Garmin Approach R50. All-in-one optical LM @ $5K.

[Streuner]

I did use the driving ranges and the Play mode. The club path and face path I did watch a few times and it looks ok to me but I did not control those numbers every time. Only if a shot felt strange or outstanding good. 

[Thomas_P]

I acquired an R50 and love it to be honest. I think the readings are accurate and it is super convenient in terms of set up and just booting up. I was hitting into a net with just the screen on the device and spending most of the time on the driving range and that convenience factor I thought was huge.
 

I just put up a projector and screen this week but have not had time to play around with it too much - will do this weekend. 

[Muffy]

2 hours ago, Thomas_P said:

I acquired an R50 and love it to be honest. I think the readings are accurate and it is super convenient in terms of set up and just booting up. I was hitting into a net with just the screen on the device and spending most of the time on the driving range and that convenience factor I thought was huge.
 

I just put up a projector and screen this week but have not had time to play around with it too much - will do this weekend. 

 

Nice setup.    Is there putting data capture in "driving range"?   Just wondered what sort of data there is for putting.....if it still had clubface and path info, ball info, etc.....or is the putting just for simulator play.   And then all this is camera capture for the 3.75" width of the ball placement area?  

[Thomas_P]

1 hour ago, Muffy said:

Nice setup.    Is there putting data capture in "driving range"?   Just wondered what sort of data there is for putting.....if it still had clubface and path info, ball info, etc.....or is the putting just for simulator play.   And then all this is camera capture for the 3.75" width of the ball placement area?  

There is no putting in the practice area unfortunately. I’ve heard people are lobbying Garmin for putting practice in a software update. The putting in the sim feel pretty good though. 

[Streuner]

There are a few things the Approach R50 should improve some software issues. 
I would Like to see some kind of club comparsion and the visibilty of shoot data when review the practise session is very poor. You have to export them to a text file. 

[Carolina Golfer 2]

1 hour ago, Streuner said:

There are a few things the Approach R50 should improve some software issues. 
I would Like to see some kind of club comparsion and the visibilty of shoot data when review the practise session is very poor. You have to export them to a text file. 

Yeah. This is a big thing to me.  If im mirroring to a large screen via the HDMI. Id like to be able to view a recap of the session or at least all the shots of thst club.  

[Streuner]

49 minutes ago, Carolina Golfer 2 said:

Yeah. This is a big thing to me.  If im mirroring to a large screen via the HDMI. Id like to be able to view a recap of the session or at least all the shots of thst club.  

Yes, and this is likely only a software issue, I strongly beleave this can be changed quickly if Garmin want this. I simply Hope there is enough complain 

[Muffy]

On 12/6/2024 at 5:24 PM, Thomas_P said:

There is no putting in the practice area unfortunately. I’ve heard people are lobbying Garmin for putting practice in a software update. The putting in the sim feel pretty good though. 

I'd just read Garmin's press release on the R50..." Utilizing three different cameras, the launch monitor can track more than 15 ball and club metrics², including measured spin rate and spin axis. It can also provide precision analytics for every club – from the driver to the putter – and deliver high-speed impact videos so players can review a close-up look at their contact for each shot."  And then another "Golfers looking to better themselves between rounds or during the offseason can utilize the training mode feature on the Approach R50, which records sessions and saves stats for each club, allowing players to see and understand improvements over time."  

 

So it appears like Garmin's intent was to have putting in practice mode.  I was thinking the one fiducial (dot), relatively flat angle and low height on the putter face, and the camera angle it might be difficult to capture the fiducial.

[Chubbydog]

Does anybody know if there's a place in the settings to adjust the altitude?  Could that be the reason that it's reading a little short for some people?  The ball definitely flies further at 6500' than sea level.  

[txbadger]

47 minutes ago, Chubbydog said:

Does anybody know if there's a place in the settings to adjust the altitude?  Could that be the reason that it's reading a little short for some people?  The ball definitely flies further at 6500' than sea level.  

yes, it is in session settings.  It defaults to where you are (assuming you have the wifi connected) but it can be adjusted manually. 

Edited December 13, 2024 by txbadger

[Chubbydog]

This thing fits everything that I'm looking for.   My only other question I haven't been able to find is that if you buy the $99 subscription to Garmin, can you use one of the watches, or GPS units on the course?  Just by logging in to your account.  That would make even better if you could.   I don't own one currently, but would for sure buy one if that was the case.  

[JCP22]

4 hours ago, Chubbydog said:

This thing fits everything that I'm looking for.   My only other question I haven't been able to find is that if you buy the $99 subscription to Garmin, can you use one of the watches, or GPS units on the course?  Just by logging in to your account.  That would make even better if you could.   I don't own one currently, but would for sure buy one if that was the case.  

