I recently bought a Forerunner 955, which I am generally very happy with, but updating and installing maps seems highly unreliable. This is my experience - is it typical?
- Watch came with Europe map installed. According to the graphic on the watch, this map covers the whole of Europe and is around 12GB in size.
- Watch says this map needs updating.
- I queue the update, and later attach the watch to the charger. The map slowly updates via wifi... After 4h30, it's at 95%, and then the next time I check it's gone back to the watch face. The map manager indicates that an update is still required, but attempting to update repeatedly produces the error "Map sync failed". I conclude it has failed, give up and go to bed.
- Next day, I download and install Garmin Express on my Windows laptop, and attach the watch. It is not recognised. After a reboot of the laptop and the watch, and several rounds of unplugging and reattaching, Express finally recognises the watch.
- Express claims the Europe map needs updating. I successfully update it (and a couple of smaller golf/other maps that were installed) and install the "Middle America" map which I'll need for an upcoming trip! I am surprised to see that the watch has more free storage than before I started this process.
- On examination, Express shows the watch has only Middle America and *Western* Europe maps installed. The watch itself claims to have Europe and North America maps installed, and also claims they need updating even though they were installed only minutes earlier. I choose the ignore this last point.
- I successfully install the Central Europe map via Express.
- I try to install the Eastern Europe map via Express. This appears to work, but then Express does not list Eastern Europe as installed, and panning to eastern Europe on the watch shows that indeed the data isn't present. I try installing several more times, which produces some error messages and some silent failures, and eventually manage to download and install Eastern Europe, and verify that it really is present.
- So finally I have, as far as I can tell, the whole of Europe (3 maps), and Middle America maps installed on the watch, after a good two hours of fighting with the watch and Express. Express confirms that four maps are installed - Western, Central and Eastern Europe, and Middle America.
- The watch itself claims that two maps - "Europe" and "North America" are installed and both need updating. I am going to ignore that. I can indeed zoom into these areas and see street level detail.
The watch is on the latest firmware 21.19. Is this a typical experience? I am concerned about just how long and unreliable the process was, and how the update via Express silently removed data for Central and Eastern Europe, while the watch still claimed to have maps for the whole of Europe installed. I wouldn't use the watch as my only source of mapping data, but this could be a safety issue if you're relying on the watch as a backup, and it turns out not to have maps installed for a region despite claiming in the watch UI that it does.
