After the release of MK2 is there a software update for mk1?

Here’s a list of issues that I remember off the top of my head.

There are many more but I’d have to go through this forum to get them or just look at the list of fixes in each update and also the time difference between updates.

Compass. From the start it was not possible to set the compass to use magnetic north. It would only use True North. This means it would display differently to an analog compass. If you knew the magnetic declination for your location you could somewhat compensate but you shouldn’t have to. It took months to get a fix.

Safety stop. If you drifted into deco but then cleared deco before reaching 5m you received no safety stop countdown. The safety stop was just canceled. This took months to be fixed and was then reintroduced in the next update!

Temperature. There was a mismatch between the displayed temperature and what was logged. The difference varied from device to device but was up to 3°C on some devices (including mine). It also varied as to which was the closest to the actual temperature. On my first device the displayed temperature was accurate but the logged temperature was 2-3°C lower. This took many months to get fixed but was reintroduced with 10.20 and still hasn’t been fixed again.

Exit/Surface location. This has never worked well despite many suggestions and requests. The exit location is not accurate at all and I've had it having me surface in a car park 50m from where I actually surfaced. The problem is the device only turns on GPS seconds before it grabs the location.  This even goes against Garmin's own recommendations for accuracy from GPS.  They say to turn it on for as long as possible so as to "soak the GPS" (their words https://support.garmin.com/en-US/?faq=CC5azODuBd9BhRbKvp82JA).  All they need to do is turn the GPS on at the same time the Mk1 decides it is starting the End Dive process.  That way the GPS will be on for as long as the End Dive Delay which is configurable by the user.

Dive Start Detection. This is another area that could be improved and has been requested.  At the moment a dive will start if you are in one of the dive modes and you go below 1.2m.  That's fine for most cases but gives false dives in other cases.  For example, I jumped in with a buddy and she dropped one of her fins.  I ducked dived to get it.  I was underwater long enough to need to even breath.  The Mk1 recorded it as a dive of less than 1 minute.  Another case where I'd surfaced after a dive and then duck dived to get to the exit on the rocks.  Another 1 minute dive.  I had a Citizen dive watch that I bought in 2005 that logged both SCUBA and skin diving.  It could easily tell the difference and never once got it wrong.  The Mk1 is a computer and can be programmed to do just about anything.  This would be so easy to improve.

This is just a small list and I'm sure others could add to it without much trouble.  The problem isn't so much that the Mk1 has had issues.  All computers can and do have issues.  It is the handling of the issues that is the problem.  Garmin barely acknowledges the issues and take far too long to address them, if they address them at all.

Now, I do get it that the Mk1 is seen as a life support device and so extra care needs to be taken.  However, if you a) look at their shoddy development process that allows fixed issues to be reintroduced and b) compare them to Shearwater, I don't think safety is the reason.

Let's look at Shearwater.  They acknowledge issues almost immediately and fix them quickly.

An example of Shearwater.  Last year I had some surgery and was out of the water for just under 7 weeks.  Just before my first dive back, my Shearwater Perdix correctly displayed my surface interval as 47 days.  I did my dive and when I got home I downloaded the dive to Shearwater Desktop.  It reported the surface interval as 60 hours and 19 minutes.  I reported it to Shearwater (via their forum on ScubaBoard).  They not only acknowledged the problem immediately but it was fixed and released in a week.  They would have the same safety concerns and yet they have not once released an update that was unsafe.

So, as I said above, it's not the presence of the issues that is the problem, it is the fact they don't acknowledge the issues in a timely manner, if at all, but they take far too long to fix them, and then there is the possibility of them reintroducing the problems in a later update.