How reliable have your devices been?

Gents a general question, how old are your units? I'm not clewed up on model names, specs and ages etc.

.... My original 660 locked up and died literally. We were on a family holiday in the middle of the USA. Ended up buying a new nav and reloading my routes. I'd saved them all to Dropbox as a back up.

My point is this was almost 4 years ago and my 660 was probably 18 months old. When home I spoke to Garmin and they were fairly vague about repair. It was too far out of warranty and they didn't know if it could be repaired or how much it would cost. So your best bet sir is to send yours back to us and buy a re-conditioned one for a £100. So I did.

How many of us have forked out several hundred quid and then had this happen?

I know nothing lasts forever but 18 months (in my case) is not old. It's been going on for years

Cheers

Clive


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If it was four years ago, get over it.

PS Fresh thread created, so as not to detract from a thread that was otherwise specifically about a bod's failing 550 and his appeal for assistance.

Zumo 550 - bought in 2006.........

Lifetime mapping, still working.

Al

zumo 550 and 660 all been very reliable.

If my Sat Nav gets too old, I trade the bike c/w Sat Nav and start again.

2610 still going strong

TomTom Rider V5 (2013) Lifetime maps

Think I bought it in 2013, works great

Zumo 550 - on my fourth replacement. 2 in warranty and 2 recons.

Quality that would be unacceptable in almost any other device, but par for the course for Garmin.

stolzy said:

Zumo 550 - on my fourth replacement. 2 in warranty and 2 recons.
Quality that would be unacceptable in almost any other device, but par for the course for Garmin.

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Yet the 550 remained bikermates' GPS device of choice for years, until superseded by the 660. Indeed the prices for a 550 remained above those of the 660 for a while, whilst the newer device suffered software induced memory problems. The software problems were fixed reasonably quickly by Garmin.

That the 660 is now spoken about in hushed reverential terms, speaks for itself. The common cry being: "Don't waste your money on that BMW branded shit, mate. Ripoff suits" or some such.

660 hasnt missed a beat, bought in 2010

660 bought in August 2010. Still good, use it in the car now as I have a Nav 5.

You were mugged. At only 18 months old you were entitled to a repair or replacement.
The manufacturers warranty does not affect your statutory rights.
Bit late now to do anything about it.

4 years ago......wonder why you even remember, let alone care.

I have a very reliable Zumo 590 now that I have addressed the battery issue. I got it last year.

Today I picked up a second hand Nav V and set to updating the maps in trepidation of the issues posted here of late.

4 hours later and 2018.1 western europe installed without the use of an SD card or safety net and all my routes for spain in a couple of weeks downloaded perfectly too. Apparently you can't have more than 29 waypoints in a route so a couple of them have been split into 2. Fair enough, that's easy enough to sort out

Ok thanks

Wapping said:

If it was four years ago, get over it.

PS Fresh thread created, so as not to detract from a thread that was otherwise specifically about a bod's failing 550 and his appeal for assistance.

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I probably didn't make my point clear enough. If this happened several years ago and is still happening today.....

stolzy said:

Zumo 550 - on my fourth replacement. 2 in warranty and 2 recons.

Quality that would be unacceptable in almost any other device, but par for the course for Garmin.

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Then Garmin are taking the piss....

We've spent hundreds already, it fails, Garmin take back our duds. Re work them and sell them on again without curing the fundamental problem. Even if this happens to a small percentage of the units it's still happening and they keep taking the money.

Is this sharp practice or just business?

I'm not made of money so to spend well over £500 and have it fail in so short a time is not so easy to get over.

I just wondered what other Garmin users felt/ had experienced

Cheers

Clive



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AberdeenAngus said:

You were mugged. At only 18 months old you were entitled to a repair or replacement.
The manufacturers warranty does not affect your statutory rights.
Bit late now to do anything about it.

4 years ago......wonder why you even remember, let alone care.

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I remember only because my memory was jogged by Frodi' post below.

I care because it was my money that was lost. I'm sure if you lost something expensive that you liked you'd remember too.

frodi said:

My Zumo 550 has decided to keep trying to locate satellites. We were using it over Easter in the car and in the middle of a trip it just went into "Locating satellites" mode and wouldn't do anything else. After about 20 miles or so it managed to locate satellites and resumed functioning.

This weekend I was doing RevUp4DSI. It functioned fine from home to the start. The routes for the weekend were loaded and away I went. About 5 miles later in the middle of the M50 it went that way again and has stayed like that ever since.

Is there some magic reset or has it just suffered one too many bumps on the noggin? I have a spare but I have lifetime maps on this one and would like to keep it.

TIA

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Transglobalundies said:

I just wondered what other Garmin users felt/ had experienced

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I have used Garmin motorcycling GPS products since the days of the Quest devices and before that the early palm top devices. With each new iteration the devices have become better and better at doing what they are primarily meant to do, which is to guide a bod from A to B or from A to Z via all the letters in between. Similarly, their computer based software, whether it be Mapsource or BaseCamp, has got better and better too.

