Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Been using the bike for almost two weeks now. Overall, I think it's a great piece of equipment with just a few caveats mentioned below. I went with a recumbent bike for several reasons, but mainly because my knees can't hold up to the stress of a treadmill yet. I'm a fairly large individual who is needing to lose weight to make sure I'm around to see my son grow up. First, the bike is rated for a maximum weight of 325 lbs. I'm more in the 350 range, but I decided to take a chance that the max weight is probably less than what the bike can actually support. Fortunately, I was correct in this assumption. However, if you are above the maximum weight, just know that you are using the bike at your own risk. The main thing to understand though, is that for performing cardio exercise, the bike is great. It's quiet, doesn't draw a ton of electricity, is well made, and isn't too difficult to put together. The features all work as advertised, with some minor exceptions I'll get to in a moment. When the bike arrived, it's in a single large cardboard box. It's somewhat heavy, although my wife and I who are every bit the opposite of body builders didn't have too much trouble moving it upstairs to it's designated spot. I did the assembly myself which took about an hour or so. Tools are included with the bike, but if you have a set of allen wrenches and a couple of decent phillips head screw drivers, you'll probably want to use those. The assembly instructions were pretty good, consisting of just diagrams. The seat is reasonably comfortable, even given my... ahem... larger size. The built in programs seem to be pretty good, but I'm not much of an expert on how effective they are for various goals. I have been using the intervals program mainly since my goals are primarily weight loss and improved cardio fitness. Changing resistance levels is very straight forward. One thing I highly recommend is visiting the Schwinn website and downloading the manual for the 2017 model (as mentioned by another reviewer), as there are some differences with the various features between the provided paper manual and how they actually work. So what are the negatives? - The built-in heart rate contacts on the side handles are flaky at best. If you want to monitor your heart rate, you'll definitely want to order the Polar T31 Non-Coded Transmitter and Belt Set. It works very well with the 270. It does occasionally give an anomalous reading where it looks like your heart rate jumps by 10 or so bpm for a moment, but other than that, it's been very useful. Just don't get a "coded" Polar chest strap as it won't work with the bike. - The built in speakers pretty much blow, but I wasn't expecting much from them and only checked them out for the sake of this review. - There is a small shelf that you can set your tablet or phone on to watch media while you're exercising. It blocks the main display, but I actually like that so I'm not just staring at how many minutes I have left in the workout. However, if you place a regular iPad-sized tablet a bit too far to the left, it seems to interfere with receiving the signal from a chest strap. Setting my iPhone 6 Plus there in landscape mode doesn't seem to bother it. Not a huge deal for me, but something to keep in mind. - It would be nice if the built in fan had a little more oomph. Lastly, for me, the calorie count is always pretty far off of what would be expected. However, as mentioned earlier, I'm am fairly over the maximum weight for the bike. When you configure your user on the bike's console, it doesn't allow you to put in a weight above 325. Obviously that would have some bearing on the calorie count being different. I've been using my Apple Watch to figure out a more accurate assessment. However, it's probably worth noting that even if my weight was exactly 325, the count given by the bike is no where near what most formulas found online would indicate. I suspect this is mainly due to not factoring in an average heart rate, but I don't know for sure. The iPhone app is functional, if a bit rudimentary. Linking workout data to My Fitness Pal works very well, although I manually modify the calorie count on the My Fitness Pal web site. Bottom line, however, is if you are looking for something to get yourself going on a path to better fitness or less weight, the bike is great. I actually really enjoy exercising with it. My plan is that once I've lost some of this weight and in somewhat better condition, I'll invest in a treadmill. For now, though, the bike serves my needs and I'm already seeing slight improvements in the stability of my knees and ankles. Most importantly, exercising combined with a better diet has already resulted in getting a few pounds off.