Golf Simulator? (1 Viewer)

trigs

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Anyone else have a golf simulator at home? What do you think of it? What are your opinions?

I decided to buy the Optishot2 as I don't get out on the links as much as I'd like. Plus I could use all the practice I can get.

The reviews I've read say it's not the most accurate but I'm sure it's good enough for my level, especially for the price compared to other simulators.
 
I friend of mine just completed a golf simulator room in his basement. His daughter plays for college.

I haven't played it yet, but I've seen a couple of pictures. It looks pretty amazing.
 
I've done a fair amount of research, and it really boils down to what you want out of it. If you just want pure entertainment, the Optishot and the Rapsodo RMotion will be fine for a couple hundred bucks. If you want any sort of usable feedback, you'll have to get into the Skytrak or better and invest $2k+ to get up and running. In the end I just got a hitting net and with foam balls and then chip real balls into a chipping net.
 
On the same line as the SC300, I've been considering the Garmin G80. Like that it has simulator features and on course uses, so it's not just a one trick pony.
 
I don’t have a lot of experience/knowledge with an indoor setup. I’ve always had access to outdoor facilities and used TrackMan. I don’t have the space to set one up here but they’ve always seemed pretty amazing to me. If I lived where the weather forced me indoors and off the course for long periods of time I would probably look into one of these!
 
Anyone else have a golf simulator at home? What do you think of it? What are your opinions?

I decided to buy the Optishot2 as I don't get out on the links as much as I'd like. Plus I could use all the practice I can get.

The reviews I've read say it's not the most accurate but I'm sure it's good enough for my level, especially for the price compared to other simulators.

I did a ton of research a few years back and I probably know as much as golf sim technology as @BGinGA knows about poker chips :cool I have an Opti2 in my corporate office. I also bought a Skytrak a while pater as an upgrade but ended up returning it.

What do you want to know specifically?

Here's a few pictures of my setup:

golf.jpg


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office 3.jpg
 
I recently installed one for a client but I don’t recall what brand it was. He didn’t have the computer set up on it before I left so I didn’t get a chance to try it out.
 
I did a ton of research a few years back and I probably know as much as golf sim technology as @BGinGA knows about poker chips :cool I have an Opti2 in my corporate office. I also bought a Skytrak a while pater as an upgrade but ended up returning it.

What do you want to know specifically?

Here's a few pictures of my setup:

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Nice setup! Just curious how others feel about them. Have they helped your game do you think? Are they as much fun as I'm hoping they'll be?
 
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Nice setup! Just curious how others feel about them. Have they helped your game do you think? Are they as much fun as I'm going they'll be?
Thanks man.

Opti2 is a toy and nothing more. That isn't a criticism - you can't expect a $300 device to perform like one that costs $10000.

I made a lot of modifications to mine including building a platform and using a 'real feel' mat from Matzilla so the hitting surface was level with my feet. If you want to see a breakdown of my setup, I posted about it a couple years ago here: https://golfsimulatorforum.com/foru...7901-complete-start-to-finish-simulator-build

I found OPTI 2 helped my short game since I found the device to be more accurate on shots within 100 yards. Anything beyond that was a crapshoot and wildly inaccurate results ranging from 400+ drives to massive slices and pulled shots.

The Opti 2 is incredibly finicky... I could never get the clubs to calibrate right despite spending hours messing around with taping clubs and installing special lighting, etc. I enjoyed setting up a net (I don't hit directly into the screen even though it is an impact screen) with a bucket of shag balls and practicing shots at various ranges within 100 yds repeatedly... I feel like that made a significant improvement to my short game... if nothing else just the repetition and muscle memory.
 
Arrived today - one day early! Despite not having the whole setup ready, and despite the fact it feels like 40 degrees out today (that's over 100 for you Americans - setup is in the garage), I had to quickly get a few strokes in. Foam balls bounce way more than I thought they would lol. Definitely seems like it'll be fun and help me get some more practice in at least.
 
I have optishot and its just collecting dust in my garage. Used it only for 1 season and ruined my game. Its probably useful to measure swing speed but other than that I don't trust the ball trajectory on the screen. The sensors are sensitive to light so I have to use incandescent light behind me and the shadows is bothering me. You can probably try different lighting setups and might help on the accuracy, no luck on my end.
 
I have optishot and its just collecting dust in my garage. Used it only for 1 season and ruined my game. Its probably useful to measure swing speed but other than that I don't trust the ball trajectory on the screen. The sensors are sensitive to light so I have to use incandescent light behind me and the shadows is bothering me. You can probably try different lighting setups and might help on the accuracy, no luck on my end.
I've read that sunlight and incandescent light messes with the infrared and increases the inaccuracies as well as shadows. Fluorescent or LED is better. I'm going to block out the window and replace the incandescent bulbs in my garage. I'm also considering using a small desk lamp with LEDs to focus directly on the infrared lights on the hardware.

That's what helps according to what I've read.
 
I tried Top Golf once. I somehow managed to strike a ball twice in a single stroke, launching it at high speed... backwards.

