Fenix 8 AMOLED 47mm: random power offs (and restarts)

I'm now starting to see more of these intermittent shut downs and random starts. As explained in another post, yesterday the watch just turned off (no activity ongoing, just noticed it was off). After around 12h the watch turned on again. During that time it was not possible to do any of the tricks described in posts to start it (e.g. press and hold back/start or try something via charging cable & Garmin Express). Connecting to charging cable would just end up with blue triangle looping on and off every few seconds.

Today during a run the watch also just suddenly turned off. As I was heading back to investigate this further, the watch suddenly turned on by itself (after about 5min) and the exercise was in "stop" state. So I headed back to continue where I left off, finished the exercise, saved it, and some 1-2 minutes later the watch turned off again. Once again I just waited some ~10min and suddenly the watch turned on again (by itself).

Is it just my unit faulty, or are others seeing such intermittent random power off (and eventually power on) with their watches?

Also would be nice if someone from Garmin could comment whether you want some logs or whether this is already indicative enough to return the watch for warranty replacement; if nobody else has these issues I wonder whether it is worth spending more time troubleshooting or just replace the unit (which also would be a pain after configuring the watch for a week; is there even a way to backup/restore all settings to a potential replacement?).

I wouldn't expect such issues with such a high end watch, despite the fact that it is the first firmware since launch.. feels like spending more time troubleshooting than using the watch for what it is meant for.

  • So far, my F8 rebooted 2 out of 3 days.  I haven't noticed any ill affect as yet.

    A couple of elliptical sessions and walks have been recorded on the F8.  I record my cycling on an Edge.

    The F8 is paired with a Google Pixel 8, Polar H9 (elliptical) and H10 (cycling) heart rate monitors linked sensor via ANT.

    Usually random reboots seem to come from corrupt files or file systems.  I don't know if this applies to the F8.  Since this is the initial release for these watches, I suspect corrupt file or bad code.

    I know one reboot occurred when I clicked on watch faces in settings.  I didn't note the conditions for the first reboot.

    I haven't considered returning, I have confidence in Garmin, they will fix it.  Seems like with other Devices the new firmware releases are quarterly.  I hope we don't have to wait until the end of the year for a fix.