The Garmin Edge 705 is not only the most technologically advanced cycling computer on the market, it is also very fun to use. In this review I will be describing some of the cool features that set this device apart from the competition. I have been using my Garmin with a PowerTap wireless hub for a few months. Before using a Garmin I did not understand why fellow cyclists kept raving about their Garmin bike computers. Now I understand! 

The Garmin Edge 705 really caught my attention this summer while leading a bike tour at the Tour de France. One of the guests had the Garmin and would give us live updates of the current gradient as we pedaled up Alpe d’Huez. It was interesting to see how even though the average gradient of the climb is 8%, the gradient varied significantly with the steepest section at 14%. Having this information helped me better gauge my effort and to understand why certain sections of the climb felt so tough!

The Garmin GPS mapping capabilities is what really sets it apart from other bike computers on the market. The Map Source City Navigator street maps (not always included) uploaded in your Edge 705 make it work like a car GPS device with turn-by-turn navigation. If you are travelling to a new destination where you have never biked before, you can search on Garmin Connect for bike routes in the area and can save them to your device. Your Garmin will then navigate your ride with turn by turn. Even if you don’t have the street maps uploaded, the device comes standard with a built-in base map which will navigate you back to your starting point should you get lost on unfamiliar roads.

Garmin offers City Navigator street maps software for most European countries and many countries around the world for an addition +/- $99. For the bike tours in France that I lead each year, I map the bike routes out ahead of time with my Garmin and share the bike routes with the cyclist coming on the tour. Those guests with their own Garmin can upload the routes to their personal Garmin before the bike tour starts (City Navigation France required). Another benefit is that each person can see exactly what to expect in terms of distance and elevation before the bike tour and can adapt their training accordingly.

If you have a record ride over a set bike course, you can save it as a course on your Garmin Edge 705 software. The next time you attempt to break your record, simply select the saved course. The Garmin will navigate your ride and will show how you are progressing compared to the saved record ride. It calculates your goal time to each point on the ride and the distance you are ahead/behind as you pedal. This works particularly well for time trials over a set course. Another cool feature is that you can share a ride wirelessly with other Garmin users within a 3 meter radius.

The new online Garmin Connect software maps your rides on Google maps (example ride). The Player shows the progression of the ride on the map with the ride data (power, heart rate, speed, cadence, elevation) at each point during the ride. You can share your ride by email or through the social networks life Facebook, Myspace and Twitter. You can also track your progress and data with the online calendar features. This software is free to all Garmin device owners.

The 705 comes with 2 displays that you can switch between. Each display can be customized with the information you would like to see. You can have up to 8 data fields per screen. This gives you 16 data fields in total with the 2 displays. Setting up the display and other settings is very easy and intuitive. I found I could do pretty much everything without looking at the manual.

Riding with power works great and is easy to set-up. The Garmin like the PowerTap, gives you the option to have a 3 second moving average of your live power data. This means the power number you see every second on your screen is a moving average of the last 3 seconds. I prefer using the moving average when training as it gives a more constant power reading and makes holding a specific interval zone easier to achieve.

Another big plus in my opinion is the huge amount of storage memory the Garmin holds for downloads. This gives you the option to download your files every few days or weeks.

In this review I have described just some of the great features of the Garmin Edge 705. There are many more great features that I continue to discover. When trying to come up with any negatives I can’t. The Garmin is indeed the ultimate bicycle computer and I can unreservedly recommend it to all cyclists who want to have the ultimate training device.