Anyone using an Athlon Rangecraft?

[Tom K]

For anyone who has an Athlon Rangecraft I have a couple of questions. Can you download the shot session files directly to your computer via USB cord, or do you have to use an app? And what format are the files in - are they .csv? I did email Athlon and asked them the same questions and they said that you can download .csv files directly from the Rangecraft, but I'd like to hear testimony from real live actual people.

I have a Garmin Xero and while it's great, it really irritates me that the session files are in a .fits format. I can download them to my computer, but there does not appear to be any convenient way to convert them to an Excel compatible format. The only way to get .csv files from the Garmin to my computer is to email them via the Garmin ShotView app. That's somewhat clumsy but doable. And it's all well and good until the app stops being supported and no longer works, which does happen.

Regardless, any of these small radar-based chronographs have rendered optical chronos (and the original big orange LabRadar unit) completely obsolete. They take up almost no space, weigh next to nothing, and are extremely easy to use. No having to set up skyscreens/units downrange. No stringing wires back to the bench. No gun/chrono/target alignment issues. Instead of rarely using a chronograph when shooting because it's such a pain in the butt, you can set up the Garmin or Athlon in a few seconds and use it or not as you see fit.

 

[rh73]

The Athlon saves files in .xlsx format. You cannot save directly to computer via usb cable.

 

[Tom K]

The Athlon saves files in .xlsx format. You cannot save directly to computer via usb cable.

I had emailed Athlon about this topic several months back (before the units were available) and they claimed that you could download the data with a USB cable. Your post made me question that so I emailed them again, and now they agree with what you said - that the files are in .xlsx format but you cannot download them directly with a USB cable.

You have to email the files to yourself using their app, which is very disappointing to me. This is the same method that the Garmin uses, which as I said is clumsy, and what do you do when the app is no longer supported or stops working? Still, either unit beats the LabRadar for usability and all are miles ahead of skyscreen chronographs.

 

[rockquarry]

I had emailed Athlon about this topic several months back (before the units were available) and they claimed that you could download the data with a USB cable. Your post made me question that so I emailed them again, and now they agree with what you said - that the files are in .xlsx format but you cannot download them directly with a USB cable.

You have to email the files to yourself using their app, which is very disappointing to me. This is the same method that the Garmin uses, which as I said is clumsy, and what do you do when the app is no longer supported or stops working? Still, either unit beats the LabRadar for usability and all are miles ahead of skyscreen chronographs.

A spiral notebook works well.

 

[rh73]

I had emailed Athlon about this topic several months back (before the units were available) and they claimed that you could download the data with a USB cable. Your post made me question that so I emailed them again, and now they agree with what you said - that the files are in .xlsx format but you cannot download them directly with a USB cable.

You have to email the files to yourself using their app, which is very disappointing to me. This is the same method that the Garmin uses, which as I said is clumsy, and what do you do when the app is no longer supported or stops working? Still, either unit beats the LabRadar for usability and all are miles ahead of skyscreen chronographs.

With the Athlon app you can save the files to an Android or iphone or save to icloud or google drive etc. The new Labradar lx .csv files can be exported directly via usb-c cable according to their website.