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Solar ring color - is one better than the other?

C.sco
over 3 years ago

My first 7X Solar Sapphire developed an issue where it ended up in an infinite boot loop, and had to get sent back to Garmin. I found another one locally at a store, and before I got a chance to send the old one back to Garmin, I was able to compare them side by side. These are the exact same model watch. Old one on the left, new replacement one on the right.

You can easily tell the solar panel on the old one was a lot redder, and the new one is a lot yellower. I assure you, it's not due to different viewing angles, the solar panel on the new one is substantially yellower at all viewing angles and in all light.

I asked Garmin if this was something I should worry about, and they essentially said "no", and said it was probably due to different viewing angles (it isn't). Anyways, not knowing which one was better, or whether it even made a difference at all, I just let it go.

But in the 2 days I've been using this new one, it seems like it struggles to get very much energy from the sun. This is a screenshot of my watch after driving to work this morning - the bright morning sun was hitting it directly during the entire drive, for 30 minutes - the watchface was perpendicular to the sun, and my window was down so it was not in between the sun and my watch. You can see, it got VERY little energy from the sun. When I did the same thing with my previous 7X, it would net 10-15k Lux hours. This time it barely got 1k. And I noticed the same thing yesterday, walking around outside in the sun, that it barely seemed to take in any energy from the sun at all.

Is it possible that the yellowish version of the solar panel just sucks? Should I return it and try to get another one with the reddish solar panel? It seems like my first 7X solar worked vastly better than this replacement one I got.

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    So I did a test. I have two Fenixes at home at the moment as I thought something was iffy with the one I originally ordered. The original one has a yellow ring, the other one is red. Put them both on the balcony for half an hour, and both recorded 0.3k lux/h on this dreadful dark day. But things get interesting when I look at the solar power received over the past few days. This watch was only on my desk in a dark place, while I sat on it and worked there with the yellow one. Somehow, the red idle one recorded more than the yellow one. Hmm..

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    I heard earlier Garmin sapphire lenses have a layer of coating on it maybe the yellow one has more coating or it should not have it around the solar ring somehow this one have it...

    Anyone with non sapphire f7 have yellow ring?

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    My opinion is that is clearly a different supplier of solar panel.... The yellow seems better in the eye but if it doesn't charge properly then it's useless.. in fact any of them should reflect the ring colour at the main screen but they already failed to that!

    Ask Garmin to tell you which supplier made its unit's panel... Give them the watch serial number and demand an answer to that. I think you have the right to know

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to 9058036

    I don't think they provide this type of information to customers and at this point we're not sure if one is better than the other.

    The sample number is too small now

    I hope more customers test and report back

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to aryanabdulla

    For a watch that costs almost $1000 and is designed to work as a tool you don't wait from the costumers to make your quality control... They had to inspect and actually try every spec of the unit before they sell it.

    They are already too expensive and the only reason that we forgive the high price is because we believe they are trustworthy!!!

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to aryanabdulla

    They are the supplier hahahaa

    Ok we have to ask the right questions with these guys before the play crazy Rofl

    Better question: who builds the panels and where and who provides the first material for them?

    I don't believe that is only the different angle of the photo... The guy knows his watch and he also knows the other one that he owns now... I believe him 100% about the red and yellow colours and also I believe him that it doesn't charge properly.

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to 9058036

    You really think a guy from hotline would know that? You'd have to contact one of their engineers..

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    Perhaps there are only some colors nuances due to the used material during production and that doesn’t effect the functionality at all? That one/some solar models may have a solar functionality issue may happen- nothing unusual.

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    Just an update, I got my new (3rd) 7X Sapphire last night, got lucky because it was literally the last one left at any REI store in a 150 mile radius. This one seems great so far, no issues with anything, and the solar panel looks much redder/darker, just like my first one. Holding it up to some gentle sunlight coming through my kitchen window this morning, I could see the graph plotting 50% lux intensity, and the lux hours were going up by 0.1 every few seconds.

    I can conclusively say something was wrong with the solar on my second watch. I cannot say for certain that it was related to the color of it, but its's suspicious that the one that didn't work was yellow, and the two that worked are red. We'll probably need a larger sample size before we can really know for sure.

    But for now, I'm happy. All seems good with this 3rd and (hopefully) final 7X Slight smile