STRYD Pod – The Detailed Changes
This is a detailed look at the hardware differences between the original STRYD footpod(s) and the latest version that takes into account WIND.
This post is not the most exciting piece of writing on this site! It lets me put the mundane details here in this post AND as a link in the main STRYD review….read that. It’s more interesting.
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STRYD Pod Changes
The most obvious difference from the latest pod to the original pod is that the LED on the top now has a blackened surface and, when charging, the charging light shows as a cool-looking ring. The old charging light was effectively a blob of white that sometimes glowed orange!
The visible surface and side grooves look identical to me. With the exception of the groove to the rear, which is covered in the next section as it is linked to a difference in the cradle.
The underside of the new POD has a very slightly larger ‘wind‘ hole. The previous version used this just for the barometer.
Also, there are two obvious copper electrodes for charging via the new cradle.
STRYD Cradle changes
The new and old cradles are different and NOT fully compatible.
The new STRYD will fit into the old cradle but this will effectively disable the wind feature as there is no air intake hole on the earlier cradle.
Also, the old STRYD will NOT fit into the new cradle. Here’s why
There are two differences to the cradle, the more obvious wind channel and a hole at the front of the cradle and an extra-wide spacing ridge to the rear. This ridge will NOT accommodate the old STRYD and hence effectively old-STRYD becomes longer and too big for the new cradle.
To the front of the new cradle, there is a hole to let in a measured amount of wind and a channel to guide it towards the hole on the underside of the new STRYD pod.
The new POD doesn’t charge on the old QI charger, it is a wired-only charger.
STRYD Charger Changes
The previous, non-wind version of STRYD initially saw a wireless QI charger give way to USB cradle-based method of charging. This is retained in the Wind version of STRYD and presumably will remain so moving forward. It’s cheaper to manufacture and requires less internal space.
The charging cradle LOOKS like one of the cradles that you put under your laces to mount the pod when running. But it is NOT designed to be run with as the gap between the pod and charger is SO small that only extremely thin laces would fit.
Here you can see the charging pins on the new charging cradle which is clearly MUCH smaller than the previous STRYD wireless charger.
Other Changes
2019 sees many new changes to the STRYD ecosystem over and above these relatively minor physical changes. Read about those in the main STRYD Running Power Meter Review
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Is it me or is the Stryd Wind pretty hard to fit in its cradle ? And it doesn’t seem to secure either since it can be “twisted” in the back on both sides. Never had any such problem with the Garmin or Milestone pods. Would be an expensive loss too !
mine goes in fairly easily. I was worrying the other way to you in that as it was easy-in, it might also be easy-out.
I had that worry with the first version though and i’ve still got that.