Recommendations for accurate home body fat analyzers?

[Jeff]

I guess the title says it all. I work out a lot and I'm looking for ways to measure my personal health and state of my diet - using a scale is nice but it doesn't tell me if the 8 pounds I've put on since the summer is muscle or fat, etc etc. It would be nice to have a little more information to let me know what's working for me and what's not, if I have to worry about weight gains or not, and so forth.

I know that there are inherent accuracy problems with home systems, minimized by testing at the same time of the day etc etc. If anyone has product recommendations I'd be glad to hear them.

[Elyanna]

I bought this one because it was cheap and also I saw it at my gym. It's not infallible but seems to be reasonably accurate as long as you follow directions and don't use it with your feet.

My body fat percentage using my feet: 19.2
One foot and one hand: 20
My lips and my hand: 12.1 (SO UNSANITARY)
My armpit: 10.3

[Bodhiman]

Those are good for a general idea and are usually used when dealing with a large group. The major drawback is that they can be inaccurate based on hydration, food intake and body temperature (see here). For basic, household use - probably as good as you're going to get but don't take them too seriously. For a more accurate reading with these, you might try buying some conductive gel, taking readings at the same time every day, preferably not within an hour of exercise and 3-4 hours after eating.

[Wolf Larsen]

I just bought an Omron 306C and it seems pretty good so far. There appear to be two tricks to getting consistent results. The first is to use it at the same hydration state (I do it first thing in the morning before I drink anything) and to hold it the exact same way.