In years and over 1000's of miles travelled I have had just two significant problems:

1. The first edition 660, which suffered from a widely recognised software problem on first issue, whereby the device was unable to hold reliable satellite signals in areas of poor signal quality, like alpine valleys. This was fixed via a Garmin software update reasonably quickly.

2. A BMW branded (it's a Garmin under the skin) Nav IV which lost its aerial connection after thousands of miles and many hours of use. The device was well outside of its maker's and statutory warranty periods. BMW were not interested in helping me get it fixed, so I contacted Garmin to explain my long association with their products, my overall satisfaction and to ask what they might do to help? They could not have been more accommodating if they tried. They sent me a pre-paid courier bag in which to place the device, asking only that I remove the battery I think. I returned the device to them. Within a short period they sent me what they claimed was a reconditioned Nav IV, though to me looked brand new. It worked perfectly and continued to do so right up to the point I sold it secondhand on this site.

I have no use for all the additional bells and whistles, music, phone calls, weather updates and the like that Garmin (following public demand, I assume) seem to have packed their latest devices with, nor do I have any use for 'Tell me how many times I have put the brakes on' and other nonsense that appears to be latest fad. Nor do I value or use things like, windy roads or whatever it's called. What I do have real use for is a reliable, easy to use GPS device, robust enough to stand the rigours of motorcycling long distances in all sorts of weathers; a device that has excellent map coverage (regularly updated for free after initial purchase) and one that will reliably run routes that I have reasonably easily created on my Mac from within BaseCamp (formerly Mapsource on my PC) or from within the device itself. That the same reliable device integrates well with its four button cradle and / or now the whirly wheel thing on my bikes, records a track record of where I've been and will if I require it to run thirdparty mapping, is just a bonus.

So, could you say that I am happy? Yes.

If you are still unhappy, cross even after four years, I can only suggest that you vote with your feet and wallet from now on, either by using no naviagation device or by switching to TomTom, the only mainstream reliably available alternative.

shay said:

2610 still going strong

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Yay ....

Unlike the 1200 section, this respondents to this thread seems to be all but universally happy with their premium priced product.

This is how Garmin treated me - with my 400,550 and a Nuvi

Blackal said:

Was down in Southampton earlier this year, and my sister was complaining that her 3 yr old Garmin Nuvi 360 (top of the range at the time) had pitched a fit.
I phoned up Garmin and asked if I could drop the unit off at their new headquarters at Totton, rather than posting it?

http://www.garmin.com/garmin/cms/si...t;jsessionid=19FAE96ECB6A6EBF7A97E00513919E43



The girl on the phone said to bring it in, and someone would meet me and give me an initial appraisal and take it from there.

A girl came out to reception to see us, and listened to an explanation of the symptoms on the Nuvi and appeared very helpful, so..................

I handed her my broken Zumo car mount (I had foolishly tried to aleviate the stiffness in the ball-joint by putting a couple of drops of extra-virgin olive oil in the joint ) which had started to break up due to destabilisation of the plastic in the cup and asked if they could repair it?


Thinking "in for a penny.................." - I also asked her about the upgrading of a Zumo 400 (UK mapping) to full European mapping using the £36 upgrade disc. (I had been told by the retailer that it would upgrade the maps, and when it didn't - I thought I had been thrown a "wobbly ball")

Anyway - the result?


1) My sister's Nuvi (out of warranty) was to be repaired (replaced) for £75 including P&P

2) My Zumo car mount has been repaired and posted out to me FREE OF CHARGE

3) The girl printed out a step-by-step instruction sheet for upgrading the maps on my Zumo 400.

Two weeks later - My sister received a brand new Nuvi, FREE OF CHARGE, with an apology for the "delay"

I have no reason to believe that anyone dealing with those problems by phone or e-mail would have been treated differently.

I can't think of a single reason for straying from the Garmin camp.


Al

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The 2610 still works but I did try a garmin 350 for a couple of years. I had issues with the routing on minor roads in Ireland, had a long email conversation with Garmin and their mapping company. Eventually gave up and bought a TomTom 400. It routes correctly but the info on screen isn't as clear as the Garmins. I will get used to it but Garmin's screen display is better.


One little trick I like about the 2610 is that you can set vehicle type to truck and avoid motorway / toll road. It will route you along minor roads but, especially in France, will take you around the villages on small ring roads, rather than through the centre.

Don't know if 660 nav v1 will do this as I've never owned one.

I don't plan routes, I set a destination and, usually set avoidance to motorway / toll road and enjoy the journey.

I have a cheap nuvi with US and european maps that I use in the car. I used it on a car trip to the US and worked perfectly. I probably should have used that on the bike instead of the 350 / tomtom.

also, I paid €1,100 for the 2610 so I'm glad it still works. The screen laminate flakes off in time .. hasn't happened to me yet. It's a good backup to have, I can mount it on a ram mount and plug it into the accessory socket on the kTm if needed. It's a little heavy for the cockpit gps mount.