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Screen Orientation - polarisation

Tim_B_
over 5 years ago

I’ve had my 530 for around 2 months. The first few rides were outside with the backlight on, the last 5 weeks have been inside. Went for my first outdoor ride today for a while but had the backlight turned OFF. 

It was a late afternoon Autumn ride here in the hills so a lot of it was in the shade. I found the screen very dark and hard to read. If I turn the backlight on (I have the Di2 buttons set to turn on the backlight) the screen was easy to read. I found though, that if I rotated the 530 Ninety degrees, I could read it just fine, almost like the screen polarisation is 90 degrees out.

My Oakleys are Polarised, if I look at the 530 in it’s correct orientation through the glasses, it’s easier to see than if I look under them. If I turn on the backlight it is easy to see the screen.

is this normal?

  • Former Member
    0 Former Member over 5 years ago in reply to mariosimas

    The unit can be dark when it's caught in the shadow - it's one of those transflective screens where it really needs light to be shone into it to reflect back the screen. If you have your unit on the stem your upper body will cast a shadow onto the unit most of the time. So i have now used the out front mount which places it in front. A touch clearer as it catches more light.

    But that damn magenta route color is fark all hard to discern from the other roads around the route. Garmin could sure use a better brighter route coloring. Bright green would be brilliant. 

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to Former Member

    I have mine on an out front mount too, that doesn’t explain why it is much easier to read when turned 90 degrees under exactly the same conditions just seconds apart.

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to Tim_B_

    I've had exactly the same problems with my 530 and purposely keep my mount a little loose to try and "find the right angle" for current light conditions, but I've not had much success with that so far. Your above pictures illustrate the readability perfectly. It would be great is there was some kind of a polarizing "screen protector" (or whatever) to give us a high contrast display like that shown on the right!

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to mariosimas

    Exactly. Way too dark in the morning hours and dusk. When the sun falls on it directly looks great. I am thinking Garmin engineers do not road test their products under all conditions. The screen darkness is the first thing I noticed on this unit, with or without sunglasses. When you shut the units off, the screen is pitch black. The 820 or 520 is not, you can see the screen as a mid gray tone. Frankly the color feature is next to irrelevant to me. I prefer a bright high contrast screen without having to crank the backlight to the point that my battery now dies in 4 hours. 

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to mariosimas

    Very frustrating to me. Otherwise it is a very nice unit. I hope Garmin will do something about this. Wonder if they use actual riders under many weather conditions to test their products before they launch them. I think not.

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to CarlosCausillas

    I’m a little disappointed that Garmin haven’t commented on this issue one way or another

  • 0 over 5 years ago

    Has anyone figured out a solution for this dark screen issue? I've noticed the same thing and am very sad about it since the unit is so great softwarewise. I've been testing it for the past two weeks and noticed that I had to increase the screen brightness quite a bit to see it comfortably and that really decreased the battery life. I wish I could just see the screen clearly without the backlight on during the day and that's not possible which is very disappointing. It's a $299 unit. I can't believe Garmin didn't test the screen visibility while testing glass options. I'm considering returning it due to this issue since I have trouble reading what's on the screen. Many people I know are doing the same thing. I can't pay $299 for a device that won't last 10 hours in one charge due to the screen brightness. Please, let me know if anyone has figured out any solution!        

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to 7134808

    Golden rule of using GPS with Polarized sunnies is that it'll fark up your screens. Garmin can't turn the clock back to polaroid and request a new way to invent the polarized lens

    nor can they ask galileo to reinvent light rays....You'll be best served to just wear standard sunnies or better still get one of those polychromic lenses that don't darken much but will get lighter when it's darker. 

    I can see my 530 quite well - i've angled it slightly away from me - so that it catches more light and away from my shadows. When the light hits it well you'll think the back light is on - when it's off all the time.

    Another way to brighten your 530 screen would be to use a LED torchlight attached to the handlebar and shine on it.

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to Machoman

    Geez man, read the whole thread, it has nothing to do with sunglasses. Polarised sunnies actually make the screen look better...

    You can see from the two pictures I posted, much easier to see at 90 degrees rotation and the pictures looked better than it did in real life.

    let me get this right, are you seriously suggesting we should ride around with a torch on our bars in broad daylight just so we can read the Garmin clearly?!?! Wow.

    I’ve resorted to running the backlight 24/7 which is ridiculous really.

  • 0 over 5 years ago in reply to Tim_B_

    I have not yet tried looking at the 530 via polarised lenses - i'll give it a try this weekend. I guess i was sounding cynical because Garmin ain't gonna take your unit back and go through the entire warehouse/factory to look at one with the brightest screen and send it via DHL to your home address.

    Nor is Garmin about to stop the production and go change screen supplier. You're stuck with 530.

    The next best solution would be to wait for the Edge 630. Or try the Wahoo Roam. I don't hear any complaints about the screen clarity with the Wahoos.