Karoo 3
If Hammerhead needs to sell more units then it's time to start thinking about the Karoo 3.
So my question is, if Hammerhead offered the same trade-in deal as they did for the Karoo to Karoo 2 upgrade, what improvements would compel you to buy a Karoo 3??
(Assume that the already requested items have been fixed in the K2, such as Di2, disable rerouting, and my personal favorite distance to next POI, etc)
The biggest upgrade that would compel me to buy a K3 would be a major revamp of screen layout management. If I could design my own screens (even with a max of 2 columns x 5 rows) and arrange the 1/2 and full width fields in any order, and use any of the full width columns for graphics, and leave any of the fields blank,
.... And do it all with drag and drop, AND be able to do it on-the-fly during a ride, then I'm sold.
What big picture changes would tempt you to buy a Karoo 3?
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Off the top of my head - here is my wishlist:
- Same form-factor (not a dealbreaker)
- Upgraded chipset (lower power consumption / faster). The current one is old.
- New Android version. For Zwift companion and other apps (probably also consume less power)
- Apps that could be sideloaded now in the app store getting updates automatically
- Integrations Integrations Integrations (Trainerroad, Intervals.icu, Zwift?, Trainerday, Dropbox, Google Drive, Fitbit, Apple Health, Everything)
- Some kind of SIM based killer app. (Track your friends/team in real time / Minutecast weather) Would love this.
- Some kind of summaries on the dashboard. Hours/week, km per year etc. Doesn't have to be Strava or Intervals or Training Peaks just the basic info. (Maybe per bike totals)
Contrary to a lot of the comments I read in these posts I am a really happy customer of Hammerhead's. I love the K2 and my friends and I are happy to see what's in the update every two weeks. I am super impressed that a small team can deliver a product and experience that competes at a world class level.
I'm not sure the K3 is coming that soon but I'll buy it when it does.
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Slightly disappointing topic - the HH Karoo 2 is such a fine piece of hardware with at times rather mediocre software, and I guess this shows the problem with a business model where devices are sold with half finished s/w on the promise the device will improve. The idea of having to upgrade to a K3 now makes it feel like a subscription model, however throwing away perfectly adequate h/w is an incredibly poor environmental policy...
The key feature, the map and navigation is excellent, however there is so much scope for s/w improvement (and I am not talking about extra features, I am talking about the basic in-ride experience), as the o/p mentioned revamp the screen layout -I used the K2 at lunch today - my map screen is set with two data fields on the top (they have to be on the top otherwise they get covered over by climber, as I cannot customise climber..), every time climber appears it covers over the arrow of where I am on the map. Also there is ~5mm bar of empty black space under the text of the data fields before the map. The "drawers" at the bottom have a pointless tab on the top which covers over some of the map....
Battery life needs to be improved but again why cant the device be more intelligent to preserve battery. I cant believe this is even close to being optimised... My Suunto watch has a tiny battery but still manages to power a GPS chip for 20hrs recording...
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@Richard Horn
Sure, there is still space for improvements. It is not surprising that a product can be further developed through user experiences.
Hardware and software are also developing at the same time. This (trio) cocktail leads to new changing insights.
Beside this: #Live Slow #Ride Fast #Be Creative
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+1 to what Gareth and Richard wrote (I have complained about the pointless tabs earlier as well). I would add generally less lag and a touchscreen that works in the rain to the list (plus an altimeter that works in Germany as well :)
Still, realistically I don’t see myself upgrading until the next next generation (K4) at the earliest, unless I manage to break the current one, or there is some kind of a killer app that I can’t even think of.
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No murmuring of K3, just me doing a thought experiment wondering what people wanted in a next-gen head unit. Apparently from the responses I've read here and the same question over on Reddit, there isn't much suggestion of anything new or exciting HH can do other than tweak the K2 a little.
As for me, I am generally happy with my K2 but there are a few small things that would make it better for me (distance to next POI, for instance). But I can imagine a vastly improved UI as suggested above, featuring unlimited screen layouts, drag and drop data fields, and in-ride swapping of data fields. I hope HH has that somewhere in their product development road map.
