nike amp+ watch - a runner’s ipod’s best friend?

it was a gift from my lady for xmas and up until lately the weather here hasn’t cooperated enough for me to give my new toy a try. i have quite a few races to run this year including my first marathon so this was both a great gift idea and a chance to add another gadget to my stable. she humors me with letting me have so many toys. in any case i can’t run without my ipod and this figured into the equation nicely.

for those uninitiated the nike amp+ watch/remote is something you wear on your wrist (duh!!) that controls the volume, play/pause, skip and stop/start for your workout. it interfaces with the little plug that’s part of the nike + running deallio for your ipod and the chip in your shoe.

information on this particular item is really sparse. i mean, you can see one behind glass at a niketown store, but that’s no help. it’s not available in an apple store; so that’s no help. the only image you can see online looks like an artist’s rendering, again no help. so after thorough testing and use i have written this review and included pictures so you can see what i saw.

just wearing it looks like a black rubber band on your arm, but hey, it’s actually pretty cool. since the band is rubber you need to trim it down to fit your wrist. actually pretty easy to do with the included size chart and a pair of scissors. take my advice, go a size bigger, then you can trim down after using it for a bit.

the face: the lighting on it comes up from underneath the black top when a button is pressed. it’s really slick looking as you can see from the picture. however here’s something to consider: the time is not always displayed on the face and is displayed in 2 phases. the first part shows the hour, then an animation dissolves it off the screen, and then it shows the minutes. i don’t mind this myself, but it might be a dealbreaker for others.

setting the time: really quite easy as there are only 7 buttons on the entire watch. it flashed an ‘h’ for hour when it was ready to adjust the hour, an ‘m’ for minutes, etc. really not rocket science.

linking with the ipod: on the ipod select ‘nike+ipod’ — ’settings’ — ‘remote’ — ‘link’ and then on the watch press the ‘play/pause’ button. that’s it. seriously. a message on the screen will show you that you are linked together.

controlling the ipod: this is about as easy as you can imagine given all the dedicated buttons. all the basics are there so i won’t go through each one. i will say this, each one is responsive and there is no longer than a 1/2 second delay when changing a song or accessing any feature. you can even put the ipod to sleep from the remote as well.

workout functions: okay this is where it gets fun. the main drawback that i found in using the nike+ kit is that you will, invariably, press the wrong workout function button. utilizing the power song is not necessarily difficult, but not super easy. this solves all those issues. you can start your predetermined workout by pressing the button on the left side. that same button you can press to activate the voice feedback function. (who doesn’t like a computer telling them how good of a run they are doing?) you can also hold that same button to activate your powersong too.

to pause your workout you just need to press the play/pause button, (genius i know, pressing pause to pause your workout) and then press it again to restart. finally you can end your workout with the same button by holding it for a couple of seconds.

an overlooked feature which i really like is that the battery can be replaced by anyone with a nickel and the right battery. you don’t need to take it to anyone and it can be done in under a minute. it also has survived multiple showers so don’t worry about rain or any of that stuff. i just don’t recommend swimming with it. use your head people.

overall: in summation i find this ‘watch’ to be more of a remote and less of a watch, but for my purposes that’s perfect. see, i like that the ipod tracks all that stuff for me like time, distance, and whatnot and don’t need the watch function as much. when i wear it without the ipod i like the feel of it on my arm (if you have worn the yellow ‘livestrong’ bracelet you can imagine the feeling as it’s similar). i adore this watch for running and like it otherwise. as a running tool i find it indispensable.

Mar