Tanita BC533 Glass Innerscan Body Composition Monitor
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List Price: Our Price: $89.99 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Health Care See more product details |
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Customer Reviews of Tanita BC533 Glass Innerscan Body Composition Monitor
Customer Review: Works well, but a bit hard to operate
Summary: 3 Stars
Not as intuitive to operate as you might imagine. If you haven't had a Tanita before, this is one of those products you can't just pull out of the box and use. You'll need 15-20 minutes of looking through the manual to get the hang of it. The manuals (yes, there's 2 of 'em you have to read), fortunately, are pretty good and give you the information you need to get started.
It's also a shame Tanita didn't think to put a memory function on this particular model. The scale will store your age, height, and activity level, but it won't allow you to check your readings from past weigh-ins. So you have to take a reading, have a pen and paper nearby to jot down the 5 or 6 numbers the display shows, and do it all before the auto-off function kicks in (or play around with the buttons to keep it from turning off).
You'll need a concrete or ceramic tile floor to get accurate, consistent readings. The scale is very sensitive to the surface it's placed on, so don't use it on mats or your bedroom carpet.
As for precision and readings, no complaints there. The scale does what it says, and body fat and weight readings are consistent and accurate. The rest of the readings are derived from formulas, so in a general sense they're correct but your mileage may vary depending on physique and personal background.
This particular model displays your weight, body fat, bone mass and water content as values (you get kg and %). Visceral fat is displayed as a rating (1 is perfect, 5 is ok, 15 is over, 25 excessive, etc), would have been nice to have it as a % value.
If you're a home user, who hits the gym 2 or 3 times a week and wants a bit more info to fine tune the workouts, you'll probably be satisfied with this product. Serious trainers or athletes should look to other models, IMHO, as they'll probably find this one lacking in functions and data.
Customer Review: Works as advertised, but questionable durability
Summary: 4 Stars
If you're looking to purchase the Tanita BC533 Glass Innerscan Body Composition Monitor you're probably someone who takes fitness seriously, or you're trying to make an effort to take it seriously. My wife and I purchased this scale 3 years ago to help us with our New Year's resolutions - that should tell you which group we fit into. :)
By now, you've probably read all the specs, so I won't tell you what you already know. But it is important to know how well it works. Shortly after making the purchase I went to a local facility and had hydrostatic body fat testing. The results were very close to what the Tanita had indicated - within 1%. This was perfect confirmation that the scale was well worth the high price tag.
*** TIP *** At times the Tanita would give us inconsistent results. After some time and deduction my wife and I concluded that it was much more accurate just after getting out of the shower. As if the moisture in our feet somehow facilitated the measurement. I don't purport to have any scientific evidence to support this, but I can tell you, without question, it was far more accurate that stepping on with dry feet.
The only downside, albeit a HUGE one, was the durability of the unit. About a year after we purchased it, it became very unstable. It would only power on half of the time. We'd replace the batteries and it still would not work. Eventually I noticed that the battery contacts were rusting. A little cleaning worked temporarily, but after time they completely corroded, rendering the scale lifeless. For the price, I would expect that this scale would have better protection against the moisture that is common in any household bathroom.
CONCLUSION: Buy the scale, but don't keep it in the bathroom.
Customer Review: Very useful
Summary: 5 Stars
The only method to measure body fat reliably is hydrodensitometry weighing. However, there exist two kinds of accurate devices that are capable to estimate this measure and offer reliable results, bioimpedence and skinfold calipers. In order for them to provide with repeatable and dependable measurements, skinfold calipers ought to be used by professionals while bioimpedenzometric scales do not.
The science behind the Tanita BC533 scale is bioimpedence, which allows for a body composition estimate by sending a brief pulse of low voltage electricity through your body. The electricity that leaves your body at your feet is then read by the scale and your body composition is calculated and displayed for your convenience.
Because the estimate is done through electricity everything impacting on electricity and its conduction also has an impact on the results you get. For this reason, you need not to use the scale while your feet and/or your body are wearing isolating materials (shoes - especially plastic, and socks and sweaters - especially in wool), when your skin is wet (ie: after a bath or shower, when you have recently sweat), and when you have eaten or drank in the previous 3 hours. On top of that, because of circadian hormonal rhythms, weight changes within the day. My suggestion is to pick up a time of the day and stick with it. For even more dependable measurements, use the scale in the same conditions every day so that you can compare successive measurements and hopefully track your progresses.
This scale isn't any more difficult to use than other bioimpedenzometric device is, but you need to know the technology and its limitations in order to exploit it to your own advantage.
Pros: it looks stylish, it's very dependable
Cons: it needs to be set up, it requires a flat surface
Customer Review: Wow, a Wake-Up Call
Summary: 5 Stars
The Innerscan was very easy to set up right out of the box. Within minutes, I was stepping on the scale and seeing weight, which I was already painfully aware of. But seeing the body fat percentage really woke me up. I'd already begun changing my diet and exercising more, but knowing that I can now watch the fat percentage go down (please!) and muscle mass increase, I am more inclined to use the scale. I know that watching just weight can be frustrating, as fluctuations due to water weight can be annoying. But I am now even more motivated to continue improving my lifestyle.
I do believe that some convenience of use was traded off for style and appearance... you basically have to step on the scale, wait for weight and body fat % to be read, then get off the scale and either get down on the floor or pick the scale up to check the other readings. The buttons that you press to view bone mass, muscle mass, water %, etc. are fairly small and use icons that aren't easy to see six feet away. But frankly, the two readings that are important to me are weight and body fat %, and those are displayed automatically, so this is a minor inconvenience. And bottom line, it just looks cool.
The documentation provided with the device is excellent, including not just usage instructions, but some real information on what the numbers mean, an overview of healthy goals, keys for getting the most accurate readings, etc.
After using this just once, I'm convinced that everyone should check their body fat percentage on occasion... it may very well come as a surprise.
One extra cool thing is that it measures the fat around the abdominal area, which research is showing is a significant contributor to heart disease. The one area I'm normal on!!
Customer Review: Easy to use, but is it accurate for petite Asians??
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a wonderfully easy-to-use scale (note: you have to step off of the scale--at least I had to--before pressing the other option buttons to get readings of water %, physique rating, etc.). No trouble whatsoever keeping my balance on the scale. However, I'm suspicious of my readings because I'm in my mid 20s, 5'2," East Asian, and 114 lbs. I only started working out a few months ago and have never really done any strength training, and the scale tells me I have the metabolic age of a 12-yr-old (or lower, since the scale reports lower ages as "12"), and that my physique is 8 (which supposedly makes me an "athlete")--8 is just below the highest score of 9 = "very muscular." I know I'm nowhere close to being "very muscular" by any standard! Plus it tells me at 20% body fat that I'm "underfat"--I only started working out because I felt slow/heavy due to gaining over 10 lbs of flab by eating a bunch of junk food over the past few years--just don't think gaining more fat would make me feel/be healthier! I think I do have a higher-than-the-average-American metabolism (otherwise I'd be way heavier than I am now given my eating habits), but I just don't think that, beyond overall weight and body fat % readings, the scale meaningfully reflects where I "rank" relative to all other females of my age and height. I.e., I think compared to other East Asian women of my age and height, I'd have a physique rating of 5 (average). But other than this subjective disbelief, which may/may not be unfounded, the scale is fine. I had my body fat measured by skinfold calipers at a gym a few weeks ago and that % is within 1% of the scale's reading.