Got a new Edge 840 (Solar) yesterday. Besides of numerous issues have already been mentioned in the Forums here, sharing some first impressions. Hopefully it'll save some grief to folks who is still deciding .
The other day I heard someone compared a system by saying “its UI was made by Aliens for Predators.” So it's kinda the same impression with Edge 840 (though by now I suspect it's the case with any Edge-family device).
As an owner of Garmin Fenix watches since their very first model, I can say that it's visible at once that product managers/owners and designers had worked on them. Especially with the latest 7th series. Yes, there are some bugs here and there, but so far it's a real pleasure to use the watch and the product is worth every penny spent.
With the Edge, I got a feeling that its UI was given either to inexperienced students or outsourced to a very cheap contractor without giving proper instructions and/or designs.
- there is no unified interface style and menu system between devices. Fenix settings that are in one place may be in a completely different location on the Edge;
- maps on the latter cannot be turned on/off;
- if there are two maps for one region, you won’t know which one is used
♂️ - USB connection speed is super slow ( forums.garmin.com/.../edge-840-terrible-usb-connection-speed );
- screen brightness has been mentioned in multiple posts here;
- my activities recorded on Fenix watch got synchronized (which is plus), but either only metadata (i.e. stats) or a recorded track isn't shown on map by design - no sure which is worse;
- and the largest drawback that beats the whole original purpose of the purchase - the "external display" mode doesn't show a map whatsoever; i.e. while recording my activity on Fenix watch, I do want to see a track on map in addition to common metrics.
All in all, $450-550 USD (depending on edition) device feels like a cheap $100-150 one :(
