Garmin Inreach Overheats and crashes - how to Soft Reset

I've been using an old Garmin Inreach SE for years and generally it's been rock solid, aside from occasional bluetooth disconnects (which are fixed by toggling bluetooth Off/On on my iPhone)

On this latest trip however, I had a bit of a scare. On day 2 of the trip, I realized at one point that Earthmate had lost bluetooth contact with the Inreach. I then realized the device appeared to be powered off. The battery had been at 90% when I last checked, so this made no sense.

No amount of pressing the power button, using a variety of USB power bricks or micro USB cords could get it back on.

I gave it to my wife who is the smart one, and she finally realized that there are instructions on the back (which had been almost rubbed off) which say to press the X button and Down button until the device resets.

In hindsight, it's almost sure that the Inreach overheated - it was a warm day (85F) and we had left it sitting in direct sun on a hot rock for several hours.

Another lesson: what to do if your inreach fails? We were not so much worried about our own personal safety, but more about our friends & family back home, and scaring them. For the next trip, we'll make sure we have a "What if we lose contact" contingecy plan.

0 Like2Hike over 2 years ago

I don't have a perfect response, other than taking steps to avoid problems.

1. Keep device away from temperature extremes and water submersion.

2. Frequently check battery consumption rate and adjust various settings if rate too high.

3. Buy a tether to prevent losing or misplacing device.

4. Give friends and family a link to Garmin InReach status page so they can see if Garmin is having technical problems.

5. Give friends and family a link to IridiumWhere website, so they can see if you have good satellite coverage.

6. Advise family to allow plenty of time (define for each trip) to make alternative contact before panicking.

0 twolpert over 2 years ago

Instructions for hard reset for and SE which will not boot:

https://support.garmin.com/en-US/?faq=eNcuI0khAH35fWcRzq2iw7&productID=584862&tab=topics

What is in the original post is not the complete sequence.

Unless you carry more than one iR device with an active subscription, there really is not much to be done if the only one you have fails in the field. You are going to be out of touch until you reach a point where you can communicate in some other way.

In addition to suggestions elsewhere in this thread, you should consider carrying either a solar charger or a power bank to allow field recharging. With the exception of the Montana 7x0i devices, NO iR device has a user/field-replaceable battery pack. Montana is so huge that not many people will hike with the device, let alone carry another battery.

With regard to a "what if we lose contact plan" - I hate to say it, but for back country excursions, the plan MUST be "dispatch SAR". Yes, maybe your battery is dead, you dropped the device and it broke, or whatever. But it's also quite possible that you are disabled in a location where iR communication is not possible. Betting that it's NOT an emergency is literally betting your life.

This is also why you should always enable iR tracking when in the back country. SAR needs a place to start if you can't push the SOS button.

/soapbox

0 8259601 over 2 years ago in reply to twolpert

I believe there are two different reset sequences: Soft Reset (which I did) and Factory Reset (which you linked to) - if I'm reading it correctly, the Factory reset would totally wipe the device's memory, which would result in an unusuable device. Not something you'd want to do by accident in the field, right...?

0 twolpert over 2 years ago in reply to 8259601

Yes, the link is to a factory reset. If you do this, you will lose all "user" data on the device (for example, routes and waypoints). You also have to repeat the outdoor portion of device activation. You can do that without Internet connectivity.

So yes, you might not want to do it in the field because of the user data. But it does NOT make the device unusable.

In general, if you are having problems with the device:

1) If it will boot and respond to input, soft reset from the screens/buttons.

2) If it will not boot, try a soft reset from the buttons first.

3) If you still have problems, try a hard reset from the buttons.

If it still doesn't work, you're probably out of luck.

In this particular case, since you suspect overheating, you might have to wait for the device to cool down before trying any of it.

0 skyeye over 2 years ago in reply to twolpert

I had similar experience with Delorme explorer and 66i recently.

Simply not very nice handling I did. Both devices were fixed behind windshield glas of the car and left the car and went for a drink.

Both devices refused to operate when I came back. The 66i had some red exclamation mark on the display refusing to do anything useful.

The Delorme did show after pressing the on button battery overheat. No other menus etc available.

I took both devices in my pocket, went back to the coffeehouse, had other drink and then all was OK again, the alarm marks went away and all did function.