Fenix 6x bricked twice... now indefinitely waiting for replacement

I was so excited to get my first Fenix watch after years of using other brands.  In September, I finally pulled the pin and bought the Fenix 6X Saphire.  In addition to all the typical outdoor activities, I was excited about the prospect of using this watch while hunting.  I immediately bought the BirdsEye maps with the intent to load the 1000 acres of land I usually hunt on.  This land has many small creeks, swamps and marshes that show up beautifully in the BirdsEye maps.  Also there are old logging trails and paths that can easily be seen on the satellite imagery but are not present on any maps.   It took me several hours to get the watch updated.  Between the firmware update and the map updates, it took the greater part of 5 hours to get it all up to date before starting with the BirdsEye maps. 

Once I got Base Camp setup and my BirdsEye subscription recognized, I started off  with a simple test. I grabbed a small area in my hunting area n the low resolution and downloaded it.  I then did sent to... Garmin.   When I enabled the maps on the watch, they were unusable due to the pixelation.  I figured as much since I used the lowest quality.  I then tried the same thing with the next higher quality.  Better, but still not great as I couldn't easily identify the terrain of interest.  OK, so now I tried the highest quality images.  The Basecamp only lets you pick an area that equals 77Mb or less, so that was a little disappointing since I would need 6 or 9 areas to capture the acreage I was interested in.  Not a deal breaker I suppose, so I tagged the first area and downloaded it. For 77Mb it took an insane amount of time.  I'm talking an hour on a fibre connection.  Not cool!  I'm thinking to myself, I have to do this at least 5 or more times.

This time, though after I sent the maps to the watch, the same typical stuff happened, the little icon went from yellow to green, so I ejected the watch.... What's happening, It's not booting up.  Blue triangle... flashes once in a while... but stays on the blue triangle. Now I'm thinking what did I do wrong?  I remember seeing the built-in watch maps being initialized (green line expanding n BaseCamp).  Did I eject before these were complete?  There were no warnings or messages, no indication that the BirdsEye didn't complete the transfer.  The BirdsEye showed a yellow then green check mark when I did the Send to... Garmin.

Call support, try all the reset methods, nothing.  tried the forced USB mode... nothing.  Bricked!  Spoke to Garmin support and hey advised since the watch was one day old that I should deal with the retailer.   Ok.  Called Mec, new watch on it's way. 

Get the new watch within a week.  Now I'm documenting everything I do in great detail.  Spend the next 5 hours updating the watch again.  Now onto Basecamp.  Since this s a new watch my subscription isn't showing up.  Called support, they transfer my subscription to the new SN.  Ok.  Let's try this again. This time I wait 2 hours for all the green lines to fully expand in Basecamp.  (Built in maps initializing for use in Basecamp)   I do a clean wipe of the old maps I downloaded. and choose an area that equals 76Mb (last time the limit was 77Mb this time, I can't get past 76Mb... weird.)  Download the maps... wait an hour... maps are fully downloaded and visible in Basecamp.   click on the maps and Send to... Garmin.  Looks fine.  watch sill shows 100% and USB symbol.  Eject...... blue triangle... again.  no boot, no reset, nothing works.  This watch is bricked.  Now I'm pretty annoyed and upset. 

These maps are on the compatibility matrix for the Fenix,  but I now bricked two watches.  I call support and they tell me the maps aren't supported and I shouldn't use them on the watch and besides the screen is too small to have any value anyway.  Wait...what?  These are on the support matrix and who are you to tell me what value these maps could bring me in a hunting situation.  Not impressed.  Now for a replacement.... The support person was concerned they were on Backorder, but made a couple calls and secured one of the watches thay keep for emergency replacements. She assures me that one is reserved for me.  Do the whole RMA thing, ship out the watch the same day.  Takes a week to get to Garmin.  Call the day after it arrived to confirm new watch is on the way.  No go!  I'm stuck waiting for the back order.  What happened to the watch on reserve for me?

Apparently, it's no longer available.  Very frustrating!  Now, I'm almost two months in and have had the watch for 2 days, with the rest of the time waiting on support.  Very disappointing!

  • Has anyone successfully loaded BirdsEye maps on your Fenix 6X?

  • Has anyone successfully loaded BirdsEye maps on your Fenix 6X?

    The real LPT is always in the comments: you can't solve a software problem by replacing hardware.

  • Totally sounds like a software compatibility problem, and the BirdEyes maps are officially supported by Garmin, so they should find the solution. And it's probably not by replacing the watch;.. There are videos of a 5X showing those maps, so it works at least on the 5X. Welcome in the wonderful world of quality control at Garmin. They have the watches with the most features, but also with the most bugs. It's not new, and since they are selling well, it's probably not going to change, sadly. I would be in your situation, unless you find someone able to make it work on a Fenix 6, I would make sure it's working fine with your settings on a 5X, and switch to the model that is actually working right now. To believe in Garmin for fixing a bug is not reliable enough in my opinion... 

