Home Golf Simulators - Optishot vs Trugolf

This is a guest post by Steve Webb of Golf Tech Systems and this article first appeared on Steve's 'Which Golf Simulators' blog which is available via www.whichgolfsimulators.blogspot.co.uk

With so many golf simulators and golf sim products on the market which is the best to go for? Well it all depends on requirements, space and budget. There is no real right answer as each simulator seems to have something that the next hasn't got or cant do.

I own a company called Golf Tech Systems and sell the Optishot and Trugolf Simulators. Although I believe these are great systems I'm not biased to these products and believe there are also other systems that offer great feedback and accuracy. I'm a big fan of flightscope for out on the practice ground!

Find below a comparison of the two different systems. Hopefully it will answer a few questions if you have been thinking about purchasing a system.

Optishot

A system for only £299 so is it really that good? I get asked many questions on the accuracy of the optishot simulator and whether its a proper sim or just a Nintendo Wii on steroids! Well I'm glad to report its far superior to a Nintendo Wii however obviously at £299 there are drawbacks. Firstly and the most important is Strike. The sensorpad works purely on what the club is doing through the impact area. Infrared sensors detect the club face and register club head speed, face angle, swing path and tempo. As its only registering this it cant detect how high your club is away from the sensors. IE: if you thinned a shot it would still think you struck the ball perfectly. This is its fundamental problem as a topped shot will quite happily appear to be sailing down the middle of the fairway.

The second drawback is telling the software which club you are hitting. The system will select a suitable club for the distance to go, IE: 7 iron for 150 yards....however if you would normally use a 8 iron for this distance you manually have to click the change club icon or one of the arrow keys on the keyboard. This can be annoying at times but fine if you have more than one player as the other person can stand by the computer to change clubs.

Some may say when they see the two drawbacks, 'That's Rubbish!!'.......However before you dismiss optishot for its two flaws just think about it. A system that can tell you your swing speed and more importantly swing path and face angle for only £299!! Even without the graphics, courses and game play a system that can give you those important stats will improve your game. That's got to be worth the cost of a new driver!

So simply going into the driving range mode and understanding trying different swings to get these parameters back to 'square' will result in a straight shot.....now add the fact it has 15 courses on the European +3 model, plus driving range makes optishot a great tool to improve your game. We have many clients say they can live with the strike issue purely to get a system on a budget as they know when they haven't struck the ball right.....I've got to say it's a good attitude to take and is becoming a regular opinion. Lighting is key to get accuracy as high as possible and is something that will need to be done properly. Many customers purchase optishot from other retailers without understanding the lighting required to get the system to register properly. I know of many returns saying its broken or not accurate.....this isn't the case just the fact lighting requirements haven't been explained properly. I also recommend creating your own clubset in the system to improve accuracy results.

You can add components to enhance your experience and we currently sell many 'packages' which include stance mats, projectors and projection nets and screens. A 'traditional' looking simulator setup excluding PC can be achieved for around £1800 and will be the envy of all your friends, especially with another cold winter on the way!!

Trugolf

A step up in budget is required to get into the Trugolf Systems. The personal is the entry level system costing £8995. The only component required to get going with the personal is a PC. The personal comes with teeing area for both left and right handers, a projector that's floor mounted under a protective hood, hitting net with a good quality impact screen and overhead lighting. The beauty with this system is its portability. It comes with a travel bag on wheels to take all the frame and netting and it is setup without having to attach projectors to ceilings or screens to walls....everything is freestanding!

Trugolf uses a patented system called Trutrac. It combines a sophisticated sensorpad along with acoustic microphones that are positioned around the framework in front of the impact screen. Basically the sensorpad takes all the clubhead information, similar to optishot but much more advanced. Then when the ball hits the screen the noise is then measured to each of the microphones. This instantly calculates the launch and direction of the ball. Combining the club head information from the pad and the ball information from the mics results in a fantastically accurate system. It's extremely simple but hugely effective. The key is to make sure that the screen is positioned exactly the right distance from the sensorpad so the calculations are extremely accurate......and that's it!!

Because Trugolf has this technology means theres no need to input club selection like optishot. This means you just look at the yardage and pick the club you want and hit away. It's also a great system to practice not only the normal shots but also punch shots and draws/fades etc. Even setting the weather conditions to Uk spec (Wet & Windy!) can result in extremely accurate practice sessions.

Trugolf also own E6 Software and this comes in both full and lite versions. The Technique Personal comes with E6 Lite but can be upgraded to E6 full for £995. The main difference is Lite uses static images, has less weather variations, camera options and loses the scoring zone on the driving range. It doesn't seem like much but when you see both versions side by side its like night and day. The static images although have the same graphics just dont seem as realistic. E6 full with trees and water moving just makes you feel that you're right there on the course and that alone is worth the upgrade price when spending this sort of money.

The driving range feature is great and many will spend most of their time here. The scoring zone allows you to place any sized target at any position on the range. Viewing an overhead shot of the target allows you to see the dispersion of your shots and is very effective. Stats of each shot appear full screen after each shot and then scale down to the top left of the screen and can be instantly printed, whilst a side on image at the bottom of the screen shows your flight of each shot. The tracers can be changed in colour, a feature that is great when comparing different brands of club or shafts.

So moving on from there the Trugolf range steps up to a bigger portable solution (Prestige) including a Alienware PC for £16995. Its then a jump into the hard wall sims that start at £31,995 right the way through to the Horizon which has a colossal 217" diagonal screen size! Whilst that's some serious money these can be easily doubled as home cinemas and with state of the art sound systems can create a fantastic dual purpose.

So is Trugolf worth the extra jump from Optishot? Well i'll stay unbiased and let you be the judge of that.....Golf Tech Systems have launched their first Centre of Excellence at a Golf Club in Oxford where there's a Technique Prestige installed. Simply book a demonstration and you can try the system for yourself.

All I will say though is that many have tried, loved and purchased optishot....and why not, its tremendous value at £299......but once you step onto Trugolf there's no going back!

For more infomration visit Golf Tech Systems, www.optishotindoorgolf.co.uk or www.trugolf.com

Golf Tech Systems’ is a leader in golf technology and golf simulators, have recently opened their demo centre in Oxfordshire giving customers the ability to view, test and compare the different systems before committing to buy.

For further information Golf Tech Systems or to visit the demo centre vist www.golftechsystems.com or call 01865 682414

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