You do not need a golf membership to use any Garmin golf watch. 

[Streuner]

On 12/13/2024 at 10:15 PM, Chubbydog said:

This thing fits everything that I'm looking for.   My only other question I haven't been able to find is that if you buy the $99 subscription to Garmin, can you use one of the watches, or GPS units on the course?  Just by logging in to your account.  That would make even better if you could.   I don't own one currently, but would for sure buy one if that was the case.  

I do not know if I understand your question correct. To use a Garmin Apporach Golf watch you need NO subscription to the HTH membership. This membership is mostly for simulation reasons. BUT if you have / or want to buy a Approach S70 golf watch then you get a goody from the HTH membership, the watch will show you the green slopes if the course provides them to Garmin.

the HTH membership is connecting with your Garmin account and automaticly every device will take notice. you can see and admin this in the Garmin Connect or Garmin Golf App on your mobile device.

 

and to your altitude question, every time when you start the device and start a training, the device asks for temperature, altitude and humidity setting. If you play a course at HTH, the device asks you to take the real live weather data, or any temperature / wind / humidity you want.

[iacas]

I can confirm that the GCQuad dots (even the tab for a GCQuad dot) will work with the R50.

 

At least with a 7I swung by one of my lefty students earlier today. My R50 will arrive tomorrow, and I look forward to trying to find a way to test it against my QuadMAX.

[Streuner]

All videos that I have seen where someone did try to use the GCQuad / GCthree next to a R50 failed. The infrared sensors produced interferences and Minimum one of the devices did not work. 
it would be very interesting but I have no Hope for. 

[iacas]

3 hours ago, Streuner said:

All videos that I have seen where someone did try to use the GCQuad / GCthree next to a R50 failed. The infrared sensors produced interferences and Minimum one of the devices did not work. 
it would be very interesting but I have no Hope for. 

 

Yeah, I'm not confident, but I do have some ideas.

[Spinozist]

This is an interesting unit. I think the all-in-one aspect is cool and unique, and if the clubhead data turns out to be good, then obviously that puts it in a special tier. If I were looking for an indoor unit this would be in the mix. Bit on the bulky side though.

[iacas]

Some quick notes. Mine arrived yesterday, and on Monday I used a student's in his lesson with him.

• The touch interface is very responsive. Almost iPad-like. Not at all like crappy touch screens that lag or where you're not sure you hit the button.
• A lot of the smaller (negative) issues are software based, so I think they can iterate on them and improve them:
  • I named myself "Erik J. Barzeski" and so my little user "circle" shows up as "EJ." First, stop assuming someone's initials. Second, when I choose "Edit Users" the only option to edit is… to remove the user. I can't edit my name or whether I'm a righty or a lefty. That's not "editing" a user.
  • I created "Student Lefty" and "Student Righty" as guest profiles, and think they should add colors to the little circles. It could let you more quickly find the person you're looking for. Not much of an issue with three, but if you play with a group of ten friends here and there, it would help.
  • There are four different ways to dismiss a screen, which I found funny. You can tap away from a panel, click an "X," click "save/cancel," or click "Done." They could have done
  • Not all clickable areas appear to be tappable. "Power Save" and "Battery Save" are tappable (you can change the settings), but they just say "Power Save : ON" or something.
  • I definitely don't love the shot tracer. In the overhead view, a dot appears where your ball would have landed. But… if you're hitting the same club, every dot is the same color (orange for a 7I). I think the last dot, the last shot, should be a different color. After you've hit five or ten shots, you don't even really know which dot is the new one. Again, software based, though. Could be improved.
• The impact camera is more than what's offered by a lot of things (like even the QuadMAX), but at the same time, not all that useful. It's only about six (eight? ten?) frames and it's snot from a not great angle because you hit from so side-on.
• The hitting area with club data is pretty small. This won't work very well off of grass. And you'll want to move it around lest you wear out your
• Alignment is super easy. Lay a club down, rest two balls against it… aligned. I do wish it prompted you to align it when you turn it on, even if one of the options was "keep current alignment" if you haven't moved it since last using it (or it never moves in your sim or something).
• I don't have a subscription yet and may never get one. I don't plan to use Home Tee Hero for much. I may plug it in to GSPro at some point. I think you can connect to it via your WiFi network. As in… it joins your network, and so you can be online and connected to it wirelessly. I'm not sure what the USB-C port is for.
• The fiducials (club stickers) I have for the GCQuadMAX also work on the Garmin. You don't need to use their larger stickers. Heck, I used the tab from a GC fiducial on Monday and it worked fine.
• The storage/travel case is well done. It's solid, sturdy. But, oddly, there's no real good place to put the charger and cable. Maybe I can set it in against the back side beneath the handle? I could have used a little pocket for that.
• The weight is not anywhere near as substantial as it looks. Because the GCQuadMAX is denser, I think it may almost be just as heavy (I think officially it's 7.x pounds for the Quad and 9.x for the R50).
• Because the unit sits almost directly beside the golf ball, I don't think people are going to be as worried about shanks as they are with the GC units (GC3, GC4/MAX) or other "side-on" units. I do wonder about someone accidentally hitting it off the toe and into what seems to be plexiglass covering the cameras, though.
• The range UI is nice — you can split screen to show the impact video, the shot data, the range overview of ball flight… etc. If you hook it up to an external display I'm pretty sure you can get three things. Maybe four, with split screens on both?

