This is an update for my original XT Racing GPX Pro Review.

First, let me say that the reliability problems I had in the past with the screen seem to have been solved. It’s been nearly three full years and the screen is still working just fine. That said, having some more time with the GPX Pro, I’ve got a few more thoughts:

First, XT Racing’s customer support has continued to be awesome. I’ve emailed them about a number of issues and they’ve been really good about providing me help and general advice.

That said, having spent more time with the software and continuing to learn about analyzing the data, there are some limitations with the GPX Pro if you want to get really serious about your data analysis. If you haven’t yet read up on the subject, I highly recommend Andrew Trevitt’s DataMC for a good introduction to data acquisition and analysis.

Simply put, I’ve come to learn that the XT Racing software is easy to use, but rather limited.

For example, sometimes you don’t want to know what the throttle position is, but rather how it changes over time. How fast are you applying the throttle? Are you being smooth? Well you need a “math channel” which is basically a formula applied to a data channel from the logger. Math channels can do all kinds of cool things like show your lean angle based on your GPS’s lateral acceleration data using the formula:

lean angle = abs(atan(GPS_LatAcc) * 180 / PI)

Or want to know how much you are trail braking?

Trail_Braking_G = min(Corner_G, Braking_G)

Unfortunately, the XT Studio software doesn’t support math channels at all and so you’re left wondering if the reason you were able to accelerate harder out of that corner on lap 5 was because you picked up the bike sooner. And if you ever want to use sensors for your suspension like riders in MotoGP, WSBK and MotoAmerica, you absolutely need math channels to be able to properly interpret the data.

The other major limitation of the XT Studio software is the limitation of only one channel per graph. Many other software packages allow you to graph multiple channels on the same axis in a way which makes data analysis easier in many cases. You may think that this is a small issue, but you can see a lot more data at once on the screen because each channel doesn’t have to be graphed on it’s own dedicated X/Y axis which can make you much more efficient which is a big deal when you’re not only riding, but your own pit crew and data engineer during a race weekend.

This isn’t to say the XT Studio software is bad, just that it’s targeted towards more simplistic use cases and not people who are looking to extract as much information from their data. Considering the price point of the GPX Pro, that’s quite understandable.

Of course XT Racing is always looking to improve their products so maybe they will add things like math channels and more advanced graphing options to their analysis software like AiM’s Race Studio or GEMS GDA have.