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Edge 520 broke last week after a year and a half of gentle use, of course it's out of warranty now so Garmin would like me to pay them £76 to fix it
£76 so I can have another year and a half of ropey firmware updates, stages dropouts and no phone alerts
.......never......again!
can anyone recommend a good alternative?
can anyone recommend a good alternative?
Riding without worrying about technology?
it's an alternative, I'll give you that, but not a good one!!!
can anyone recommend a good alternative?
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Out of warranty repair seems reasonable.
Try an Edge 1000. Mine's been ace for the last couple of years. 🙂
It's out of warranty, but after 18 months, was it "fit for purpose"?
It's surely reasonable to expect it to last longer than that.
Have a look at Money Saving Expert for consumer rights and tell them you expect it to be fixed.
APF
oh yeah I won't be paying anything, 18 months is not long enough for a £300 bit of kit to lastIt's out of warranty, but after 18 months, was it "fit for purpose"?It's surely reasonable to expect it to last longer than that.
Have a look at Money Saving Expert for consumer rights and tell them you expect it to be fixed.
APF
What broke, and how?
Personally I've had no issues with Garmin products over the year, but maybe its a quality control issue. If you want something different the Wahoo computers seem to be getting good reviews.
Warranty should be two years minimum, shouldn't it? Assuming you're in the UK from the £ signs.
Under EU rules you always have the right to a minimum 2-year guarantee at no cost, regardless of whether you bought your goods online, in a shop or by mail order.This 2-year guarantee is your minimum right. National rules in your country may give you extra protection: however, any deviation from EU rules must always be in the consumer's best interest.
If goods you bought anywhere in the EU turn out to be faulty or do not look or work as advertised, the seller must repair or replace them free of charge or give you a price reduction or a full refund.
From [url= http://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/guarantees-returns/index_en.htm ]here[/url], hidden in the Guarantees for Faulty Goods section. We are still crushed by the oppressive jackboot of the EU, so you still enjoy that right, for now. 😐 Get back onto Garmin and tell them you want a replacement or a refund, sounds like they're trying to fob you off.
My Garnin 305 is still going strong
My Garmin 305 packed up after about five years. I got a refurb for £80 or something. After another few years that fell off my bike onto the road and got crushed by a car. Another refurb for £80. I was prety pleased with that.
I couldn't fault their customer service, and I rather like their hardware, but their software QC is a bit shite. Overall though my Edge Touring is brilliant for the money.
Existing Android mobile or tablet?
My Nexus 7 2013 goes out with me most rides in back pocket of jersey/jacket using Strava/Ghostracer/Polar Beat, it's often better at GPS lock than my Sony Smar****ch 3 (which I tend to take along and use Endomondo, as a backup which has an on-the-fly map and curiously seems to stay better GPS locked than other Android Wear standalone apps).
thank you for showing me this, I'll give this one a go firstWarranty should be two years minimum, shouldn't it? Assuming you're in the UK from the £ signs.Under EU rules you always have the right to a minimum 2-year guarantee at no cost, regardless of whether you bought your goods online, in a shop or by mail order.
This 2-year guarantee is your minimum right. National rules in your country may give you extra protection: however, any deviation from EU rules must always be in the consumer's best interest.
If goods you bought anywhere in the EU turn out to be faulty or do not look or work as advertised, the seller must repair or replace them free of charge or give you a price reduction or a full refund.
From here, hidden in the Guarantees for Faulty Goods section. We are still crushed by the oppressive jackboot of the EU, so you still enjoy that right, for now. Get back onto Garmin and tell them you want a replacement or a refund, sounds like they're trying to fob you off.
Remember your issue is with the retailer and you need to prove its an inherent fault not something caused by misuse.
Plenty of my friends have had issues with them but there isn't a competitive offer from anyone else right now. I'm still using the Edge800 although it is my 2nd one as the first one objected to riding in the rain (out of warranty replacement).
You could look at the Wahoo one, seems to get good reviews but not sure if it has been ridden enough in anger to really test. Was one being bought out by hammerhead in August too - again untested . https://www.hammerhead.io/
I hear good things about the 1000. I'd probably go down that route now rather than and 820 if mine needed replacing.
