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Problems with Garmin 645 Music

Former Member over 6 years ago

This post is intended to inform people thinking of buying this watch. It outlines what I think are problems and will be updated as I experience new issues or if issues are addressed by Garmin.

Issue 1. Garmin Pay will require a pin every time you use it. Garmin may say otherwise but my experience is that in order to pay for something you will need to first select the wallet app and then go through a difficult and slow process to enter your pin on the watch (all up takes around 30 secs). Have tried all of the posted work-arounds, none work, effectively Garmin Pay is not a usable payment solution.

Issue 2. Unless you have a Spotify premium account you can pretty much forget about connecting to the major streaming services. Google Play and Apple etc are not supported. If you read otherwise, its wrong.

Issue 3. Copying music by USB does not group by album. I get around this by using genre etc instead. I have tried both Windows Media Player and MediaMonkey to re-tag the songs, neither resolved the issue. Transferring via Garmin Connect produces the same result.

Issue 4. Hotkeys are disabled. No reason I can tell than Garmin wants to make their higher end watches more attractive.

Issue 5. In Australia, far less banks support Garmin Pay than Google Pay etc. Make sure you check with your bank first.

Issue 6. The watch consistently gets stuck between some screens. This is affecting my Strava stats, for example it takes over 10 minutes to save a workout and adds that 10 minutes to the overall run time (makes me look even slower than normal...). Note that no 3rd party apps etc have been installed. Update 18/6 - Garmin Support have advised that this is a known issue and that I have been added to an "open investigation". They cannot advise if/when it will be resolved.

There are many other niggly/buggy issues as well, convinced now this watch is not a keeper. Def not as solid as a 235 or 935.

Looking through the responses I can see this post has attracted at least one professional deflector from Garmin, just makes things even sadder..

Top Replies

jim_m_58 over 6 years ago +1

for #1, you need to make sure your watch has the WHR on all the time. That's how the watch can tell it's been taken off and requires the pin next time you use GP. Other than that, you only need…

All Replies

0 George over 6 years ago

1. Garmin pay is a useable payment solution and I use it all the time, to the extent that I now usually leave my wallet at home (I particularly like not having to carry a phone or wallet a run or bike ride and still being able to buy a coffee or a bun afterwards). I find it quicker than using Google or Apple Pay on a phone, even if you have to enter the PIN. There does appear to be a bug where it seems too sensitive to moving about thinking you have taken it off when you haven't but even that's not too bad.

2. Google Play and Apple Play are tightly tied to their respective proprietary platforms. I'm not sure why the monopolistic behaviour of the tech giants should be a Garmin issue. Spotify is better imho anyway.

3. Try suggestions elsewhere. It depends on the source of your music.

4. More expensive phones have more features, which is reasonable no? I do have some sympathy though that perhaps Garmin have far too many models and this results in arbitrary omissions to justify the difference sometimes.

5. In Australia, many of the banks resisted Apple Pay for years, seeing it as a competitive threat. They're going to be correspondingly slow for other smaller suppliers. If you just sit there waiting for your bank to change, then they have no incentive to do so. I changed from Barclays to Starling in the UK, specifically because they supported Garmin, and then I discovered that I also had a much better bank in many other respects. So shop around, it's good for everybody!

6. Yes, agree with you the phone is a big laggy sometimes (but not so often that it is an issue for me). Many journalists explain this away with processor speed but I think it's just a bug. Sometimes it crashes altogether

Comparing the 645 with the previous generation 235/935 isn't right. The 245/945 will probably have many of the same bugs. Again, imho Garmin make far too many devices meaning that they spread their programming resource too thinly and can't keep up with themselves. If I was Garmin, I would abolish the 2xx series as this is now uncompetitive at this price point. I'd also get rid of the 9xx series as this overlaps too much with the Fenix.

Overall, I love my 645m. I prefer its smaller form factor to the 945 and its better feature set to the 245.

0 Former Member over 6 years ago in reply to George

Not having a go at Garmin, just highlighting the things that don't work so that potential buyers can make an informed decision. I disagree entirely with your Garmin Pay response, using a phone is waaaay easier than trying to pay with a 645 M.