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Multi-frequency is sapphire/solar only!?!

multiades
over 3 years ago

F6X Pro user, was excited to potentially upgrade to F7...

...but they gave all the regular F7 glass models and the F7 Solar w/o sapphire the same GPS chip as the F6?!

IMO that's a dealbreaker. +$200-300 for solar and sapphire because those are the only models that come with multi-band GNSS. That's a huge disappointment.

Less major, the large bezel on all models to accommodate improved Solar functionality is bad, ugly, and non-functional. I was hoping that the bezel would shrink and the screen would grow on all models over time, but they seem to have no interest in doing so. Garmin could have sold a bunch more F6->F7 upgrades with a few small changes, IMO.

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    I don't know that it's the same chip that's in the fenix 6. I think it's upgraded, because I believe it allows all-constellations to run at once (fenix 6 makes you choose only up to 2 out of the available 3).

    But, that said, yes it's correct that you need to buy Sapphire if you want the whole tamale - multi-gnns WITH multi-band support. Non-sapphires do multi-gnss, but only single-band.

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to C.sco
    C.sco said:
    I don't know that it's the same chip that's in the fenix 6. I think it's upgraded, because I believe it allows all-constellations to run at once (fenix 6 makes you choose only up to 2 out of the available 3).

    DCRainmaker's test says something different. He says that the watch seamlessly and independently chooses which constellations to use, but it's always 2 at a time, one of which is always GPS. So if, for instance, GPS+Galileo gives poor performance, it tries to switch to GPS+Glonass.

    This is what I made of it:

    "All Systems: This confusingly named option is dealers choice between GLONASS and GALILEO, and Garmin is the dealer. As a user you can’t choose which one to use, but instead, Garmin is now switching between GPS< GLONASS, GALILEO, BeiDou, and QZSS based on the quality of the satellites from each, determining “which to prioritize”

    www.dcrainmaker.com/.../garmin-fenix7-7s-7x-in-depth-review.html

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to gspinoza

    Would be cool if there was a datafield that displayed what (constellations) the watch is currently using. Otherwise we'll never really know what it's doing in the background (although, if it works, then I don't know if I care)