CED7000 Shot Timer - Perfect for Dry Fire Practice Shooting or RO use in USPSA, IPSC, 3 gun, and Steel Challenge.

This is a great little shot timer. It is very easy to use and the battery stays charged for quite awhile. Changing the settings is very simple as is the basic usage. You can do anything you need to do at the range with this little time.I like that it is small enough to place in my pocket. The buttons on top make it very functional from many different positions.Highly recommended.

Unfortunately, I got a lemon. I know others who have this timer, and I bought this one on their recommendations. After the battery died the first time, the thing would not hold a charge. Due to ammo costs, it took me a long time to use this product after my first foray of playing around with it. That was when I discovered it would not hold a charge. That sucked.What DID NOT suck, was the seller. Even though the return window had long closed by the time I discovered the issue, they worked with me , helping me through the process of getting Amazon to grant me an exemption and return the product for a FULL REFUND. They did not have to do that, and I appreciate that they did. That is why I gave a 5 star for the overall rating. You can get a lemon out of any product, that is not big deal, but in this day and age, I appreciate the fact that someone stood behind the product they sold, even when they did not have to. Thanks for that.

First let me say that the CED7000 timer is one of the best for the money and before I purchased it I already was a little familiar with it because we use the RF version for IDPA at a club that I belong. The reason I purchased it is because it is advertised as “Perfect for Dry Fire Practice” and I want to improve my draw and first shot time for USPSA and IDPA so I decided to get it but it did not turn out to be what I thought it would be (more on this below).The timer has a good quality backlit LCD screen that uses blue characters and white background light. This makes the screen easy to read and it provides plenty of information showing the countdown to start, 1st shot time, total shots, number of shot strings and more. The timer case is also of good quality but the buttons leave much to be desired. First of all, the buttons are made of what can be described as low-quality shiny silver plastic and the writing on them is engraved and not painted. That makes the writing illegible in most lighting situations and unless you are familiar with the timer, you will not be able to read the markings on the timer so you can operate it.I purchased a silicon skin to protect the timer and a wrist strap for use during action shooting. The silicon skin is nice, comes in different colors and fits perfectly but the wrist strap is not made of breathable material and causes my wrist to sweat. Since the wrist strap is a simple strap with Velcro and it is long enough, I can use some type of cloth sleeve on my wrist and strap the timer over it so I do not sweat from it being directly on my skin.Pros, Features and Functions:- It has a rechargeable battery and the battery lasts many hours and the battery does not lose charge while not in use.- It is excellent for live fire recognition and you can set the microphone sensitivity. Generally, if the RO who handles this timer is a few feet behind the shooter, you do not have to adjust the sensitivity for anything from 9mm and up caliber fire. Note that you may have to raise the sensitivity if the shooter is using a suppressor or you can use the optional wrist strap to strap it on the shooter’s wrist.- It can be upgraded to the RF version, or you can buy the RF version but I would only suggest that if you are the organizer of an event. For example, we use the RF version for IDPA where the RO has the timer in the field and the scorer has a large LCD screen on his desk showing the total time so the RO does not have to tell him/her the timing information every time a shooter is done. The large LCD screen (about 15” big) is sold separately for about $170.00 at the time of this review.- You can find many accessories like an external horn, the large LCD screen, carrying case, skins, screen protectors, external battery and mounting options like a belt clip and wrist strap. You can find the accessories on the Double Alpha website as they are mostly unavailable on Amazon.- In Comstock mode, the timer will keep track of time from the first beep until the last shot fired so there is no need for a stop button.- You can program the timer to do a random delay between 2 to 5 seconds when the start button is pressed or set it to a custom delay up to 10 seconds.- It has a silent operation mode and you can connect a visual signal to the aux jack but this will require a bit of electronics knowledge on your part because I was unable to find such accessory. If you are familiar with microcontrollers, you can use that signal (it is 3.7V) as a High on a digital input pin of the controller and from there you can do anything your imagination allows you as a visual or audible signal.- It has PAR and MultiPAR functions which means that you can have the timer beep at intervals signaling the start and end of a shooting session.- It has a spy mode where you can register other shooter’s shots without the beep sounds from this timer.- It has a stop watch and countdown mode but I don’t think this is something that anyone would use because our phones and wrist watches have a stop watch and countdown functions anyway.- The charging cable is USB and that means you can use any USB charger that you probably have laying around or even plug it in a USB port on your desktop or laptop. Or even more conveniently, you can use a USB power bank like this one:  Portable Charger Power Bank 22400mAh Ultra High Capacity - It only weighs 77 grams which may make it feel cheap but it is actually nice when you have to strap it on your wrist or hang it from your neck.Cons:- The button markings are unreadable- It will not be able to withstand water. It may be ok if you use it during light rain but the gap between the buttons and the timer case is pretty big and if something is spilled on it or get wet in any way, it will be damaged- There is no power button. Power on/off is achieved by holding the “Clear” button.- In Custom PAR mode, when you hold the clear button to turn the timer off, it will reset the settings and you will have to set it up again when powered back on. Not sure if other functions have this problem or this is just a software bug but the timer will not lose the settings in Auto PAR mode.- It is by no means waterproof and barely water resistant which is something to be desired for a timer that is meant to be used outdoors.- It does not come with a belt clip but only with a wrist and neck lanyards that are there to prevent the RO from accidentally dropping the timer but when operated by the shooter, a belt clip or a wrist strap is a must especially if you are practicing for some type of action shooting like IDPA, USPSA, etc. Unfortunately, these items are sold separately and they are fairly expensive for accessories that should be included.Now, the problem for me is that this timer will not recognize dry fire as a shot and the only way to practice is to put it in custom or auto PAR mode and set the beeper to go off at an interval of your choosing. So, the way to practice draw and first shot using the CED7000 is to set it to do a random time delay start and a predefined stop delay time (say 1.5 seconds). Then you press the start and get ready for the first beep sound to draw. Once the start beep goes off, you must try to unholster the pistol, disengage the safety, take a sight picture and dry fire before the second beep. Note that the time between start to stop, includes the long start beep. So, if you set it at 1.5 seconds, you will hear the stop beep 0.75 seconds after the start beep sound ends. It works best if you have a laser training cartridge and try to hit a laser target at a 10 yard distance (depending on the size of the target). As you get consistent in hitting the target before the stop beep goes off, you can lower the time between beeps. Now, all this sounds great but my hope was that this timer would recognize the firing pin hit and show me the actual time it took for me to fire the first shot. Have I known that this is how it is going to work, I could have done the same function using an Arduino nano ( Mini Nano V3.0 ATmega328P 5V 16M Micro Controller Board ) and a passive buzzer ( Passive Electronic Buzzer for Arduino ) and make this happen with less than 5 bucks. If I include a 10 dollar LCD screen and 3 tactile switches, I can have the same exact functionality for less than $20 and 1 hour of programming. So in my case, 130 bucks is way overpriced for what I want to do with it. This is the only reason I gave it 4 stars and not 5. If they did not advertise it as “Perfect for Dry Fire Practice” I would be happy to give it 5 stars. In my opinion, they should change the wording to “Could be used for Dry Fire Practice” and explain how.I decided to keep the timer for live fire practice but for dry fire, I will use the MantiX system ( MantisX Firearms Training System ) which works amazingly well in recognizing the firing pin “hit” during dry fire and it provides a plethora of information to help you understand how to improve overall. The reason I am keeping both the MantisX and this timer is that this timer is much simpler to use for live fire when timing is what matters most and does not need anything to be attached to the firearm making most holsters unusable for practice. If all you need is to practice dry fire at home, I suggest that you get the MantisX system which is priced reasonably compared to this timer. If you belong to a club and have access to an open range where you can practice live fire action shooting, this timer is highly recommended and you cannot go wrong with it.

