For my FR945 to get a proper GPS fix (green GPS notification), it takes at least 15, usually 30+ minutes. For a few months I have ignored it and just adjusted the distance when running or cycling, but eventually I got annoyed by it.
So I dug deeper into the watch and found the ephemeris data (CPE.bin file in the Garmin/RemoteSW) present, but it seems the software doesn't pick it up ("CPE : Missing" in System/Info).
Deleting the file, the folder, synchronising with Garmin Connect, by WiFi and Garmin Express always brought back a fresh copy of the CPE.bin file, but did not change anything in the behaviour above.
Factory resetting the watch a dozen times (with different firmware versions), deleting the device's xml file or anything else I found in the forum did not help either.
So I have started to downgrade the firmware, hoping a legacy version of the firmware would downgrade the GPS firmware as well. Though I have tested a lot, the only firmware that does not get downgraded is the GPS - it keeps its version at 6.60 - if the main software is lower than its respective GPS version, the GPS version shows up with an exclamation mark like this "GPS : 6.60 (!)".
It was rather challenging to get legacy versions of the FR945, did not get them from Garmin, but have tested these:
Main software: 2.80, 6.20, 6.85 beta, 9.00, 9.56 beta, 9.58 beta, 10.40, 11.03 beta and of course 13.70
Firmware versions of other aspects of the FR945 get downgraded, like ANT/Bluetooth, WiFi, SensorHub and CIQ - just GPS stays on 6.60.
Is this maybe the firmware versions I have tested, do not come with a GPS firmware portion? I have also created a "force.tmp" file in the Garmin folder...
As the watch's hardware works perfectly well, getting a manual GPS fix without using the ephemeris data after approx. 30 minutes and the activity is flawlessly recorded, I assume the latest GPS update might have bricked the ephemeris data file to be picked up and used for speeding up the GPS fix.
Has anyone had this issue, too, and found a way to fix it? Or does anyone have other firmware versions or knows how to (temporarily) downgrade the GPS part of the watch's firmware?
I would lilke to reprogramm the GPS part of the watch's firmware - or downgrade and test - to make sure I can continue to use this really expensive piece of hardware.
Any help would be hugely appreciated!