Fenix 6x pro bricked after 16.60 update

This is just a report of what happened to a 1,5 year old watch with recent updates.

My Fenix 6x pro (non solar) was running SW 16.30 just fine until a point where I noticed heavy battery drain - 1h in gps would eat up 100% of battery. This happened a couple of days before we saw 16.60 officially out.

I made a factory reset (from menu) but it didn't help at all. I made a hard reset (as described here https://forums.garmin.com/outdoor-recreation/outdoor-recreation/f/fenix-5-plus-series/149936/hard-reset-firmware-reinstall-data-location-and-backup?ReplySortBy=CreatedDate&ReplySortOrder=Descending) and it didn't help as well.

Without BT connection it would survive maybe 2 hours in gps mode, with BT as before - no more that 1 hour (note, I did not install any apps, watch faces, data fields). Then, 16.60 rolled out - I installed it via webupdater. After reset Fenix was unresponsive - stuck on default watch face with no time movement. After making and other hard reset, I was stuck with a tactix (!?) watch face and no response whatsoever.

I reached Garmin support and got a SRR number.

Given the number of threads with various problems with 16.60 - I'd stay away from it until garmin says anything.

Top Replies

All Replies

0 davidmdavies over 4 years ago

Morning. I have had similar issues this morning with the odd Tactix watch face. Also, activity tracking (steps) turned off. Then the watch froze completely.

0 davidmdavies over 4 years ago in reply to davidmdavies

Update: device is pretty much bricked now. It's stuck in some weird Tactix/blank screen/non-responsive loop.

0 davidmdavies over 4 years ago in reply to davidmdavies

Now stuck in a boot-loop (Blue triangle, then the word 'Garmin' then the triangle again...

0 henleybailey over 4 years ago in reply to davidmdavies

Are you able to plug it in to a PC and see the file contents? If so, navigate to the garmin folder and find the file gupdate.gcd and delete it.

0 2378548 over 4 years ago

same happened to me, first got tactic watch face and now stuck in the blue rectangle boot loop and nothing works ... hope they will replace it to a new watch so i can sell it and never go back to garmin ever again

0 Raul77 over 4 years ago in reply to davidmdavies

Had a similar issue with my 6x Sapphire after updating the maps a few months ago, they sent me a new one.

Just contact Assistance, there is nothing you can do anymore.

0 Federonic over 4 years ago

Try the following :

Performing a Master Reset

Ensure watch is powered off²
Press and hold Back/Lap
Power on watch while continuing to hold Back/Lap
Release Back/Lap button once "Clear user data?"message appears
Select Yes

The reset is successful if the watch finishes powering up and goes through initial setup. Try the steps again if initial setup does not appear. Following the reset, place the watch outside with a clear view of the sky for a minimum of 20 minutes to acquire satellite data.

If the master reset does not work, another method to reset the watch can be tried. Select the heading below for steps on the secondary reset.

Secondary Master Reset

Ensure the watch is powered off²
Press and hold the Down, Start, and Back buttons
Power the watch on while holding these buttons
After the first beep release the Start button
After the second beep release the remaining buttons

The watch should now be reset.

0 b1azk0 over 4 years ago

Came back with a new one.

Our service support told me this looks like a hardware failure - most like corrupted memory and they didn't even bother to do any resets.

New watch came in with 12.20 preinstalled. Now it's 16.60 and running fine.

0 2378548 over 4 years ago in reply to Federonic

not working and tried both... still bricked with boot loop

0 davidmdavies over 4 years ago in reply to henleybailey

No, the watch wasn't booting so no comms to the computer.