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Vortex Anarch Rangefinder Review

xThor said:
Buddy didn’t find it at the course.

It was fun while it lasted. I’ll check again with them tomorrow
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oof. That's rough. Hope something turns up.

I always put a label maker sticker on mine with my name and phone number. After losing one once I will force someone to ignore the contact info next time around.
 
tahoebum said:
Every brand has it’s own algorithm to calculate slope and it’s not going to fit every golfer. A high swing speed, high ball hitter might hit 7 iron from 180 yards while some older or slower guys might be using a 3 wood from that distance. The slope algorithm of any rangefinder could be wrong for both of them.

My old club‘s 11th hole was a 190 yard par 3 that dropped about 100’ to the green surface. I remember standing on the tee will 3 buddies that all got different readings from their rangefinders and all of them were wrong for my trajectory. I knew after playing the hole hundreds of times that it was -12 yards and the closest reading from their rangefinder was -15 Yards.

It’s easy for me to make elevation adjustments if I have a line of sight distance and I also want to record all of my rounds into GHIN for handicap purposes and that’s against the rules if I’m using the slope function. I buy without slope or turn it off.
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That's part of the reason why I always ask what the actual is to people who are shooting it on some of our par 3's with slope. Everyone's is different. On on par 3 which is maybe a 25-30ft drop I've seen anywhere from 5-11 yards difference depending on what rangefinder people are using. I try to use it as more of a general range vs an actual as ball flight can change that as you stated.
 
xThor said:
Buddy didn’t find it at the course.

It was fun while it lasted. I’ll check again with them tomorrow
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Oh man that sucks.
Keys to your vehicle or your wallet in the case is a great tip to not forgetting it.
One of my favorite things about our private club is you get your stuff back 99% of the time.
I hope it turns up for you.
 
xThor said:
They said they haven’t found it yet. My buddy that’s a member is going to swing by the course in a bit and look
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Brutal, hope they find it.
 
rhinosparky said:
Oh man that sucks.
Keys to your vehicle or your wallet in the case is a great tip to not forgetting it.
One of my favorite things about our private club is you get your stuff back 99% of the time.
I hope it turns up for you.
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It’s a private club I used to be a member of, so I know everyone there pretty well. Hopefully it turns up tomorrow.

This was the first rangefinder I had stopped using the case with, and have a pouch in the bag.
Just got caught up talking with buddies after the round yesterday and it slipped my mind completely.
 
dozer933 said:
The next time I play I’m going to take some notes on what color the flag is and if I get pin lock first go or not. At my home course I have experienced false or no pin locks, but when I was playing in Florida a few weeks back it worked flawless

Also, in regards to slope, I never use it but will test it again to see how it relates to my adjustments I make for elevation change. Curious to see if mine seems to be tuned properly or not.

Would be cool to hear from Vortex on how these functions work to better understand why the rangefinder might not be locking onto pins or giving a certain slope adjustment that seems off.
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As always, thank you for the feedback! It's incredibly valuable on our end.

For PinSpotter - if the rangefinder has detected multiple objects, such as the flag and the trees behind the flag, the rangefinder will display the closest object’s range, which is typically the flag. It is possible to acquire false pin locks if an object is a certain distance in front of another object (Example being something like a single tree in front of a larger wooded area). Reflectivity is the biggest factor for the pin itself - there could be certain colors that are more reflective (Example: black being less reflective than white) but overall, this should not affect performance.

For Slope - performance is not affected by any settings selected (outside of, of course, turning it off!) - we'd be happy to chat more about this one, but would need a bit more info for any discrepancies seen between different RFS to compare the following: 1. Straight Line Distance 2. Slope Adjusted Distance 3. Angle - the Anarchs have identical internal software, so slope distances should be identical!
 

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I got to see and use one of these on the course and , yeah this may be a buy for me. It felt amazing and it worked impeccably
 
mts25 said:
I got my Vortex Anarch based on the reviews in this thread. I'm pretty disappointed. Right out of the box, playing on my home course where I'm really familiar with the yardages/slopes, it's not accurate. Line of sight is pretty accurate, but the slope calculations are way off. I tested it today with 3 friends with my Vortex vs a Bushnell, a Cobalt and a Voicecaddie TL1. The Vortex read pretty far off the other 3 every time. With my familiarity with the course, it was pretty easy to tell. The Vortex slope readings often being more than 5 yards off the other 3 rangefinders which were consistently close. It's clearly a defective unit. I get it, these things happen.

However, I called Vortex and their answer was to send this brand new unit back to them for repair instead of just swapping it out for me. I could understand their position if I'd had the thing for a while and it could be a wear/damage issue, but inaccurate right out of the box? So now I have the time it takes to ship it to them, the time for their people to look at it (I'm told 7-14 business days), then the time it takes to get it shipped back. So I'm probably without a unit for at least a month in peak golf season.

Mark me down for not being a very big fan of Vortex.
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Just wanted to follow up on this. Sawyer from Vortex contacted me through this forum and ended up overnighting me a new Anarch to replace the one I sent in for repair. Pretty impressive. I should have it today so I will have the unit for my golf trip to Reynolds Plantation next week. I'm playing 7 rounds there so I should be able to give the Anarch a pretty good test and comparison to several others.

