGS800 feels too expensive for something that's not quite refined it seems.

Yes, I can edit crank length, calibrate etc from the IGS630. Tried on 3 powermeters no jumps, sticky watts or weird behavior
The IGS800 seems to have been quietly scrapped, their windows vista project if you will. It's been replaced by the Binavi, addressing the IGS800 complaints (for cheaper)
FWIW I find IGPSport very reactive when I reached out to their customer support, updates are frequent and the glitches I reported were all patched within 2 weeks

[Aradell]

FYI, If you want to get more data fields under your map on Garmin Edge devices you can:



GPLama video about the Connect IQ field here:
https://www.youtube.com/   watch?v=HCb7OFJqUj8
(Remove the spaces, because the I can't post the link otherwise)

[Lotnik]

Karoo 3 is just what you need. Ticks all the boxes you mentioned. Buy one and live happy till the end.

[crazyravr]

All the people recomending Karoo2, I just switched back to Garmin 840. Reason? The main one is the HORRIBLE battery life and screen visibility in sunlight.
Battery life - sensors connected are power/cadence, varia, navigation - if I get 7h I am happy (for anything longer I always bring a power bank (ie. long gravel rides or bikepacking).
Screen - in full sunlight even on the brightest setting you will have to cover the screen to see anything on it.

My wifes cheap $200 IGSport can do everything the K2 can (without installing extra apps which will only drain the battery even more) and lasts at least double the time using the same sensors connected etc.

[jhearrtot]

just throwing this out here if you haven't yet, look at Coros Dura should you prioritize battery life over everything else.

i haven't gotten it yet, but will likely buy it to match with my Coros Pace Pro watch and stay within the Coros ecosystem