You could look at the Wahoo one, seems to get good reviews but not sure if it has been ridden enough in anger to really test.
The Elemnt has been out for well over a year... I'd never go back to Garmin for a few reasons as documented elsewhere. Elemnt Bolt is newer but essentially an Elemnt in a smaller casing. Vive la revolution 😀
the hammerhead one looks great, wonder what the price will be
I have a Wahoo ELEMNT Bolt. It's leagues ahead of the Garmin 520.
I never trusted the routing on the Garmin 1000, and it used to give up after 20 miles anyway...
My Wahoo Elemnt is brilliant, much prefer the map style for its intended purpose.
No way my next 'Garmin' will actually be a Garmin....too many problems with my Edge 500 over the years.
There seems to be a few options out there now...
Wahoo
Bryton
Lezyne
I've got Garmin & Lezyne, they are both crap in different ways.
Lezyne Enhanced Super GPS - it isn't touchscreen (so the battery last longer) but I think does everything that the Garmin does without the breakage bits.
The bluetooth connection on mine was dodgy twice when I first had it - not the first 2 times of use, but Lezyne released an update for it and it has been ideal every since.
the elemnt is very good indeed, excellent in fact. But i noticed it's not as cheap as it was at Xmas. Brexit? Or more sales negating the need for discounts?
Lenzyne Super GPS is great!
Lenzyne Super GPS is great!
Does that one have any mapping?
Drac - Moderator
My Garnin 305 is still going strong
My 705 too.
5 years warranty on all electrical goods here in Norway
just saying like
fight for your rights
I have a bryton 100 and it is surprisingly good for the money. Simple but does all the gps and ant+ stuff without fuss
Lenzyne Super GPS is great!
Does that one have any mapping?
Nope. Just tracking your ride.
I have the Year 9 and not the new Year 10 [i]Enhanced Super GPS[/i] but still no mapping as such
It has navigation - but I don't use it - can't be bothered with the faff of adding it to the unit to then be told where to ride - I like to pretend I'm still a free spirit and decide where to go myself...
"Does that one have any mapping?"
Yes kind of, all Y10 have mapping as in you hook it to your phone GPS via bluetooth (witch uses google maps I think)
So you can plot a map on line and save it on line, which will appears on the phone app, select the route and you can follow it.
GPX is breadcrumb, TCX will give turn by turn.
You can also use it as a sat nav, select where you like to go and it give you a couple of routes to get there, (normally cycle friendly)
Or just use it a track where you been.
Few little issues to start with (some user error) but seams all ok with the updates.
Best thing is the price when you compare it to Gamin.
My 510 has a great in built feature.. it over exaggerates elevation by 10-25% and makes me look like a riding god
Best of luck with that 2 year warranty thing. Our Samsung TV needed a new screen after 13 months & 2 weeks. If pursued through the courts it falls flat at an exemption to the 2 year rule that the UK dictatorship agreed upon.
I still have a working 705 (although it's battery doesn't hold much charge). That said I think in general Garmin bike GPS devices are pretty crap, over-priced and under-spec'd but they have little competition and I guess the market isn't big enough to justify a big R&D spend. When I compare my 1000 to what you can get in a smartphone for the same money it pains me.
I too have a 705. The batteries are available on eBay and are a simple change.
Bryton have this great feature where the ride it tracked wasn't the ride you did. It's great for stopping thieves tracking you
Never had a problem with my 500 (circa 5 years) or second hand 800 (6 months) but agree that some units do appear to have issues.
Cycling buddies are reporting good things about the [url= http://www.tredz.co.uk/.Lezyne-Micro-Colour-Navigate-GPS-Computer_99082.htm ]Lezyne range[/url] of GPS units
I mostly use an Oregon these days. I don't think the "recreational " models suffer anything like the number of failures/problems the newer cycling units do.
As for the software, I've read that development of Basecamp has ceased and there's no replacement products. That's a real shame as it's really powerful, even if it has a steep learning curve.
Yeah, I'm on my second Garmin Edge Touring (again, out of warranty by a couple of months) due to persistent issues with crashing, navigation failures and screen freezes.