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On a k3, 2 or original Karoo. For off-road riders especially, the ability to use third party maps ( not sideloaded apps) I can’t vouch for everywhere but in the countries I have tried, most trails don’t exist on the maps. So I use a Garmin which also has awful supplied maps but at least I can chose to use third party maps.
Oh and graphical displays in the smaller layout cells as we had before the pre Karoo 2 UI “upgrade” or not depending on your point of view. In summary, I would buy a K3 for better software but just newer hardware, nah -
Despite the fact that I complain about some situations with Karoo 2, I would switch to Karoo3.
However, there are conditions:
- the price level remains unchanged
- exchange for my Karoo2 with a financial discount
- a screen that will be fully visible in the sun
- a wider screen in the same housing, without frames as it is now
- a battery that is enough for a minimum of 16 hours of driving
- the possibility of expanding the memory with a memory card
- solar charging while driving and after Karoo is turned off
- a decent, durable plug for the usb socket
- no changes to the current software that would deprive it of its current options, only its extension
- selection of at least 3 different maps, just like in Dashboard
- Android 12 or higher
- launching Google Play Shop for downloading additional software, without bothering with sideloading -
Most of my "wish list" could be software improvements on K2:
1. Make compatible with the Garmin remote (for switching screens super easily on the fly)
2. Make compatible with IQ apps -- I miss my wind speed app
3. This may need a K3, but pls. give us incident detection of some sort
4. The only hardware improvements I can realistically covet are: lighter weight, smaller bezels, better battery
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1. OK. I have a garmin remote and miss it.
2. Dificult or imposible. IQ Apps is Garmin proprietary software...Is it like saying compatibility with GArmin Connect? I miss WindSpeed APP too
3. Ok, but Garmin has many false positives with incident detection. If you want it so much you can put a Specialized Angi on the helmet for example
4. YEs please. A Karoo 3, and Karoo 3 plus, with > 3.7" screen (the most important), 50% smaller bezels (the 2n most important), Current most efficient and powerful processor, gyro and multilanguage... and the perfect cyclocomputer for adventure. :) -
The K3 should be different on the hardware level.
The software will be identical as the K1, K2 today.
Yet, the software itself can be improved in many ways.
My hardware requests
- Bigger screen and a smaller bezel
- Higher resolution of the screen
- Better readability when riding with the sun out in summer time. When riding in the summer I need to use my backlight which is the reverse of what I had to do with my Garmin. During the summer I ride longer so I need my battery and now it's drained by the backlight.
- Better colors. The colors of the K1 where much better compared to the K2. K2 is somewhat more damped. Also the black ain't totally black.
- Bettery battery life
- Fast charging because now my K2 isn't charging fast. Needs a lot of time to charge (2 hours or more)
- Make charging with fastcharger possible.
Software improvements
- much more datatafields, see list of garmin here, HH list is nothing compared. Garmin list 1030 > https://www8.garmin.com/manuals/webhelp/edge1030/EN-US/GUID-53FC7978-187F-4E53-AA33-04853F86B05F.html
- faster loading of the control center
- more layout possibilities
- colored datafields like Wahoo has
- user configurable datafields on the climber pages
- better coloring of the grades on the climber page
- align datafields yourself meaning left, center, right
- possiblity to have 3 datafields on one row instead of 2
- and I could go on ...
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+1 and open the app store for others to develop nice stuff. Will give a real boost. No energy in dashboard, route building, only facilitate connection there. Let komoot and ridewithgps do their thing, same as trainingpeaks, golden cheetah and elevate. ( training ) focus on the hardware. Maps better suited for mtb with contourlines and surface info with the known local, regional and international routes for road and mtb are usefull . ( i use openorgmaps now )
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On the hardware side I wish there would be
- an SD Card slot, especially since the Maps are so huge in Size (they could remove the useless SIM Slot as far as I am concerned)
- a bigger or at least more square screen - the Karoo 1 was much better than the 2 in this respect
- go back to a garmin compatible mount - this proprietary thing is just plain stupid and a massive annoyance.
On the software side I would like to have
- more than one Map screen. I would like to have a full screen map to orient myself and also one that still shows Data like speed, heardrate or power - like I can have on Garmin
- have the possibility to add custom Maps. The stock maps are crap compared to plain and current OSM. And some of us want to use different rendering and/or Topo Maps.
