15.20 Spurious sensor & GPS issues

I've had my Fenix 5 plus since launch and do not recall seeing the issues I have observed since upgrading to 15.20

1) When connected to my GSC-10 I got to my destination and paused the activity with the 'Resume Later', upon resuming for my return journey the GSC-10 did not connect. When I noticed this I ended the activity and started a new one and the GSC-10 connected.

2) On a walk I noticed I had no temperature reading just '--.--'', I had to manually connect to my Tempe to get a reading.

3) During the same walk I used the back button to go to the watch face, a little while later I returned to the walk activity screen and the GPS had note tracked all the while I was in the watch face and I just had a straight line connecting current position to last recorded position. I did not pause the activity I just left the screen. With this issue I have never really paid much attention to the way going back to watch display should function so if others say that's the way it should work then fine but I thought it should still track.

Just after the release I rebooted the watch to fix the DND issue so I don't think a subsequent reboot will help these issues

This release certainly appears to me to be having issues I have not previously observed over the years

  • Not saying it's not due to 15.20, but it is so similar to issues I had last year, with version 12.x. that I describe my solution here, just in case:

    ANT+ sensors were losing connection, and during walks going back to watchface resulted in distance and/or track not updating. Nobody else had these issues back then. I suspected that one of my Tempe sensors was defective. Whenever I manually connected to that Tempe sensor, the watch rebooted. I took the suspect Tempe out of service and no issues since.

    However I'm still not really trusting going back to the watchface/widget loop during an activity, so I only do that for brief moments.

    If you have an Android phone with ANT+, you can use the ANT+ Plugin Sampler app to see if your Tempe sends nonsense and/or constantly loses connection even when very close by (as mine did). Tempes don't transmit often, so give it some time, like 5 minutes or so. And before retiring the sensor, try replacing its battery.

    It still seems unlikely to me that one rogue sensor data stream can trip up the whole activity recording process within the watch though. But maybe it did.

  • Parts seem similar but with the exception of my point 3 (going back to watch face) I have never experienced these issues. The watch is used nearly every day for indoor workouts with HR strap and outdoor walks with a Tempe. It is also used as the recording device for one of my bikes with a GSC-10 (the others use an Edge 830 for reasons I won't go into)