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LTE Searching, but not connecting

amgray13
over 3 years ago

I have had some problems with the 945 LTE. My first unit had a mushy start/stop button, so I sent it back for a replacement. My first unit LTE worked great at my house, perfect every time. I received the replacement unit (new) and transferred my LTE subscription to the new watch with confirmation of the new SN. Since then, the new watch has never been able to connect to LTE. When starting an activity, LTE is always in 'searching' status, but never connects. This status continues throughout the run. When disconnecting bluetooth and forcing a sync over LTE, the watch will time out and fail after searching for about 5 minutes. Same location as the previous watch that worked 100% of the time, and it has worked 0 times with LTE. Garmin connect reflects that LTE subscription is enabled for the replacement and the watch itself reflects that as well. Anyone else have this issue? Any fix? It has been over a week, could this be an issue with watch activation on the network / access? Any advice is welcome. Hoping I don't have to replace the watch a second time.

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    I also had a replacement and used support’s instructions to move my subscription to the new watch.  The overall replacement process and subscription management seemed smooth.

    I did all of this about 4 days ago and realized yesterday that mine also was not connecting to LTE - at least it stays on “ Searching “ if I try to force an LTE sync and is never ready for Live Track if I am away from my phone.

    I’m also wondering if the activation / subscription transfer process is somehow at fault here.

    My replacement had a support email thread going so I replied to that one with this question yesterday and will see what they say.

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to nord0296

    Same issue here. Watch won't connect with LTE. I noticed it when it hasn't been able to sync my workouts via LTE. The wheel spins for a while and then it lets me know that it failed. In a chat with a Garmin support rep about it right now. . .

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    i hope this mushy button thing was an anomaly. it seems that is something that has plagued Forerunner watches for years. my 935 is pretty good in that regard...it's always functional but sometimes i have some buttons with less than desirably tactile feedback but it usually correct itself in time (had this watch 4+ years and i am awaiting delivery on my 945lte tomorrow)

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to Garmin-Brooks

    I can try a wifi sync, I don't know if I have tried that.  But since setting up this watch I have done 2 activities without a phone near by and neither sent any live track start (each activity 40-50 minutes).

    I have power cycled the watch (hold power to shortcut and power off)

    I have factory reset and re-set it up

    Support is asking me to hold power beyond the ask for help prompt until it fully powers off?  I haven't tried this, seeing the ask for help prompt scares me as I don't want to do it unnecessarily Slight smile

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to Garmin-Brooks

    I did a successful wifi sync, then tried an activity with no phone and a forced LTE sync, but never connected to LTE, but the watch kept 'searching.' I also tried the hard power cycle (holding past the emergency alert) as mentioned below. This also did not work.

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to amgray13

    The new beta released today has an interesting "Test" option in the menu and a "Networking Debug" within it.

    From there I tried poking various items.  I can get:

    • LTE "on" and showing strength - 40-50%
    • Active Subscription - Yes
    • Inet PDN - No
    • Priv PDN - No
    • COAP - wait PDN or No
    • Ping Fails
    • Timeout Test - No

    Not sure if any of this is useful...

    Am also told wifi sync may help to bring over appropriate credentials to allow the LTE connection to be established and to try it a few times.  Unfortunately for me I've gotten 5 or so wifi syncs through now and still have the same functionality (LTE always searching).

  • +1 over 3 years ago in reply to nord0296

    I can't promise it would work for everyone, and depending on your subscription it could be rather costly, but...

    Summary:

    • I had initially signed up for a monthly plan for my watch
    • I got a replacement ~2 weeks in
    • I used "manage subscription" to transfer the subscription to the new watch
    • LTE never worked to connect

    I tried numerous things (wifi sync, wifi music sync, factory reset and re-setup, power off/on, power off/on while connected to charger).  Nothing seemed to help.

    I ended up suspicious that the first watch worked fine (through a "normal" setup process for LTE) and the new one used the subscription transfer option on the web.  The watch always showed it had a subscription but was not getting an active connection / PDN.

    I decided to forgo my remaining ~10 days of monthly subscription and canceled it on the web.  Then I used the app to follow the "Setup LTE" option as I had done the first time with my initial watch.  Perhaps I should have instantly tried LTE here, but I decided to do 2x wifi syncs for good measure (as support thought this was important before, but it wasn't seeming to help).

    At the end of this I tried LTE sync and it worked the first try.

    Assuming the cancel / re-setup is truly what fixed it, hopefully garmin can figure out the issue as it is a bummer to throw away part of a month (or much of a year?) to exchange bad devices or upgrade (when other devices are available).

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to nord0296

    I don't want this to be marked as answered. I'm sure this method works. I am working with support. I have the year contract and there is a 70$ early cancellation fee. The current CSR is refusing to waive that fee currently because they want to investigate this issue instead of letting me fix my watch by a known method. A bit frustrating. I have sent them my garmin folder and now await full functionality of my watch. 

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to amgray13

    Totally understand and agree.  When they swapped my watch I was mildly worried about the subscription loss but it would have only been losing like $3.

    Certainly canceling and restarting an annual plan is not an acceptable solution to getting a replacement working again.

    Hopefully if my process is a possible real fix for the issue it gives Garmin a chance to investigate what happens in an initial setup vs a subscription transfer and fill that gap.