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Backlight always slightly on

I'm having issues with the backlight always being slightly on when going to bed. When I hit the light button this obviously brightens up the screen, however even when backlight is "off" I'm still seeing some level of light on the face in a dark room. There doesn't seem to be any settings for fully off or backlight brightness.

My wife is a bit annoyed so I can't use it for sleep tracking until I can sort this out. Speaking to another garmin owner, this isn't and issue for other garmin users (Fenix 5s).

When the backlight is "off" it's still easily bright enough to read the time and cast some light on my pillow in a dark room. Can't notice it during the day though.

Anyone else having this issue?

see pics, camera doesn't pickup the brightness of "off" but you get the gist, off is definitely not "off" ciq.forums.garmin.com/.../1322105.jpg ciq.forums.garmin.com/.../1322106.jpg

0 emr215 over 6 years ago

Wow, your bedroom must be really dark if the watch without the backlight is bothering your wife. I do not think there is a setting to completely turn off the screen - you can turn off your watch, but then it is off and not tracking your sleep. My suggestion, FWIW, is to try some different watch faces and see if you can find one that is less bothersome.

Another idea is to go over over the developers forum and see if you can get a developer to develop a "dark" watch face.

Good luck...

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

The light not going off completely is not expected and something that we would need to investigate. I would recommend that you reach out to your local Product Support team. It is likely that they will recommend swapping out the device so that this one can be looked at in depth.

0 MegLyn86 over 6 years ago

I have noticed a slight glow to the watch face when I go to sleep at night on my 645 base...

0 R_Tellis over 6 years ago

I don't get any type of light on my 645 base model when the backlight is off.

0 CraigDennen over 6 years ago

Coming from a Suunto Spartan I miss the slight always on backlight you can set but my 645M gives off zero light whatsoever unless I turn on the backlight.

0 chunkywizard over 6 years ago

To the OP you don’t have gesture enabled do you?

0 MegLyn86 over 6 years ago

I contacted Garmin Support this morning abut my backlight glow always being slightly on, it is NOT normal as Garmin-Joey said. I had no idea if it was normal or not since I came from using a basic FR15 watch. I had my backlight set to come on after sunset and gesture off. They want my FR645 watch for testing and are sending me a new one. Wonderful customer support from Garmin!

0 Lucinda over 6 years ago

I'm interested to see what they find .mine also has a slight glow all the time. It doesn't bother me but I worry about battery drain .

0 toomuchtaurine over 6 years ago

To the OP you don’t have gesture enabled do you?

No, it's definitely not the standard backlight (see difference in two photos posted). I have gesture backlight enabled only during an activity.

0 toomuchtaurine over 6 years ago

I contacted Garmin Support this morning abut my backlight glow always being slightly on, it is NOT normal as Garmin-Joey said. I had no idea if it was normal or not since I came from using a basic FR15 watch. I had my backlight set to come on after sunset and gesture off. They want my FR645 watch for testing and are sending me a new one. Wonderful customer support from Garmin!

Have you heard anything back from garmin / sent your watch back yet?

I contacted Garmin support today and they gave me instructions to factory reset an reinstall firmware.
The instructions they gave to reinstall firmware with the "webupdater" tool didn't work. There was not even a "Reinstall the same version" option as listed in their instructions. (seems like that software was made in 2012 when garmin was only making car gps's, it's old!).

I did the factory reset anyway, but it didn't fix anything. Still have the backlight issue and the altimeter that is out in the "negative direction".
Will contact Garmin for the loooooonnnngggg hold wait again tomorrow!! YAY.

Such a shame because I love the watch.