  • Exactly the same scenario here. Fenix 6x Sapphire, bricked the first one, same blue triangle situation, after loading BirdsEye imagery. Thought it was a hardware failure. Exchanged the unit. Methodically set up the watch then downloaded as much mid-level resolution BirdsEye imagery that Basecamp would allow. I use this for hunting (no roads/tracks to see on maps).

    Transferred the image file to the watch using Basecamp, everything transferred successfully. Exited Basecamp and disconnected the watch. Rebooted to a blue triangle. Spent an hour on the phone to Garmin support, tried different reset button sequences without luck. Now waiting for Garmin to reimburse me.

    Nice watch, but I would steer clear of Birdseye until Garmin gives up replacing bricked watches and fixes the software in a unit that they claim to be compatible with BirdsEye.

  • Pleasant surprise yesterday.  I got my replacement watch from Garmin despite them saying there was no ETA when I spoke to them the day before.  Unfortunately the Garmin support team advised me that they plan on removing support for BirdsEye on Fenix watches due to all the problems they are having.  It's disapointing that this is the approach they are choosing versus fixing the issues.  The support person said that due o the small screen size, it's not worth it on the Fenix watch anyway. 

    On that front, I beg to differ.  One of the primary reasons I bought this watch was for the satellite imagery for hunting.   Where I hunt, there are few trails and nothing but white space on other maps.  The satellite imagery provides invaluable terrain identification and landmarks that are essential to moving efficiently in the woods. 

    Does anyone know of any other compatible satellite imagery for the Fenix watches?  Support suggested that I buy a handheld from Garmin but I often spend 7-10 days strait in the woods so I'm not interested in carrying more stuff in my pack.

  • The display is definitely to small for satellite imagery (my opinion). Tried it only once and never again. 

  • It's definitely small but when your hunting in the backcountry, the easy access to reference landmarks is invaluable. I had initially loaded the maps for the 1000 acres I hunt on in high resolution, but I bricked the watch when trying to load the highest resolution.

  • I was excited about the prospect of using this watch while hunting.  I immediately bought the BirdsEye maps with the intent to load the 1000 acres of land I usually hunt on.  This land has many small creeks, swamps and marshes that show up beautifully in the BirdsEye maps.  Also there are old logging trails and paths that can easily be seen on the satellite imagery but are not present on any maps.

    I'm not sure if BirdsEye Maps have been corrected with the F6, but even if it has, my recommendation is DON"T BOTHER!  I just recently purchased a BirdsEye Satellite Imagery card to activate on one of my devices.  I decided to put it on my 945 instead of my F6 because of this thread.  Anyway, I too wanted these maps for hunting and hiking.  I made a "test" map of my neighborhood and the detail is remarkable.  Here's the problem which make these maps useless for me.  The maps show two trees in my yard that were taken down in a winter storm 7 years ago and a vehicle in my driveway that I haven't owned in 9 years.  It also shows an addition I made to my home 12 years ago.  That makes these maps anywhere from 9-12 years old.  I don't know how often these maps are updated, but images a decade old don't help me at all.  It's an annual subscription for the maps and it was my assumption that they would at least be updated annually too.  Here's a link to Garmin's website where in the overview they twice state the maps are "updated frequently".  I guess Garmin and I have different definitions of the word "frequently".

    https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/p/70144

  • wanted these maps for hunting and hiking. 
    images a decade old don't help me at all

    Where are you hiking and hunting that the landscape significantly changes every decade? On an active volcano?

    Aside from the age of the imagery, how did it look on the watch, could you post a picture? I might be interested in putting it on my F6X even if the imagery is old, since where I hike the landscape doesn't change much over time.

  • Where are you hiking and hunting that the landscape significantly changes every decade? On an active volcano?

    Actually, yes.  I live 35 miles from Mount Rainier and the landscape in the Cascades changes yearly due to severe weather and landslides.  The region averages 1-5 high-frequency earthquakes a month.  Mount St Helens' crater is growing by 16 feet per day and moving a 700' thick ice glacier.  You'll also have changes with new timber growth (Fir trees grow rather quickly), clear cuts and logging trails. The Elk herds will create trails that are quite visible and they'll never use the same route when migrating from higher to lower ground and vise versa.  You'll have all this without an eruption.  I bet you weren't expecting that answer?  LOL.  Anyway, the imagery looks great even on the smaller 945 screen.  I'll have my son show me how to post a picture later today as I'm not the smartest when it comes to doing things like that.