When requesting weather in remote locations how do I know where the supplied weather is for? The closest reporting stations could be hundreds of miles away. It would be great if it was using the point click forecast from NWS/NOAA. Also does anyone know who Garmin is using as the weather provider?
The provider is Dark Sky, fka forecast.io. Their claim to fame is hyperlocal forecasts, which supposedly are particularly accurate in the very short term. They grew up in the smart phone app market. They use a proprietary technique to analyze a number of government data sources, as explained here. These are raw data sources with which I am not familiar.
I don't use their app. My only experience with them is anecdotal, with the forecasts delivered to the Explorer. Nothing stands out in my mind. It's neither particularly good nor particularly bad. I mostly use the unit in flyover country in Missouri. YMMV, especially in areas with large local variations in weather conditions. For example, I have seen anecdotal reports of poor results in the San Francisco bay area, which has a number of very localized micro-climates.
For my own use, I tend to use some combination of NWS and/or Weather Underground.
One of the regulars here has meteorological connections. Hopefully, he will weigh in with a more informed opinion.
been using darksky for a few years now when forecast.io was the site before they got onto the inReach.
In my region of the north of new england along the coast; I've found the models fairly accurate, I would trust these forecasts as much as our weather network in canada which is based out of Toronto. I would combine this with local forecasts from Environment Canada.