That's all I can think of for now, but I'll be updating this as I go.

[Carolina Golfer 2]

7 hours ago, iacas said:

 

Some quick notes. Mine arrived yesterday, and on Monday I used a student's in his lesson with him.

• The touch interface is very responsive. Almost iPad-like. Not at all like crappy touch screens that lag or where you're not sure you hit the button.
• A lot of the smaller (negative) issues are software based, so I think they can iterate on them and improve them:
  • I named myself "Erik J. Barzeski" and so my little user "circle" shows up as "EJ." First, stop assuming someone's initials. Second, when I choose "Edit Users" the only option to edit is… to remove the user. I can't edit my name or whether I'm a righty or a lefty. That's not "editing" a user.
  • I created "Student Lefty" and "Student Righty" as guest profiles, and think they should add colors to the little circles. It could let you more quickly find the person you're looking for. Not much of an issue with three, but if you play with a group of ten friends here and there, it would help.
  • There are four different ways to dismiss a screen, which I found funny. You can tap away from a panel, click an "X," click "save/cancel," or click "Done." They could have done
  • Not all clickable areas appear to be tappable. "Power Save" and "Battery Save" are tappable (you can change the settings), but they just say "Power Save : ON" or something.
  • I definitely don't love the shot tracer. In the overhead view, a dot appears where your ball would have landed. But… if you're hitting the same club, every dot is the same color (orange for a 7I). I think the last dot, the last shot, should be a different color. After you've hit five or ten shots, you don't even really know which dot is the new one. Again, software based, though. Could be improved.
• The impact camera is more than what's offered by a lot of things (like even the QuadMAX), but at the same time, not all that useful. It's only about six (eight? ten?) frames and it's snot from a not great angle because you hit from so side-on.
• The hitting area with club data is pretty small. This won't work very well off of grass. And you'll want to move it around lest you wear out your
• Alignment is super easy. Lay a club down, rest two balls against it… aligned. I do wish it prompted you to align it when you turn it on, even if one of the options was "keep current alignment" if you haven't moved it since last using it (or it never moves in your sim or something).
• I don't have a subscription yet and may never get one. I don't plan to use Home Tee Hero for much. I may plug it in to GSPro at some point. I think you can connect to it via your WiFi network. As in… it joins your network, and so you can be online and connected to it wirelessly. I'm not sure what the USB-C port is for.
• The fiducials (club stickers) I have for the GCQuadMAX also work on the Garmin. You don't need to use their larger stickers. Heck, I used the tab from a GC fiducial on Monday and it worked fine.
• The storage/travel case is well done. It's solid, sturdy. But, oddly, there's no real good place to put the charger and cable. Maybe I can set it in against the back side beneath the handle? I could have used a little pocket for that.
• The weight is not anywhere near as substantial as it looks. Because the GCQuadMAX is denser, I think it may almost be just as heavy (I think officially it's 7.x pounds for the Quad and 9.x for the R50).
• Because the unit sits almost directly beside the golf ball, I don't think people are going to be as worried about shanks as they are with the GC units (GC3, GC4/MAX) or other "side-on" units. I do wonder about someone accidentally hitting it off the toe and into what seems to be plexiglass covering the cameras, though.
• The range UI is nice — you can split screen to show the impact video, the shot data, the range overview of ball flight… etc. If you hook it up to an external display I'm pretty sure you can get three things. Maybe four, with split screens on both?

That's all I can think of for now, but I'll be updating this as I go.

Great write up.  Thanks for doing that. 

[Streuner]

You can Split the projector screen as well. 

[Chubbydog]

I just got mine today, but it didn't come with any club stickers for the data I don't think.  First impression is this thing is awesome.  Plug it in, create your account, downloaded 15 or 20 courses i wanted to play, and I was off.  Literally 10 minutes to get my membership paid and I was playing.  I need to get the alignment figured out where I'm hitting it straight with the mat, but I didn't really care about that right now.  Does anyone know if you can change the distance driving range around to show a different angle or anything?  I'm not really a fan of the way it was out of the box.  I would like to see each shot individually.  Not every shot in the same color at the same time.  Other than that, I hit about 150 balls, and didn't have any mis reads or no reads.  Picked up everything, and even seemed to work pretty good for putting.  Only played with that for a few minutes but it was way better than the  Skytrak I had before.  

