TST Explores the ShotScope H4 (Stats Tracking Device) and Pro LX Rangefinder

[ChetlovesMer]

19 hours ago, jshots said:

Anyone used Arccos that can compare to Shot Scope stats?? 

I just started with Arccos a month ago and it gives some good information, but I don't like that its nearly $160 a year. It also has no social aspect at all (leaderboards seem cool). It has strokes gained stats for driving, approach, short game, and putting, and also further breaks each of those categories down which is cool.

While auto shot tracking is nice - the Arccos sensors are massive, flush with my standard grips and occasionally I'll catch it with my hand and it will twist out of the club. Last week I noticed my 52 was missing after the round, I pulled up my shot history and found where I last hit my 52 and went back and found it but still annoying that it came out. The killer arccos feature for me at the moment is that it will overlay the path you walked across the green so that you can set where your first putt was and the flagstick more easily.

 

Hi, I was an Arccos early adopter who used it for 3 years. I was happy with it. The last year I used it was 2019. Here's the thing. I stopped paying the subscription fee in 2018. I found the Arccos Caddie to be completely worthless. So, I stopped paying for it. At that time, all the features of Arccos (accept Arccos Caddie) worked if you didn't pay the yearly fee. This was not published very clearly in any of the Arccos information. But at that time (2018-2019), you still got all your round information, you got all your stats, you got all of your accuracy information, you got all your handicap data (this was before Arcoss started using strokes gained, at that time they just gave you a handicap for driving, approach, short game and putting.) Anyway, if you didn't pay the yearly fee, you still got everything except your phone did NOT suggest which club to hit for you before each shot. Which I was totally fine with, because I didn't want my phone to suggest which club to use before each shot. I found that feature not only not helpful, but actually annoying. I'd look at my phone and it would be suggesting a 7 iron, and I'd be like shut up. 

As far as the sensors being massive. I actually switched to Arcoss grips, which I liked better than screw in tags. ... Still do. 

I left Arcoss for 2 reasons. One, I switched to Pure grips and haven't wanted to use anything else. Two, after paying for an Arcoss link, which would have made it possible for me to play without my phone in my front pocket, I waited almost 2 years and never got one. 

So, in a nutshell here's how I'd compare them. Remember I stopped using Arccos in 2019, so this is dated. And, I've only just started with ShotScope. 

Arccos:

• I really liked the Arccos grips. I was actually able to order midsize grips and prefer them by a wide margin to anything you have to screw into your club. 
• Arccos worked by "hearing" you club hit the ball. It was great because you didn't have to "tag" your club before each shot. The sensor was activated by flipping your club right-side-up. Then it would "listen" for the strike. This worked great for me, but I heard lots of Arccos users complain that their Arcoss would miss shots. Almost never happed to me. But maybe if you play where it's loud or there's a lot of wind noise or something... I'm not sure.
• I purchased the pre-release Arccos link in 2018. To this day I haven't got it. 
• Arccos customer service blows big time. 
• Arccos caddie sucks ass, but at the time I used it, you didn't actually need to buy it, so it was fine. 

ShotScope: 

• ShotScope customer service is really good. At least from my experience and everyone I've talked to. 
• ShotScope's social stuff seems cool and I'll have to get deeper into that as I know more
• The data Shotscope collects seems to be just as good as Arccos, although my Arccos experience is from a couple of years back.
• The Shotscop sensors are smaller. I will say I still like the built into the grip thing, but if I do that I can't use the PURE grips which I like so much. 
• Tagging before each shot. This is a plus/minus thing. I don't mind doing it. Arccos was certainly easier, you didn't have to do anything other than pull your club from the bag and hit it. I will say if you were a person who had their Arccos sometimes miss hearing shots. Then tagging them yourself certainly eliminates that problem. 

I'm sure I forgot some stuff. I was happy with Arccos (until I bought and never got Arccos-Link). Their customer service stinks out loud. I never had a problem with the system missing shots, but others have said they did. I also stopped paying the yearly subscription fee and still got everything I wanted out of the system. Again, that's a few years ago. 