Anyway, if you didn't think there was a benefit to being active on this forum, you'd be wrong. :)
 
xThor said:
Ohhhhhh my god just realized I left my rangefinder on the cart after today’s round and I’m soooo mad. It’s a private club so hopefully it’s in the shop in the morning
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xThor said:
Buddy didn’t find it at the course.

It was fun while it lasted. I’ll check again with them tomorrow
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Nooooo :(
 
mts25 said:
Just wanted to follow up on this. Sawyer from Vortex contacted me through this forum and ended up overnighting me a new Anarch to replace the one I sent in for repair. Pretty impressive. I should have it today so I will have the unit for my golf trip to Reynolds Plantation next week. I'm playing 7 rounds there so I should be able to give the Anarch a pretty good test and comparison to several others.

Anyway, if you didn't think there was a benefit to being active on this forum, you'd be wrong. :)
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This is great to hear and I'm glad they are getting you taken care of quickly.
 
Bryndom said:
I got to see and use one of these on the course and , yeah this may be a buy for me. It felt amazing and it worked impeccably
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You're welcome for the dent in your wallet :D
 
mts25 said:
Just wanted to follow up on this. Sawyer from Vortex contacted me through this forum and ended up overnighting me a new Anarch to replace the one I sent in for repair. Pretty impressive. I should have it today so I will have the unit for my golf trip to Reynolds Plantation next week. I'm playing 7 rounds there so I should be able to give the Anarch a pretty good test and comparison to several others.

Anyway, if you didn't think there was a benefit to being active on this forum, you'd be wrong. :)
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Wow, that is impressive service there. Not surprised in the least.
 
mts25 said:
Just wanted to follow up on this. Sawyer from Vortex contacted me through this forum and ended up overnighting me a new Anarch to replace the one I sent in for repair. Pretty impressive. I should have it today so I will have the unit for my golf trip to Reynolds Plantation next week. I'm playing 7 rounds there so I should be able to give the Anarch a pretty good test and comparison to several others.

Anyway, if you didn't think there was a benefit to being active on this forum, you'd be wrong. :)
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That's some good stuff there
 
Bryndom said:
It’s on hard ponder, not gonna lie
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It is legit worth it, and you can find deals on them through Amazon and some other sites to soften the blow.
 
Had my first retired golf league day today and all my foursome loved it. One buddy said his hand always shook too much to use one but was able to use it and was surprised how easy it was to lock on the pin. He was really impressed! Later on in the round I was on the green putting and he moved my cart so a maintenance tractor could get thru. Well when getting out of my cart he knocked the Vortex off the cart post with his shoulder and the tractor ran over my rangefinder :eek:!!!! Must have been the trailer he was pulling but no damage or marks at all on it!!! Takes a licking and still looks great! :ROFLMAO:
 
bsbmike said:
Had a good round with the anarch yesterday...though a few notes:

-Very fast picking up the distance - no issues with that whatsoever
-Did not get the haptic feedback anytime I shot a white colored flag. Not a huge deal but wanted to mention it
-My magnet was no cooperating. Feel off the cart bar 3 times early on so I just put it in the cup holder. Maybe I had an issue with what I was doing? But it didn't wanna stay, and I felt like it wasn't any rough terrain

Still digging the unit and it gave me very reliable distances...a little concerned with the magnet issues, but we'll try again
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Thanks for the feedback here - magnet strength has been consistent feedback, and I can promise you we're working on it!
 
So here is an interesting tidbit. I asked our caddie to give it a try a few times over the last few days. It blew him away. He was ready to ditch his V5 Shift instantly due to the clarity
 
JB said:
So here is an interesting tidbit. I asked our caddie to give it a try a few times over the last few days. It blew him away. He was ready to ditch his V5 Shift instantly due to the clarity
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This is probably the best support you can get! Someone like a caddie, that it is their job to get the number.. You, me, its cool but we are hacks and if we miss the number so be it. It just hurts us. But for caddie he has to keep people happy and coming back.
 
Vortex_Golf said:
Thanks for the feedback here - magnet strength has been consistent feedback, and I can promise you we're working on it!
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I hadn't noticed much of an issue till that day...I mentioned it when I opened it, but I stuck it against my freezer door to try it out and it pulled the door open before I could pull the magnet off. Gonna be putting it to the test again soon, so I'll share what happens!

It's not a deal breaker feature for me personally, but hey stronger is always better for this!
 
bsbmike said:
I hadn't noticed much of an issue till that day...I mentioned it when I opened it, but I stuck it against my freezer door to try it out and it pulled the door open before I could pull the magnet off. Gonna be putting it to the test again soon, so I'll share what happens!

It's not a deal breaker feature for me personally, but hey stronger is always better for this!
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I had a past rangefinder that the magnet was strong on some carts and would hardly stay on, on others. Was this a different cart than what you’re used to?
 
Muchmore said:
I had a past rangefinder that the magnet was strong on some carts and would hardly stay on, on others. Was this a different cart than what you’re used to?
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It’s the first time I’ve ever played at that course and it was a Club car which is what we use at our course but I don’t wanna write it off just yet could’ve just been an issue with that particular cart I was using
 
Muchmore said:
I had a past rangefinder that the magnet was strong on some carts and would hardly stay on, on others. Was this a different cart than what you’re used to?
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It would totally make sense that different carts have a different metal makeup in their parts so magnet strength could be effected. I had never considered this until this moment but it seems to make total sense to me. I will now forever be on the lookout to see how magnets stick to different carts. #nerd
 
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