[kiwihacker]

4 hours ago, Chubbydog said:

I just got mine today, but it didn't come with any club stickers for the data I don't think.  First impression is this thing is awesome.  Plug it in, create your account, downloaded 15 or 20 courses i wanted to play, and I was off.  Literally 10 minutes to get my membership paid and I was playing.  I need to get the alignment figured out where I'm hitting it straight with the mat, but I didn't really care about that right now.  Does anyone know if you can change the distance driving range around to show a different angle or anything?  I'm not really a fan of the way it was out of the box.  I would like to see each shot individually.  Not every shot in the same color at the same time.  Other than that, I hit about 150 balls, and didn't have any mis reads or no reads.  Picked up everything, and even seemed to work pretty good for putting.  Only played with that for a few minutes but it was way better than the  Skytrak I had before.  

Congratulations. Sounds awesome. 

[iacas]

15 hours ago, Chubbydog said:

I just got mine today, but it didn't come with any club stickers for the data I don't think.

 

They're in the back mesh pocket.

 

15 hours ago, Chubbydog said:

I would like to see each shot individually.  Not every shot in the same color at the same time.

 

I noted that above. Seems like an obvious improvement for a later software update.

 

Edited December 20, 2024 by iacas
added second paragraph

[Streuner]

For Software updates, i hope that Garmin is listening to the Users 

[Carolina Golfer 2]

1 hour ago, Streuner said:

For Software updates, i hope that Garmin is listening to the Users 

I hope so, but I believe I have read that Garmin is notoriously slow on updates for any of it's products.  I find that hard to believe, but maybe Garmin owners of other devices can chime in as to the frequency and quality of updates they have experienced. 

[txbadger]

18 hours ago, Chubbydog said:

 I would like to see each shot individually.  

 

I'm in the same boat... it is odd not to have an option to just see the most recent shot.    Use the link below to give Garmin feedback on this.   When I did so I put "RE: Approach R50 Shot Tracer functionality" at the top, because this form only has a broad "Market Category" drop down instead of a product suggestion which is odd. 

 

https://www.garmin.com/en-US/forms/ideas/

 

Note: As shown in the link, this looks to be a US specific website, although I am not sure if that really matters.  Perhaps search for your country's Garmin website if applicable. 

Edited December 20, 2024 by txbadger

[Streuner]

To mention the update philosophy of Garmin, from what I have seen in the years before. If there are new products, updates are coming frequently at the first months. As soon as the device is running stable, updates are coming slowly 

[Llortamaisey]

1 hour ago, Carolina Golfer 2 said:

I hope so, but I believe I have read that Garmin is notoriously slow on updates for any of its products.  I find that hard to believe, but maybe Garmin owners of other devices can chime in as to the frequency and quality of updates they have experienced. 

My example is completely apples and oranges, however I will say that when I emailed them a map error concerning one of my local courses recently, they were able to update it within 30 to 45 days. And it was a huge error. They had the tee box for a par 3 on the complete opposite side of the hole. They even sent me a follow-up email saying it had been fixed, albeit an automated response but nice to have the follow-up nonetheless. 

[Carolina Golfer 2]

49 minutes ago, Llortamaisey said:

My example is completely apples and oranges, however I will say that when I emailed them a map error concerning one of my local courses recently, they were able to update it within 30 to 45 days. And it was a huge error. They had the tee box for a par 3 on the complete opposite side of the hole. They even sent me a follow-up email saying it had been fixed, albeit an automated response but nice to have the follow-up nonetheless. 

That's good to hear! 

[drbonesvt]

On 11/30/2024 at 10:16 AM, Streuner said:

I always had the feeling that my MEVO is having troubles to read Ball data indoor at my Garage. Club data felt ok for me. But I had 10-15% distance drop indoor and even more with longer clubs. Outside the MEVO is very solid and accurate.
So I thought it must be me who indoor is a bit restricted from the low ceiling hight and the space. But indoor side by side the MEVO+ and the R50 are showing completely different Numbers. The R50 is giving me the data I know from the outside with the MEVO + I guess the space in my garage is simply not large enough to let the MEVO+ work well. 
so for my personal usage, the R50 is a significant improvement of my indoor sim. 
 

I did not test the R50 outside so far, but the distances I see indoor are the distances I know from my stats outside 

Thank you , I’m considering this vs the mevo+ with the pro package , i basically want a practice unit