Instinct not very instinctive!

I’ve had the instinct for a year now. 

It was never very accurate to start off with. We run in a group and my stats are off by at least 15-20% every run. While others have stats on 10km my Garmin instinct will show around 8-8.5 kms. 

Now all of a sudden it has started reporting really strange stats. Like this morning I ran in a small loop (we are in a lockdown and running in the parking is the best available) and my stats were ranging from a pace of 9 min to a km to 5.20 mins to a km. Also, this is a completely flat loop. My Instinct showed that I had done 178 floors in the half an hour I ran.

I’ve tried all the obvious fixes. Reset the watch, changed the GPS to all satellites settings, waiting 2 minutes under clear sky after catching GPS....

What am I missing? The step count seems to be working fine. 

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  • Doesn’t Garmin Connect update the firmware automatically? It is showing me the firmware and EPO is current. 

  • Doesn’t Garmin Connect update the firmware automatically? It is showing me the firmware and EPO is current. 

    Firmware is upgraded automatically or manually, only when you connect to the computer with Garmin Express over the USB cable. As for the EPO, it is unclear - Garmin's support document about EPO tells you need to download it through USB from Garmin Expresss too, and it is what I observed - each time I connect to Garmin Express, the file is renewed, while I never saw any update over BT from Garmin Connect. On the other hand, I never let the watch without connecting to the PC more than some 4-5 days, so do not exclude the EPO file updates once expired. However, even if it happens in that way, the file does not update at each connection, like with Garmin Express.

    It is also possible that your watch reports a current EPO, while in fact it is expired. I'd definitelly suggest updating it via USB+Garmin Express

  • Garmin Express shows software is up to date.  

     

     

  • Do you have the APAC version, or some special edition? EDIT: yes, you do Slight smile - and that's the reason. 

  • So, there's nothing to be done as far as updates are concerned?

  • Af for the firmware version, you are all right. But to be sure you have a recent EPO file, you better connect to Garmin Express each couple of days. 

  • It will not necessarily help, near those tall buildings, but making sure you have a fresh EPO is a good precaution

  • I have the Garmin Instinct and also have the Suunto Ambit3 Peak with the large GPS nub antenna that is highly rated for its GPS Accuracy.  Walking and running out in the countryside including in heavy tree cover and areas that are difficult for GPS, I have found that the Instinct is slightly under records but is always within 1-2% of the distance the Ambit records and the same for the plotted route distance.  The Instinct underecords on a 10 mile run by around 0.15 - 0.2 miles.

    Whennit comes to high-rise buildings and built up areas, the Instinct doesn't seem to do as well. 

    This recent review of another watch included the Instinct in the testing and during the downtown area, the Instinct performed the worst.   It may be the case that the Instinct is not the best choice for this type of environment. 

    "A) Garmin Instinct: Winner of the most suck – it’s drawing mountains in my buildings"
    www.dcrainmaker.com/.../polar-grit-x-gps-watch-review.html

    When I start an activity, I always let the GPS Soak (leave it another few minutes after it connects to GPS before hitting start. It's important to start in an area with a clear view of the sky. If I start outside my house the GPS track starts slightly offset due to high trees.

    The only time the GPS has been innacurate for me is when the EPO expired, you can tell as it takes much longer to connect to GPS. 

    My only real issue with the Garmin Instinct is that due to the placement of the sensor for the barometric altimeter, if you do an activity that involves sweating, the sensor can get blocked easily. The elevation readings were off for all my runs until I looked on here and found out about what was happening. Now I use a sweatband and place the part of the watch with the sensor just over the corner like this.