Great product!!! Strongly recommend

This is my second CED7000 Shot Timer - Perfect for Dry Fire Practice Shooting. The first one had a bad microphone, so they sent me another one. At least the microphone works in the second one, but it is totally worthless for indoor dry fire practice. Anyone looking for an indoor dry fire practice shot timer needs to look somewhere else.

The unit never worked properly from day one. The battery would lose its charge within a few days. All settings would be wiped out and the unit needed to be re-charged prior to every single range trip. The 'standby' time of a month is a joke. I ordered a replacement battery after getting fed up with it and seeing another review about the possibility of destroying batteries due to over charging. I figured I was somehow to blame.Same problem with the new battery, I have never over-charged it. I called CED since I purchased the battery from them. I was told the unit has a two-year warranty, and I voided the warranty by changing the battery. I called the re-seller on Amazon EliteEdge. EliteEdge is an authorized CED reseller and was the reseller I purchased the original unit through on Amazon. I never got any call back from EliteEdge.Buyer beware when purchasing through EliteEdge and Amazon. You will get no support and CED considers changing a battery to be voiding the warranty.As for the unit itself, it mostly works. It doesn't detect dry fire practice with any sensitivity level as claimed but it does work on the range as long as it has been charged within 24 hours. I am currently looking at replacements from other companies besides CED.

I never thought such a complete timer would be so small and very loud (that's a good thing when wearing ear-pro).I haven't used it much, but it's everything I expected and then some. Great timer, a bit pricey but you get what you pay for. I'm anxious to use it again soon.

So i have been using these at different matches for over a year now. It was time for me to have my very own, great product and the features are vast.