[Friz]

I've been playing around with the ability to share rounds....I know it was mentioned before that you can share a piece of your round on social media - either selected stats, an individual hole, or your scorecard, but couldn't share the entire round.  It'd be great if there was a way to simply share directly, but I did at least find a way to view other peoples rounds.  Useful as people are getting set up and getting used to the device or looking for feedback.

Assuming you know the name, and where the person played, you should be able to view any round from someone else.  Under the desktop dashboard, go to Explore, then search for the golf course the person played and click View.  That brings up the course home page, including all recent rounds played on that course.  Now, as the golfer, I did have to click share on course hub when I signed off on my round, but in doing so I made it so anyone can see my round.  Now that you're on the course home page, you can dive directly into that person's round, and get their hole by hole/shot by shot info from that round.

So, for instance, if anyone wanted to see my last round played, go to Explore, search for Blackheath Golf Club, and you'll find my round on there to see the entire thing.  Further, if you click on my name, you'd be able to see all the rounds I've played, assuming I've shared to the course hub.  I didn't see any of this shared previously, so just wanted to put it out there as I know there had been a handful of questions, from myself included, about how to mark things, so at least here is a workaround way to see an entire round as people are figuring it out, or to simply share moving forward.

I found it somewhat interesting/annoying that while you clearly can go see all of someone's rounds this way by clicking their name under explore....you can not do the same thing through Leaderboards.  Also once you're diving into someone's name or specific round, URL's do not change so you can't simply pull that out to share it, but at least a workaround still.

[StuM]

51 minutes ago, Friz said:

I've been playing around with the ability to share rounds....I know it was mentioned before that you can share a piece of your round on social media - either selected stats, an individual hole, or your scorecard, but couldn't share the entire round.  It'd be great if there was a way to simply share directly, but I did at least find a way to view other peoples rounds.  Useful as people are getting set up and getting used to the device or looking for feedback.

Assuming you know the name, and where the person played, you should be able to view any round from someone else.  Under the desktop dashboard, go to Explore, then search for the golf course the person played and click View.  That brings up the course home page, including all recent rounds played on that course.  Now, as the golfer, I did have to click share on course hub when I signed off on my round, but in doing so I made it so anyone can see my round.  Now that you're on the course home page, you can dive directly into that person's round, and get their hole by hole/shot by shot info from that round.

So, for instance, if anyone wanted to see my last round played, go to Explore, search for Blackheath Golf Club, and you'll find my round on there to see the entire thing.  Further, if you click on my name, you'd be able to see all the rounds I've played, assuming I've shared to the course hub.  I didn't see any of this shared previously, so just wanted to put it out there as I know there had been a handful of questions, from myself included, about how to mark things, so at least here is a workaround way to see an entire round as people are figuring it out, or to simply share moving forward.

I found it somewhat interesting/annoying that while you clearly can go see all of someone's rounds this way by clicking their name under explore....you can not do the same thing through Leaderboards.  Also once you're diving into someone's name or specific round, URL's do not change so you can't simply pull that out to share it, but at least a workaround still.

Sounds a little involved but with a shared leaderboard we should at least know what course a member recently played and thus know what course to search for.  I can't wait to get my H4 in the next week and actually do some of what you guys are discussing.

[StuM]

I am liking Shot Scope even before I have it.  Was reviewing how to enter Penalty Strokes and 1) I like they have the feature and 2) I learned something about the rules I never knew, apparently there is a stroke penalty for being late to your tee time.  I always thought the penalty for being late was you had to wait for the next open tee time, but I guess not.

 

[Shindig]

23 minutes ago, StuM said:

I am liking Shot Scope even before I have it.  Was reviewing how to enter Penalty Strokes and 1) I like they have the feature and 2) I learned something about the rules I never knew, apparently there is a stroke penalty for being late to your tee time.  I always thought the penalty for being late was you had to wait for the next open tee time, but I guess not.

The feature is nice;  I'm not sure how one would have a shot tracking system without it.  

My club used to have paper scorecards and check-in at tournaments and I used to volunteer to work the check-in table.  Once, one of the low single digit handicap players was late to his tee time.  He didn't even get to the course until his group had been called to the first tee, and was at the check-in table while one was hitting.  He missed winning some prize by a shot and said some impolite things about me in the process, which was met by the tournament director asking him in equally impolite terms just what I had done to make him late. 

