Acer has announced a new biking device called the Xplova S5, a gizmo that not only tracks your biking activity but also includes a camera.
Acer's targeting the GoPro users here, offering something that serves two purposes in one device. The Xplova S5 offers GPS and many of the other features you'd expect from a biking computer, but with the addition of a 720p action camera.
The Xplova will track your progress as you ride, offering at-a-glance information including power output, cadence, elevation and speed. On another screen, a map displays how much progress you've made along your route.
It also tracks your heart rate, through a connected device, with the information appearing on screen in a graph. This is where things get more interesting, as the Xplova's camera can be programmed to automatically start recording video when it detects your heart rate rising.
It doesn't have to rely on your heart rate, either. You can set it to record using other parameters, like speed. This means that, in theory, you won't be sifting through four hours of footage after your cycle, but will end up with a montage of clips showing the most interesting and hi-octane bits of your journey.
Those clips can then be transferred to a computer and brought together to create a montage of your adventure. Acer is essentially trying to roll the GoPro and biking computer experience into one device, and I like the idea in theory. I'm just interested to know how well the auto-capture technology works in practice.
Acer is saying we'll see the Xplova 5 in quarter 3 of this year, but we don't yet know which regions it will be appearing in.
