Understandably, most of the posts so far deal with issues about this new device. Garmin has a history of releasing products to the public which charitably could be described as beta. At this point, how many (especially those who are upgrading from earlier models) are satisfied with their purchase as opposed to those who wish they had waited?
I'm happy so far, heck I'm much happier then that even. I got this after my Team Garmin 510 hit the deck when my K-Edge mount broke! I think taking extra time to deliberately update all software on anything electronic in the chain may have helped with my experience. It has been great specially when compared to the 510. I haven't any real issues as seen in the post so far.
I have played with courses loaded from RWGPS going off route and such and it's worked as I would expect and been happy.
I have found loading the courses to be just as fast as the 510 was and nothing as slow as seen in the video by DC Rainmaker.
The touchscreen has been perfect so far. None of the described issues and responsive like you would expect. The 510 was very frustrating in how unresponsive it was!
Notifications have been great as this was a feature I always wanted and find it works better then my Pebble did with the exception of canned responses like "I'm riding will call back later" would be nice....hint, hint!
Battery has been better then the 510 which was good. I ran every thing other then live track with a host of sensors and running navigation. almost 5 hours ride and got down to 80% and that includes playing with settings and screens the night before.
No doubt things will improve over future updates but I wouldn't feel this is a beta unit or software. Hopefully any problems are isolated to specific units or out of date software.
That being said I would like to see some features added:
1. canned responses to notifications
2. volume control for the tones on the unit
3. for the pull down menu scroll arrows, it has more to show like weather and such and sometimes I don't notice there is more but the arrows would indicate this by being there or not.
More Connect IQ apps the choices are as thin as the Pebble though I get there may not be much if any interest on the part of developers. Though I think this maybe a way to add some of the features I would be interested in.
Not happy that:
- Wifi doesn't work, it connects and immediately disconnects - seems to be working now
- Elevation reads about 30 m high
- Sensitive touch screen
Happy that:
- Elevation lag seems less than Edge 520
- Power sensor setting to have a "Calibrate ?" pop up on connection to it.
Not happy that:
- Wifi doesn't work, it connects and immediately disconnects
- Elevation reads about 30 m high
- Sensitive touch screen
On #1, are you successfully using automatic WiFi sync with other Garmin products; it may be one of several bugs that can be worked around (e.g. incompatible WiFi router channels); if you have a browse on the forum you might be able to solve that.
On #2, you know that you have to (regularly) calibrate barometric altimeters right? This can be done a number of ways, but I'm guessing the Edge 820 has continuous GPS-based calibration, you might want to check if that's turned on.
On #1, are you successfully using automatic WiFi sync with other Garmin products; it may be one of several bugs that can be worked around (e.g. incompatible WiFi router channels); if you have a browse on the forum you might be able to solve that.
On #2, you know that you have to (regularly) calibrate barometric altimeters right? This can be done a number of ways, but I'm guessing the Edge 820 has continuous GPS-based calibration, you might want to check if that's turned on.
As there are threads started by others with both these issues, it seems that they are real problems affecting multiple units.
In the case of the Wifi, I tried three different routers, with and without security turned on.
Sadly, I don't have an 820 yet so your experience is more valid than mine! I've just had a browse through the Wifi Suggestions thread and it doesn't seem as though many people have actually tried to troubleshoot the issues with the 820.
To elaborate on my previous answer, the Fenix 3 was finnicky with WiFi connections at launch but a lot of people managed to work around it; it won't connect to routers that are only using particular frequencies or channels (e.g. see here) so it could be a simple fix on your end. Router configurations around the world vary wildly (especially given the propensity of ISPs to lock them down with their own firmware) so it's not surprising that some people will be having issues and if you sit on your hands waiting for Garmin to push out a universal fix, you'll probably be waiting for a long time.
Overall I'm pretty happy with the Edge 820. Anytime I can get my hands on some spanking new tech I'm excited. Sure this thing has it's share of bugs, but I (as well as many folks) have come to expect that from new technology (especially Garmin). Needless to say I'm patently waiting for Garmin to push out software/firmware updates.