There are worse penalties for being super late, such as being DQ'd from a tournament.  Jim Furyk once got DQ'd for missing a tee time because he was relying on his cell phone alarm and the thing ran out of batteries. 

[StuM]

Fingers are crossed, my Shot Scope is scheduled for delivery on 7/28. 

[DeadMan]

I now have 2 rounds in the books with the H4. Overall, I like it. There are a few small things that I don't like, but I'll get used to them in time. 

The good:

• I really like the simplicity of the GPS numbers. I really liked having that on my second shot on par 5s, where my laser will sometimes have trouble picking up the flag. Way easier to look at the H4 to get a center of the green distance, because knowing the exact distance doesn't matter as much there. It was also helpful to know how much room I have behind the flag on a back pin, etc. Way less clunky that carrying a full GPS unit.
• Being able to see my last tag on the unit is a good feature to have. Another feature I like is the last shot distance feature. You can use that to gauge where to start/stop looking for a ball, which will be very helpful when I need it.
• The stats are way more detailed than Game Golf, which is exactly what I was hoping for. It will be a great tool for focusing my practice.

The bad:

• Editing shots on or around the green is annoying. This is going to be my number 1 frustration with the H4. You have to manipulate the map and zoom in. I much preferred how Game Golf automatically zoomed in on the green when you get there while editing.
• The H4 UI is not super intuitive. I thought I was marking pins during my rounds, but it turns out, after reading the manual, I was doing it wrong. Also, some features are buried in the menus (like the last shot distance feature). I should have read the manual, yes, but normally I can figure these things out fairly quickly myself.

The ugly:

• The 2 rounds I played. 

[ChetlovesMer]

I'm not sure if I'm a genius or an idiot, but I went ahead and ordered an additional set of tags last night. They are $35 and include 16 tags. 

I figured I'd like to have them on hand for if... okay when I lose one. Plus I was able to take advantage of the TST discount and get 15% off. So, they were only $30 if you follow the links and put in the codes. 

Edited July 25, 2022 by ChetlovesMer
type-o

[Shindig]

2 hours ago, DeadMan said:

I now have 2 rounds in the books with the H4. Overall, I like it. There are a few small things that I don't like, but I'll get used to them in time. 

The good:

• I really like the simplicity of the GPS numbers. I really liked having that on my second shot on par 5s, where my laser will sometimes have trouble picking up the flag. Way easier to look at the H4 to get a center of the green distance, because knowing the exact distance doesn't matter as much there. It was also helpful to know how much room I have behind the flag on a back pin, etc. Way less clunky that carrying a full GPS unit.
• Being able to see my last tag on the unit is a good feature to have. Another feature I like is the last shot distance feature. You can use that to gauge where to start/stop looking for a ball, which will be very helpful when I need it.
• The stats are way more detailed than Game Golf, which is exactly what I was hoping for. It will be a great tool for focusing my practice.

The bad:

• Editing shots on or around the green is annoying. This is going to be my number 1 frustration with the H4. You have to manipulate the map and zoom in. I much preferred how Game Golf automatically zoomed in on the green when you get there while editing.
• The H4 UI is not super intuitive. I thought I was marking pins during my rounds, but it turns out, after reading the manual, I was doing it wrong. Also, some features are buried in the menus (like the last shot distance feature). I should have read the manual, yes, but normally I can figure these things out fairly quickly myself.

The ugly:

• The 2 rounds I played. 

I didn't realize there is a "last shot distance" feature.  Can I get it before I hit my next shot?  Sometimes when looking for a drive, knowing distance-from-tee is helpful. If I didn't hit something (like a tree), there's a relatively small range of distance-from-tee in which my ball is likely to be.  Guess which of your friends on TST also hasn't read the full manual yet. 

The more detail than GG is, as you say, a great feature.  I thought my hybrids and woods were a weakness.  It turns out there's where I'm picking up a lot of my strokes gained: approach, so I stopped worrying about them as much.  I realize there's a lot more opportunity to hit those (I can play a full round at my semi-home course and not have anything shorter than a 6-iron into a par-4 or par-3, and I'd move up tees except I'm using the tees we play in club events).  That was very useful to know.  

