Garmin 800 acquiring satellites

[jonny jeez]

HELP....

I bought a brand new Garmin edge 800 from Handtec yesterday. Got it home and unboxed it, powered it up and left it to acquire satellites.

40 minutes later its still not finished acquiring. So now my clock is wrong and I am told that I am located in Taiwan.

Has my Garmin become an expensive paperweight during its 4 hours of ownership or is there some button that I need to click to actually turn on acquisition. None of my other GPS devices have any issue locking on within seconds.

Also will I be expected to wait over 40 minutes before setting out on every ride?

Please Garmin user's, tell me this is faulty or that i am thick and am doing something wrong. No instructions in the manual, nothing on line at Garmin

all a bit disappointing really.

PS I've read the dummies guide on line and cant find any mention of this...although its a huge document to trawl through.

 

[BSRU]

My 500 can take upto a minute a most but usually finishes in 30 seconds.

I do not know if it is worth it but trying connecting it to Garmin Connect.

 

[Gary E]

It does take a long time to acquire when you switch it on for the first time but I think 40 minutes is a bit excessive. Forgive the obvious question but is the device outside while it's acquiring? If it's indoors or between large buildings etc it won't be able to 'see' the satellites. Once it's acquired for the first time it becomes a much faster process each time you turn it on (about 15 seconds).
One thing that may be worth checking (though unlikely) - there is a setting that turns the GPS off (for use indoors on a Turbo I suppose) select Menu, then the little spanner symbol, then System, then GPS, then GPS Mode on/off. In that final screen you can also select 'view satellites' to see what satellites your unit has found (remember that the unit needs to acquire several in order to calculate your location).
If none of the above work then I'm afraid you have a faulty unit. Garmin have an excellent customer services department, give them a call and they'll sort you out.
Hope this helps

 

[fossyant]

You need to lock on OUTSIDE ! It also takes a little longer first time, but do it outside. The 705 takes longer to boot and lock than my 200 as it has much more software to laod up, but get it outside and it will lock on quickly.

 

[Andrew_P]

As per Fossy, mine took about 15 minutes outside to find itself, it was made in and first woke up in the Far East then turned off, and has travelled across the world and is trying to figure out WTF it is doing in London!

 

[Crankarm]

Should take a few minutes to first lock on. It needs 4 satellites. As others have said do this outside preferrably away from tall buildings, dense woodland, in a large open space. Garmin use Hotfix which means that when the unit is switched off and back on it locks on very quickly using the previous sateliite lock on position assuming the unit is in the same or nearby location. If you can't get it to work then give Garmin customer services a call in Southampton.

 

[Lee_M]

yep take it outside

 

[GrasB]

As per Fossy, mine took about 15 minutes outside to find itself, it was made in and first woke up in the Far East then turned off, and has travelled across the world and is trying to figure out WTF it is doing in London!

^^ Yeah, even electronic devices get jet lag don't you know.

As others have said, you need to be outside or at least in a large conservatory& well away from the house

 

[MickeyBlueEyes]

Yep, had this exact thing when I fired mine up for the first time. Outside I went and bingo, straight away it had picked up.

 

[gaz]

As others have said, do it outside, takes a while the first time but after that mine is up and running in less than 30 seconds.

 

[Brains]

It's not just outside it needs to go, you want to go somewhere with a big view of the sky to the south.
Is there a local park, or top of a local hill you can go to ?
As long as you can see a big expanse of southern sky, ideally to the horizon, then it will pick up whatever is around.

Basically GPSs have a bit of an issue when the last place where they knew where they were and the next one are more than a degree (about 250 miles) apart

 

[Hacienda71]

I took my 200 to Brazil and when I turned it on it took a few minutes to lock on and then the same thing happened this morning back in the UK, normally takes seconds. So it sounds like they may need a little extra time when restarting well away from it's previous location.

 

[jonny jeez]

Guys, thanks to all.

I am outside, i appreciate that, clever as they are sats cant yet see through my roof...yet....officially . It was on the garden table for the duration, but still failed.

What little the manual does say, it tells me that the "acquiring" screen will disappear as soon as it is satisfied.

This hasn't happened.

I will take the unit to a big open field someplace, and aim it at the sky. I may look a little like i'm praying to the Garmin gods but what the hell.

Gotta do what i gotta do to make this work

 

[jonny jeez]

Also, as i powered the unit up at my desk in town before taking it home i wonder if i should reset before attempting again?

Ps Garmin connect hasn't helped either. I'm new to garmin as a product but the site identified my device and offered nothing else, no forward button, no next..I'll need to investigate that later as it was nearly 1am when i gave up from tiredness.

 

[Andrew_P]

Mine found the position in about 5-10 minutes on first boot. You could try updating the firmware first http://www8.garmin.com/products/webupdater/howtoinstall.jsp 2.5 is the most recent.