Important FYI, regarding Fenix 7 Sapphire vs. Non-Sapphire

Does anyone have a comparison of the new Fenix 7 sapphire vs old Fenix 5 sapphire - with a direct on view in bright off-axis light?  I see all these photos trying to read through the glass at an angle, and I realize they are trying to show reflectivity, but that’s not how you view your watch is it?  You turn your wrist so you are looking at the watch dead on, right?  So, seems like the real question is whether bright light hitting the screen at an angle reduces visibility when looking at the screen straight on.  Or maybe readability straight on in dim light.  

I have the Fenix 5x sapphire, and had the Fenix 3 sapphire before that.  I realize they are not as transparent as normal glass, but I’ve never had any trouble reading them.  Wondering if the Fenix 7x sapphire glass is different due to solar needs.   Anyone know? 

Thanks.

Mladen T said:

TopoActive North America: 8.9GB
TopoActive Europe: 11.6GB
TopoActive THID: 2.5GB
TopoActive MENA: 1.4GB
TopoActive Australia & New Zealand: 1.8GB
TopoActive Africa: 4.4GB
TopoActive Japan: 3.8GB
TopoActive Hong Kong & Macau: 17MB (yes, megabytes)
TopoActive South America: 6.0GB
TopoActive Taiwan: 96MB
TopoActive Korea: 213MB
TopoActive SGMYVNPH: 1.3GB
TopoActive China Mainland: 663MB

For those curious like myself, that adds up to about 43GB. After factoring in the typical memory chip manufacturer exaggeration, plus the OS files and such, a 32GB model should have about 28GB or so of free space. The 16GB models should have about 12. Give or take. Unfortunately that sounds like if you have the Europe map on a non-sapphire, you'll have almost zero free space left on the watch for anything else.

So the 32GB models can hold roughly 66% of the available worldwide topoactive maps. 16GB model can hold about 28%.

For most people, of course, none of that matters at all. 99.9% of users will be fine with just one or two topoactive maps.

I'm still a bit bummed, honestly, that they went with 16/32GB, rather than 32/64GB.

it is quite frustrating that the models with Gorilla Glass have been put as a second choice. I had the Fenix 6X Pro Solar Titanium with Power Glass and I can assure you that the visibility of the display was perfect in all light conditions! I switched to Fenix 7 Sapphire Solar and am very disappointed with the visibility of the display due to reflections and imperfect transparency. I understand that the sapphire crystal makes the product more prestigious but I would have chosen Gorilla Glass if there had been the Premium version with 32GB of memory.
Sorry for my english.

I have the the 7X SS, still i didn’t get preloaded topoacitve besides Europe, I just looked.

I do have courseVeiw for several different regions.

IMHO, if you want the sapphire, GPS bands, and memory but don’t want to deal with the visibility issues, your only choice is the EPIX2/AMOLED with the reduced battery life. 

Regarding the AR coating, isn’t the reason Garmin doesn’t coat their glass because it reduces the solar charging effectiveness?  I thought I read that somewhere but I can’t remember.

FWIW, AR can be applied to the inside of the glass, resulting in less reflection and no risk of scratching the coating. Applying to both inside and out results in the glass looking like it’s not there at almost any angle but as others have pointed out, AR isn’t as hard as the glass (mineral, Gorilla, or sapphire) and can scratch.  The glass underneath may not be scratched but it has a similar optical affect at certain angles. Only way to fix it is to have it recoated, which would totally void any warranty through Garmin, or polish off the remaining AR with a mild polish thereby leaving you with a bare crystal. 

> Sapphire models have 32 GB of storage, and pre-loaded with worldwide topoactive maps. Non-sapphire has 16GB, and only pre-loaded with the topoactive maps for your region (you can download more onto it, but I'm not sure if additional ones are free or not)

Just thought I'd mention, when I got my 7S SS, it did NOT have the world topoactive preloaded. Only my own region. It was only a minor annoyance to download the rest, but just something I was surprised to find.  Maybe I got a dud.

Yup me to, i hav 7X SS, only my region was preloaded.

Ya, I'm not sure why some reviewers said that the Fenix 7 Sapphire comes preloaded with worldwide topoactive maps - it's not true, and it's not even possible. There isn't enough storage space even on the 32 GB models for that.

Non-sapphire does not come pre-loaded with any topoactive maps, but you can download any maps you want onto it for free.

Sapphire models also can have any topoactive maps downloaded onto it for free, but comes pre-installed with (only) the region the watch was purchased in.

Not a big deal, really. Like I said, any/all worldwide topoactive maps are now free for all Fenix 7 users, so it doesn't really matter what the watch comes preloaded with.

But, they have no elevation lines on the european ones, kind of a bummer.