[DeadMan]

2 hours ago, Shindig said:

I didn't realize there is a "last shot distance" feature.  Can I get it before I hit my next shot?  Sometimes when looking for a drive, knowing distance-from-tee is helpful. If I didn't hit something (like a tree), there's a relatively small range of distance-from-tee in which my ball is likely to be.  Guess which of your friends on TST also hasn't read the full manual yet. 

Here's what the manual says. I haven't tried it in a round yet:

And here is a link to the full manual in case anyone else wants to look at it:

https://shotscope.com/userguide/english/Shot_Scope_H4_en_user_guide.pdf

[ChetlovesMer]

59 minutes ago, DeadMan said:

Here's what the manual says. I haven't tried it in a round yet:

And here is a link to the full manual in case anyone else wants to look at it:

https://shotscope.com/userguide/english/Shot_Scope_H4_en_user_guide.pdf

That seems like a reasonably useful feature... No, I haven't really read the manual. 

[DeadMan]

A bit OT, but I really dislike not getting paper manuals anymore. Sure, it probably saves money and the environment, but I like being able to read something on paper without needing to pull it up on the computer or, worse, on an app. Most lego sets nowadays require you to download the lego app and get the booklet through the app only. I hate that.

In other words,

[ChetlovesMer]

24 minutes ago, DeadMan said:

A bit OT, but I really dislike not getting paper manuals anymore. Sure, it probably saves money and the environment, but I like being able to read something on paper without needing to pull it up on the computer or, worse, on an app. Most lego sets nowadays require you to download the lego app and get the booklet through the app only. I hate that.

In other words,

Our company does that (requires customers to download manuals from an app) for two reasons.

1 - It's cheaper for the what ever percent of people who prefer their instructions online and/or won't read them anyway. 

2 - Because we are required to put them in so many different languages if we put them in the box that we have to cut down 2 trees for every manual we print. 

🤪

[Shindig]

26 minutes ago, DeadMan said:

A bit OT, but I really dislike not getting paper manuals anymore. Sure, it probably saves money and the environment, but I like being able to read something on paper without needing to pull it up on the computer or, worse, on an app. Most lego sets nowadays require you to download the lego app and get the booklet through the app only. I hate that.

In other words,

Shouldn't that have been Abe Simpson in Old Man Yells at Cloud?

I agree with you completely though (although I haven't bought any legos in the smartphone era).  I also strongly prefer physical books over digital copies. 

[StuM]

40 minutes ago, DeadMan said:

A bit OT, but I really dislike not getting paper manuals anymore.

 

13 minutes ago, Shindig said:

I also strongly prefer physical books over digital copies. 

Most, including Shot Scope, can be printed once you download them from the website.  Additionally, having them in digital format means you can access it from virtually anywhere and not need to carry the manual with you.

[iacas]

1 hour ago, DeadMan said:

A bit OT, but I really dislike not getting paper manuals anymore. Sure, it probably saves money and the environment, but I like being able to read something on paper without needing to pull it up on the computer or, worse, on an app. Most lego sets nowadays require you to download the lego app and get the booklet through the app only. I hate that.

Print them yourself then, Dan.

Plus, PDFs are searchable.

😄

[ChetlovesMer]

Quick question for you all.

Where do you keep your H4 device when you are not using it? 

I can't keep mine in my car as it is often out in the sun and may literally bake the device. 

I ask because I was just about to head out to golf league tonight and when throwing the sticks in the car remembered I need to run back in and get the H4. Which as of now, I keep on my office desk. 

[dennyjones]

1 minute ago, ChetlovesMer said:

Quick question for you all.

Where do you keep your H4 device when you are not using it? 

I can't keep mine in my car as it is often out in the sun and may literally bake the device. 

I ask because I was just about to head out to golf league tonight and when throwing the sticks in the car remembered I need to run back in and get the H4. Which as of now, I keep on my office desk. 

I keep mine on my computer desk where I charge it.   I would advise against leaving it in the car.   I belong to the Shotscope Facebook group and there have been a couple people with the V3 complain about their watch cracking from heat and moisture.   I'm not sure that is factual but they did show pictures of their watches cracked on the back.