I bought this treadmill in December 2007 and I have had nothing but problems with the "activity zone" (the small box with the controls for incline and speed located right above your waistline) for the past year. The activity zone touch pad does not respond when I try to adjust the speed or incline. I''ll be right in the middle of my run and the activity zone just freezes on me. I won''t be able to adjust the incline or speed and I''m forced to finish my run with whatever incline or speed I originally set. On countless occassions, I have tried restarting the treadmill in an attempt to reactivate the activity zone touch pad but it doesn''t work. There are times I can''t even workout at all because the speed button on the activity zone doesn''t respond at all even upon start-up. There is no other way to adjust the speed on the treadmill other than by the activity zone touch pad which is a horrible design flaw. I have called LifeFitness customer service department several times informing them of the continous problems I am having with the activity zone. They have sent me 2 different activity zone replacements but the replacements have not fixed the problem. I had a treadmill technician come out and he confirmed the problems that I was having. The technician also said that the "new" activity zone replacement that LifeFitness sent me had "bad" wires in it. So, we had to request yet another activity zone replacement along with some new wires that connect the activity zone to the main console. The last repair cost me about $200 in labor(not under warranty) and lasted for a couple of months and now I''m back to having an unresponsive activity zone. I called customer service AGAIN and they refused to cover any labor costs associated with the ongoing problem. They agreed to send me yet ANOTHER activity zone replacement but refuse to acknowledge that the treadmill has a serious problem with the activity zone. I''m so dissappointed in this very expensive treadmill. I thought I had to spend more money to get commercial grade quality but what I got was a "lemon" and a company that doesn''t stand by its products or its customers. I just hope another consumer doesn''t make the same mistake I did.
The electronics are cool, if you''re just interested in some fitness running programs. You can program this machine for speed and incline and time. Basically, you can record a routine and save it. Also, it has several built in routines that are pretty interesting; interval, climbing, fat loss, 5K, 10K, outdoor running simulation.
The rollers are commercial size, making the overall mechanics of the machine very durable.
My only complaint is that the heart monitor that comes with it is one of those types where you can''t replace the battery. I bought a third party compatible one that takes a CR3230. It works fine.
It''s whisper quiet, and stays that way if you keep it clean.
Great machine.
Buy Life Fitness T7-0 Treadmill Now
I bought this instead of a landis 7. I''m regretting the decision. The console is the biggest problem with the unit. I cannot get the heart rate hill workout to work. I enter a target heart rate and the lower heart rate target is always zero. I''ve tried calling the dealer, life fitness and it''s been a waste of time. The after sales support is poor.The treadmill aspect seems ok, it works, it''s a little noisy but I''m happy with it. The console software is poor. Editing user profiles is hard as they don''t even have a cursor showing which letter you are editing. They flash the current letter, what''s a flashing space look like? Yep, a space. Not useful. With no logging or a way to export runs, I end up using my garmin 305 to script runs and record them. The custom workouts are very poor, 20 segments all equal length, who does that? Most intervals consist of a segment and a rest period and you repeat those steps. That''s very hard to do on this unit.
It has a marathon mode that allows workouts longer than 99 minutes but unfortunately, it seems none of the workouts support it. For example, if you are doing a Random workout then all is well for the first 99 minutes but once it trips over to the second 99 then the random stops working and the slope stays fixed at 0. You can still change the level but it has no effect. I was expecting that a longer workout would mean the workout type would continue to function. This severely limits the usefulness of marathon mode as basically you''d need to stop the program and restart it anyway so whats the point?
The console uses touch sensitive buttons. You can''t place an iPad of iPhone on the ledge on the console because it will keep pressing the touch sensitive buttons. This is really annoying. You''d need a tv stand or something. Push buttons wouldn''t have this problem.
The activity buttons are useful. I set them to the speeds or grades I want to use with my garmin 305 scripted workout and then manually change the mill when my watch beeps. It''s ridiculous that the console cannot script this kind of thing automatically. But, there it is.
Distance accuracy wise, it seems very accurate right now. I used a measuring wheel to count of 1 mile and with 1.0 miles on the treadmill, I measured 0.997 miles on the wheel. Close enough. But, I don''t see any way to calibrate it once the belt stretches a little. Again, on a high end mill like this, I''d expect such a calibration feature.
I had it for 3 months now and given the poor after sales service from both the dealer and the company, I''m regretting my decision to buy it but the console on the landis isn''t much better from reading the manual. The mechanicals seems very good but the console is very disappointing. If you''re a serious runner then you''ll be let down by the console. Maybe their customer base is people who just want an expensive treadmill and use it a couple of times a month but if you use it for serious running then if you can find something with a similar quality deck and a better console then you''ll be happier. The sad part is, who hard would it be to fix the console, I mean seriously!
I run about 30 miles a week.
Update:
It''s been two years now and the speed buttons don''t work sometimes on the activity console. I had them replaced last year but they failed again. So, this looks like a design issue. I''ve run maybe 1100 miles on it this year and done my first ultra. I like the unit, mechanicals are durable but the console programs are more or less useless to me and the speed adjust buttons on the activity console are very annoying. I''ll get them replaced again this yearShortly after our new LifeFitness T7 treadmill was installed, it shut down in the middle of a session. The local service rep was very helpful, and replaced the circuit board which controls the machine. We also soon noticed rust corroding the rollers, and were surprised at the lack of engineering thought and choice of material for parts which could be expected to have to stand up to sweat and salt. After several years, the machine quit again without warning. The service rep has been called, and while we expect he will solve the problem, if we were to revisit the original decision to purchase a high-end treadmill, I expect we would be happier with a Landis. It is a great convenience to have a treadmill to be able keep up with exercise, but as to Life Fitness Caveat Emptor.
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