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Edge 530 performed admirably on my metric century today

Peter_Ricc

I know that these forums are meant for issues, but I wanted to report my positive experience with my Edge 530 during my metric century ride today.  I do not have the GPS chip beta from the forum installed, but I did bring it up to v4.10 a few rides before today's.

The metric century road ride was a 63 mile (101 km) ride through hilly, rolling roads of central NY (US).  The battery started at 94% and was at 61% by the end of the ride.  I had downloaded the course from the Garmin Connect website (through the Windows Garmin Express) to the GPS a few days prior.   During today's ride I turned over navigation to the loaded, active course and every turn was properly called out with enough warning to make me feel comfortable that it was all working well.

Also, I had ClimbPro activated so all of the climbs (there were five of them qualifying for this feature) were annotated with the separate ClimbPro page.   I laughed at the GO at the beginning of each of these climbs, as if I was going to ignite the afterburners.  As I suffered up the bigger ones it was helpful to have the remaining distance displayed and really nice to see the CLIMB COMPLETED at the top.

Again, I was impressed by the 530's performance.  

  • Former Member
    0 Former Member

    In your opinion is this device out of beta testing yet? I've had my eye on the 530 since launch, however, have been put off by the reoccurring theme of dodgy software on devices at launch. I've got an 820 and its been stable and reliable for a while now and I'm not sure I'm ready to go back to being a beta tester again lol - all honest opinions welcome

  • 0 in reply to Former Member

    For me and my needs so far the device seems solid (navigation, courses, upload finished rides, and battery life.)  However, I can empathize with the two seemingly most common recent complaints here:   Strava Segments and GPS accuracy in the woods.

    Personally I use Strava to capture my workouts and rides, but when segments leader boards are 100s deep with much stronger local athletes than I, segments are not a top feature for me so this is not a show-stopper.  I may try to use this feature for my own personal best tracking, so I hope Garmin gets the issues with it addressed.

    The GPS accuracy seems to be on Garmin's radar, for this forum has a beta version of the chipset (yes beta, unfortunately).  There have been legitimate GPS problems with the European GPS constellation from what I have read so I am unsure if the accuracy issues are in part tied to that.  My mountain bike tracks here in the US seem to be the same when compared to my 520, which is to say there is some loss of accuracy when riding under heavy foliage .

  • 0 in reply to Former Member

    The recent release of 4.1 FW has resolved a lot of the major bugs. You can see the change log over at https://forums.garmin.com/sports-fitness/cycling/f/edge-530/169394/new-edge-530-version-4-10-now-available

  • 0 in reply to Peter_Ricc

    In the few hours since your post, GPS firmware 2.50 has just been released, which hopefully will address things. I've just loaded it onto my 530, but have not had the chance to test it yet. And as with most firmware updates, GPS performance on the first ride will likely be poor, until the unit can download a new satellite ephemeris almanac (downloads automatically over the GPS signal in about 13 minutes).

  • 0 in reply to mcalista

    As a long time Garmin user the 530 is rock solid for me. Love the climb pro and the massively better battery life compared to my 520. Navigation is great. Don't have Strava live segments though so can't comment on that. Garmin segments work well

  • 0 in reply to mcalista

    Thank you for pointing that out.

    Regarding downloading a new 'satellite ephemeris almanac,' can this be accomplished  by powering up the 530 and leaving it outside for 30 minutes or so, or do I have to ride with it for this to occur?

  • 0

    - It is always nice to hear positive feedback. Thanks for posting this and being a Garmin Customer.