- have a well documented API and an "app store" like connect IQ.
Currently Garmin is still leagues ahead of the Karoo and I am not talking about Di2 integration. I will give the Karoo2 a try but am already half back migrated to an Edge 1030 since there are too many shortcomings on Karoo side and too many nice features on Garmin side that will probably never have an equivalent on Karoo.
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Oh come on, this is pathetic this thread; all the demands can be sorted via software upgrade/s with K2, yes it's chipset is now aged but it's still got a hell of a lot of bang going for it and I've slates it to hell and back in these communitys yet it performs...and pretty great too!, My moans, the Lap button, what's the use of it? Fields, more variabilty on. Battery, obviously but it works for me charging etc, yes I've still got my cover, how they get lost beats me lol. If a K3 comes along it'd have to supremely better than the K2 by miles...
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It is so plain and simple: Garmin will sooner than later release an upgrade to the Edge 1040 with a high-res OLED or TFT screen, like what they are currently doing with the Forerunner 965 or with the Epix Gen2 to the Fenix 7. Do I have inside knowledge? No, but it is so obvious. Like with the sports watches, Garmin will however keep the non-TFT user face for a subpar experience in the beginning. Still, that device will have with superior battery life that will make many people wonder where the added value of the Karoo2 remains.
So to remain in competition there needs to be a Karoo 3 soon because the competitive edge of the Karoo 2 is not everlasting.
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> Garmin will sooner than later release an upgrade to the Edge 1040 with a high-res OLED or TFT screen
I am not so sure its a clear cut advantage for the purpose of a cycle computer. I have an Edge 830 and a Karoo 2, and which is best comes down I find to the light conditions.
- In dull conditions, night riding or the cafe, the bright Karoo 2 screen works best (and can still run with close to 0% brightness)
- In moderate light, you need some backlight on an LCD, and you need some backlight on the Karoo as the screen has started to disappear with the reflecting light, so its pretty even.
- In bright sunny conditions, the LCD screens (830 or indeed my old Bolt V1) seem to have the advantage as the sun reflects off the back of the screen acting like a back-light, so not only are they more visible but can be run with zero backlight. I have found the Karoo to be pretty bad in bright sun - have to turn up brightness to max > no battery life. Also generally the 830 / bolt is less intrusive as you havent got something really bright in your peripheral vision whilst riding.
I hope Garmin stick with LCD, IMHO overall its better for a cycle computer. What I would really like to see is a cycle computer company brave enough to go back to black and white and use an E-ink based screen - very low power and visibility in sun far exceeding anything else.
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I agree what concerns numbers and simple information like an elevation graph. But there is so much potential for maps and navigation with a high-res screen if you compare with a modern smartphone. Sure, the alternative approach would be to “outsource” navigation/routing to an app on the smartphone like what Wahoo is doing. But the one-stop-shop concept is attractive and it obviously is the path chosen by Hammerhead, and I believe there is a lot left to tickle down from smartphones to a bike computer.
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A lot of the things requested above are software, so could be implemented on the K2.
People need to differentiate between hardware and software. The reality is that any new hardware probably wouldn't enable any new features.
Also, people need to appreciate HH have already tried their best (within budget constraints) of providing the best screen size/resolution versus battery usage. If you want a bigger or higher resolution screen it requires more power. If you want the Karoo to run longer you need a bigger battery. You can't have both without the requirement for a massive battery. Would a slightly larger screen or higher resolution be beneficial to the majority of users? Unfortunately the H/W platform that HH uses (albeit is a fantastic open/capable solution) will never been as energy efficient as a dedicated microcontroller and screen. If Garmin wanted to change to use the same technology that HH does then it could do (it has the $$), but it knows that it wouldn't provide the same efficiencies as their current solution.
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A few days ago, an interesting article was published informing about Hammerhead's plans. Nothing is written directly, but you can read a lot about Karoo3 from the statement of the boss Jess Braun. Battery, external applications, dual-band GPS, developing technologies similar to Climber.
https://road.cc/content/feature/present-and-future-cycling-computers-299805
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@Grzegorz Ossolinsk The shared url does not work ?
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