Zero chance I'd put something that dangerous in my own house. :bag:

There is a new top golf about a mile from my house. Took years from announcement to finally built and opened and they had maybe 2 months tops before being COVID shutdown.

looking forward to it reopening.
 
I'm looking to build one in the coming months here. From what I can tell the pandemic really blew up the market where most decent launch monitors are going for over retail. I think if you want more than just a 'game' (optishot) and want to get into truly golfing a bit more you have to get into the skytrak/mevo+ price range ($2k) or jump into the uneekor QED ($6k) range.

Since I'm looking at more of a garage build it won't be nearly as nice as moxie mikes but I'm hoping it will be a good practice/time wasting tool.
 
I would duplicate this optishot2 build at my house in a heartbeat but my basement doesn’t have a high enough ceiling for it.

Yeah I've watched that video. Sweet setup.

My garage ceiling isn't super high either so I will probably just stick to using my irons and playing par 3 courses. Optishot2 has the option of turning all of its courses to par 3 courses so that's pretty cool.
 
After playing around with this for a few days, here's my opinion:

For the price ($300US I believe compared to thousands or tens of thousands of dollars for higher end models) Optishot2 is great. It tracks the club, not the ball, so for obvious reasons some of the stats are not going to be completely accurate, like distance for example. However, it has definitely helped me pick out a few issues with my swing that I probably never would have been able to figure out on my own (I'm no pro here). It's one thing to hit the driving range and bang out some balls - if I hit a bad shot I can't always know why it was bad - compared to using this simulator. You can easily see the difference and what went wrong when you miss hit, and when you get a nice swing and clean contact, you can definitely see how your stroke did well.

Main stats it tracks is clubhead speed, club face angle, club path, tempo, and distance. Like I said, the distance isn't the most accurate, but the other stats seem to be pretty close. Even without the stats, it's still a benefit to get more swings in, but it's already helped me remove some kinks in my swing. Clearly worth it imho.
 
Yeah it can really help with that. Another thing that I think plays into the optishot market is the ability to use foam balls (or no ball at all) which means you can do it without a net and such if cramped for space
 
Yeah it can really help with that. Another thing that I think plays into the optishot market is the ability to use foam balls (or no ball at all) which means you can do it without a net and such if cramped for space
Yes for sure. I'm using foam balls which is a much better option for me. I don't think I could use real balls in my setup.
 
I'm proud of myself! I just shot a 59 (on the Palm Deserts Mountain par 3 course - i.e. par 54) on my simulator. Birdied the 18th hole to do it. My first time breaking 60 and my best score on it by 2 strokes. (Disclaimer: I have it set to auto-putt because putting on the sim is crap. However, I feel like it works against me because it basically gives me a two putt almost every time unless I'm within like 8 feet and then I'll occasionally get a one putt. Come on man! I can hole a 12-15 footer every once in a while lol).

I can definitely see an improvement in my swing also. When I got the simulator, I took about 20 strokes with each club to gauge distance because you are supposed to input distances for each of your clubs for recommendations for each shot. However, I've started seeing my distance increasing most likely to my cleaner swings. So now I am actually clubbing down from the recommended clubs because I kept clearing it over the greens. When I get a chance I will go through all my clubs again and update the distances. It's been too hot and humid here lately so it's been nice to be able to get some swings in while staying out of the sun.
 
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I came across this putting simulator a few weeks ago (Exputt), and after reading and watching a bunch of reviews, I decided to buy one. I've enjoyed my golf simulator, but putting on it is basically nonexistent as the censors just can't handle it. You could tap the putt so lightly and it would sail 20 feet past the hole. I've resorted to changing the settings on it to guesstimate the amount of putts for me which is one of the options.

Therefore, after seeing this putting sim online, I thought it would be a good compliment to my other simulator. I was especially interested in it because I'm not a good putter and it's difficult for me to get a lot of practice putting in general.

It arrived today, and I have to say that it is pretty awesome. It takes literally 30 seconds to set up and works with any computer, TV, or screen through HDMI (no software downloads or installs required). It seems to be extremely accurate as it measures all the club and ball movements well. There's a practice mode which is basically just for distance work, and there is a challenge mode and 9 hole play (up to 4 players). Even my partner enjoys it and she doesn't particularly like golf, but it's just that easy and fun to play. She's asking me to find her a pink putter that she can buy so she has her own to play with now :)

There are some things that could be improved on it though: 1) There's no internet connection so no playing with people online. 2) There doesn't seem to be any available updates or add-ons coming in the future, so no new courses or anything like that. 3) It would be nice to have more options of specific distances to choose from (your options are 5', 10', 20', 30', 40', 50', however, if you select "random distance" instead of "fixed distance" and choose a max distance, you will be given any random distances up to the max distance you chose). However, these are not big issues for me.

Being able to practice putts up to 50 feet in your home using no more than about 4 feet of space is great. I've been fooling around with it for about an hour and I can already see improvements in my putting distancing. If anyone is in the market for a putting sim at home, I highly recommend Exputt.

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Yeah I'm huge on golf and golf sim stuff. My sim plans are shelved for a year or two, but I'm going to have a pretty high class setup once the plans are back in action.
 

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