10
How does the
Activ8rlives
Buddy
Step Counter
work?
Now to use your
Activ8rlives
Buddy Step Counter
! Attach your
Buddy Step Counter
to the
lanyard, hang it around your neck, wear it in your sock or in our Arm/Ankle strap accessory
when you are cycling (optional extra). Around the neck gives the most accurate count if you
wear it all day. Pockets are not great for step counters—we forget about them and they end-
up in washing machines. Also the
BUTTONS
get pressed and reset, and for these reasons it is
recommended that you
DO NOT
wear your
Activ8rlives
Buddy Step Counter
in your pocket.
The
Activ8rlives
Buddy Step Counter
has a 3-axis accelerometer chip and a microprocessor,
which measures how you move (accelerate) in three dimensions and it uses this information
to calculate the number of steps you take.
You will notice that the display does not always update as you move.
It has a 10 step filter
to eliminate inaccuracies due to non activity-related movement and bumps and the screen
may even go blank. It has an eco-friendly sleep mode to make the battery last longer but will
wake up and update from time-to-time or if you continue moving. It also records how much
time you spend exercising. Useful as part of a rehabilitation programme and it is very
accurate.
If you hold the
Activ8rlives
Buddy Step Counter
in your hand as you walk, you will see just
how accurately it can “sense” your steps and starts counting these after you have taken 10
consecutive steps.
Another ability of the
Activ8rlives
Buddy Step Counter
is that it will count and store your
steps for your last 7 days so that you can upload these at a later time in the week.
Calories are calculated based on your stride length and your weight. The values are
approximate but gives you a useful indication of how much effort it takes to burn off the food
you have eaten. You will be able to measure how much physical effort it takes to burn-off
even 200-300 Kcal—talk about an incentive to reduce your intake of “junk” calories (a
chocolate muffin at Starbucks is 500 calories—that takes a lot of walking to burn this snack
off!)
Again, an approximate distance value is calculated for you based on your steps and your
average stride length. This is useful for estimating how far you walk at work or at school, for
example.
Steps, distance, calories and activity time are all saved to your
Activ8rlives
Buddy Step
Counter
and can be uploaded to your personal
Activ8rlives
account. This is covered in later
sections.
