Hi,
I have a Fenix 7 X solar since it was launched in Spring 2022. I have been experimenting during several occasions random restarts in my outdoor activities when using GPS.
First time it happened after two or three months of usage I tried first to make a soft restart which did not fix the issue. Then I tried a hard reset where I deleted everything I had installed in my watch (screens, IQapps, etc) that did not fix anything although it is a really pain in the a%s thing to do because you have to waste time configuring everything as you had before.
At some point, I do not really do not not why, the problem stop appearing. I have been reading different posts in the forum and it looks that the problem could be caused because of the maps our devices have installed. If that would be the case maybe a map version update or a firmware update fixed the problem.
Unfortunately the problem started appearing again in February this year. I do not know either the reason. Could it be a maps or firmware update? This time I got really upset. I was not able to follow my running planned training with a watch I paid more than 1.000€ for. The restarts were random and in some activities which lasted around 60 minutes happened twice or even three times.
I decided to contact customer support. It was a long process in which I spent lot of time sending all the information that was requested which was for nothing as I was not getting a proper answer back. Finally I asked if I could send the watch and receive a new one which was not having the issue. Garmin accepted and I sent the watch, after several weeks my watch was returned. They did not change the watch though, they just tried to reproduce the problem during several outdoor tests but as they were not able to reproduce they returned it.
After the watch was returned on 4th May this year I did not experiment the problem so I was happy. Unfortunately the problem appeared once again last week. For example last Sunday in a 70 minutes football activity tracked with GPS the restart happened more than 10 times. I am really frustrated now with this watch. I have been reading more and more information about people who has suffered this problem. Some of this people have asked Garmin to get a new device which works, as a 1.000€ device it is suppose to work, and they have got a new one after sending the faulty watch.
I think I will need to proceed again contacting Garmin support and ask for it again. I hope this time they return me a new one instead of trying during two outdoor activities to reproduce the problem. The problem is that contacting support it is a time consuming activity and I do not have free time at the moment. It is also a pain for me to be without the watch during one month between sending the watch and waiting for a new one.... so I am still not contacting support again.
I have decided to open this post to inform people who have a similar problem and Garmin employees which can read this message. I have just deleted the maps from my watch and will test without them to track outdoor activities. Let's see if the problem disappears. In this case I will inform about it and I hope Garmin employees can check what is wrong with the Maps they install in the devices. Although I have to say that I believe it is not only a problem in the map (in case it is). There must be also a hardware problem in some devices as this is not happening for all the Fenix 7 devices (fortunately).
PS: I am thinking that when I sent the watch to Garmin support and the Garmin employees were trying outdoor activities was a good thing for my watch. My watch was working without restarts for 5 months after that. Can it be that changing the GPS location a lot during few days made that the problems with the maps got disabled? These are just suppositions that I want to write in case any Garmin employee reads this and can give ideas to them about which is the reason of this problem in some Fenix 7. I have also read in some forum posts that this problem was happening at some specific coordinate point, that would explain than in my last Sunday football match the restart happened 10 times as I was moving all the time around the same 100 x 40 meters zone.
I will keep informing about the result of my tests.
