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Garmin, Shame on you - horrible update policy!!!!!

 

This is an expensive device for what it offers, Apple Watch expensive. The most expensive lifestyle watch out there. I understand that it doesn't offer all the things the F945 or Fenix line offers. 

But your update policy is a shame. 

There are so many bugs, so many. Sleep not syncing. stuttering all over the place, nothing on this fluent. animations way too slow. Fade in of time when turning wrist is a joke, takes seconds to show completely. Sleep doesn't sync even though it is recored on the watch. GPS fix on some watches fail or take up to 5 minutes. PulseOX is still all over the place but instead of 89 on old sensor I now get 93%, with a Pulse ox device it is 98-99%. God.... 

Missing features or settings which have been requested a long time since release.

Like a very low brightness setting for always on display to get more battery life than 3 days. No one needs even the lowest brightness setting for that as it is way too bright for always on. 

Like a resume later option for activities, esp walking, hiking etc. No one hikes without a pause of MORE than 15 minutes.

Like making an extra step when pausing an activity for ending/saving it, so you don't accidentally swipe on it during a pause and an activity is deleted or saved without you wanting it. 

Like saving timers. 

Like bigger fonts everywhere to actually make the display rebate for most people, fonts are way too small almost everywhere, esp. sleep, sleep score etc. 

Like, like, like...

Forum is full of request for bug fixes, answers from Garmin and minor feature request. 

One bigger update with a few bug fixes almost no one needed and then silence. But you sent an update for golf which almost no one uses instead of actually doing buy fixes of stuff everyone needs and uses. 

I understand the feature may take longer but bug fixes which are necessary for us to use the watch in a normal way should have been fixed a long time ago. It has been almost 3 months since the watch was released and it is still full of bugs and almost no fix since then.

 It is so frustrating. I would recommend anyone who considers buying this watch and reading this: DON'T BUY IT! Instead for almost same price buy something different, even within Garmin there are better choices, or at least much cheaper devices. 

  • The V2 doesn’t do basic navigation as it’s not supposed to. The AW is advertised as a health asset with a particularly good HRM….however my AW 6 HRM only worked occasionally - as reported by many owners. Apple said I must have the wrong type of arm. I have no skin blemishes and no tattoos. It wasn’t faulty, they just don’t work on everybody - that’s not really acceptable for £379. I’ve never had a Garmin watch that doesn’t do what it’s supposed to do. 

  • This is so funny. I am from a different watch, the Instinct Solar, and we users are all compartmentalised, but I clicked myself through just to see what it's like with other watches. And, yeah, it's just the same - overpromising, underdelivering, not caring, and the fanboys finishing off the critics. Wow, this is bad.

  • I know. I think the only watch which gets regular updates but also has bugs either way, is the Fenix line. I own one now again because I can't use the Venu2 seriously. And I owned a few in the past and never complained. Yeah there are bugs too, but also fixes and new features. 

    OK, let's forget about new features or settings. But no bug fixes which sometimes makes the watch almost unusable, at least unenjoyable to use? That is weak. 

  • It’s great reading everybody’s views on what is or isn’t acceptable. I think as we get older it becomes more about managing expectations. To describe a Venu 2 or 2S as unusable for one person that is very usable for another, is one hell of a contrast. 

  • I follow 4 Garmin forums, 2 Samsung (phone and watch), a Bose Sleepbuds forum and two auto manufacturers (German and Japanese). The electronic ones are all just like this. High percentage of people saying This xxx is a piece of garbage and small percent saying Best product ever. The auto ones seem more balanced. It just seems to me that people go to the electronics forums when they are unhappy and don't when they are not.

  • I've had the Venu 2 for about a week now. It is not a perfect watch but it has the potential to be a real game changer if Garmin invests some effort into improving the software. Here's my take.

    Garmin has done a few things well:
    1) Design - it's built well and looks good at the gym and office
    2) Display is excellent
    3) Battery life - with AOD off and pulse ox off, I'm getting 9 days with 1h of non-GPS activity tracking per day. I don't think any other mainstream watch can compare to this.
    4) Heart rate - wrist HR is pretty accurate

    Areas for improvement:
    1) UI - It is sluggish and lags when scrolling through views. This shouldn't be the case for a 2021 watch.
    2) Pulse Ox - Only used it a few times but don't think I would call it accurate. Definitely not medical grade and would not put a lot of confidence in its readings. Hence why I leave it off.
    3) Strength app - The integrated Strength app can be greatly improved. Firstly, it really can't detect the type of activity that you are doing. Nor does it count reps accurately enough. It also does not show you whether you are resting or are currently in a set on the main screen so it can be confusing if you are doing multiple sets of different workouts. There is no way for you to record your exercise/weight during a set. This means you have to mentally keep track of this information which defeats the purpose of a fitness watch as I'm adding all this information later. 
    4) Prolonged pause/resume - Would be great for a prolonged pause on a hike for lunch
    5) Notifications - very limited, can be improved with addition of an onscreen keyboard for more complicated replies..

    Garmin has the potential to really make this an awesome watch. All it takes is for them to listen to their customers (who are surprisingly loyal) and allocation of some development resources to continue to improve the device's software. This watch is not a budget watch by any means and should be supported with feature updates for at least 2 years (It's essentially the industry standard nowadays). If on the other hand they choose to treat this watch as a second class citizen in their ecosystem, users will eventually jump ship as the competition is getting much better. So Garmin what's it going to be?

  • I’d pretty much agree with most if not all of that. Huawei brought out a pretty good watch a couple of years ago - GT2 - for less than £200 with two week battery life. If it had a better HRM and could sync with Strava it could have been the one to beat with a couple more iterations. 

  • From my previous experiences with Garmin, no other watches apart from the Fenix line are improved in any meaningful way after release. All the updates are basically there to try to deliver what was promised at the beginning, or to sometimes accomodate new devices in the Garmin ecosystem.

    So, short answer, no, nothing at all is going to happen. Sorry.

  • True, but I've ownd several "smartwatches", ie. Venu (original), Samsung Galaxy watch 3, ,Active 2, and a TicWatch Pro 3.  Of those, the only one that will do what the Venu (and probably Venu 2) will do is the Venu.  Samsung's iteration o SpO2 is horrible, consistently 5-7% off, plus to export anything from Samsung, you have to go through Strava.  The Ticwatch uses Google Fit, (nuff said), so it's useless for actual data, the Polar's and Suunto's are okay, but they're HUGE, so that leaves the Venu.  All around usability, I'd say from my experience, the Venu 2 looks to be the one with the least problems.  Sure, none are perfect, we gotta realize that.

  • Yes, I agree. I had a Samsung Active2 and replaced it with a Vivoactive 4 and now this Venu 2. The battery life was poor on the Samsung and then it took 2 or 3 hours to charge and had to be charged daily. Plus no web interface for the health data you could only see it on the small phone screen. For me (also) the Venu 2 is the best so far.