The new one is better but nowhere ner perfect. Not sure if it's ridewithgps / Strava file errors or just the Garmin software being generally shite but I can't trust it to accuratly navigate a long ride without crashing or just giving up on turn-by-turn navigation.
garmin 800, 1000 and Oregon 650. All worked flawlessly for years of abuse. They have even been submerged
I do use them - (nearly) daily and charge them up daily (nearly) maybe if there not charged up regularly they go flat?
800 must be 5 or 6 years old now, shows the scars of much abuse.
I have the rubber covers as well for them that has protected them from some damage 😉
Edge 810 was brilliant, Edge 1000 even betterer..
Ya' just bought a dodgy one out of a batch, but £76 to fix it doesn't sound unreasonable considering it costs £50 or so to get a watch battery replaced.
My 500 is/was rubbish, for the amount of money it cost...
Every time a software update was done, it borked something else.
The breadcrumb trail thing works intermittently & is very fussy about how you set the route up. What normally happens is just as I get to the first unfamiliar bit of the ride, the breadcrumb disappears just long enough for me to wonder where the hell I should be going & then come back to tell me I've gone the wrong way before disappearing again.
The battery indicator when charging never shows less than 100%, whether I have used it for an hour or 5.
One of the intenal buttons went a bit intermittent - the main page/menu button and due to the requirement to press it many many times to get it to work, a hole as been worn in the rubber housing where that button sits.
In the end I got a replacement button from a Russian guy on eBay and a colleague who works for an electronics manufacturing company got it soldered on for me.
I don't really use it enough to justify splashing out on a new device, but I am hoping when the time comes to finally retire the 500 & get something new, there will be enough other options out there that Garmin can be given a wide berth.
Navigating to the bike selection screen takes a ridiculous number of clicks & the Garmin Connect software is absolute toilet.
I have an edge touring.
It's fine for tracking rides, but not that easy to put a GPS track on to or to use it for navigation by itself. Guess it's an old model though.
It did just turn itself into a brick one day and I had to send back to Garmin who fixed it for free under warranty. I imagine this new one will do so too and then I'd buy something else.
Garmin Edge 25 is fairly solid and has all of what you need unless you really need mapping or power meter comparability. The lack of some of the fancy features is not necessarily a bad thing, as it makes it cheaper, lighter and more robust.
I had a 305 for years and years, then an 800 which was fine (once the first update doubled the battery life). I out it "somewhere safe" after Paris-Roubaix this year and needed nav for a couple of events so got an Edge 820 - which seems very good - long battery life, turn-by-turn routes, but an appalling interface which I want to smash nearly every time I use it. But once its finally deigned to bring up the screen I want rather than asking me to connect to facebook or something equally stupid, its great.
I use a very old Oregon, several years old.
No software faults, works every time all the time. Had it for about 6 years, then I got a refurbished one for zero when I sent them mine with a scratched screen and some drop off on the speed it processed.
Then sadly I broke it by falling off.
Bought a new one from EBay. Some random shop still had one in stock. Seems some of the older stuff just works better.
I have an Edge 800 (probably about 7 years old) and it's been out in all weathers, and plenty of rain when I lived in Manchester and used it daily. Still works perfectly 😀
On my 3rd 800:
1st one died in the rain on 2011 Dragon Ride - got warranty replacement
2nd one corroded so much in the USB port that no connection possible - got £76 refurbed replacement
3rd one mostly works but touch screen doesn't work top right half so not sure how long it'll last now. This one has lasted the longest.
I like decent mapping which only Garmin seem to do though the Hammerhead looks good.
I've only ever had one garmin which is the 820 I bought recently. I was expecting to be gaping in awe at my move to a brand new piece of tech that would revolutionise my riding. Imagine my disappointment when realised it's an utter shower of shit. I'm honestly gobsmacked that a company that surely should have totally monopolised the market have executed the whole thing so incredibly badly.
The software is pathetic and I'm sick of the relentless updates and I've given up trying to fix any glitches as there's so many of them. It unilaterally decides to change important settings for no apparent reason and prompted by nobody and unless I've studied a route pretty carefully in advance I'd never put my total faith in it to get me anywhere.
Utter crap and I'll never buy garmin again.
I've had various Garmins for the last 12 years. All worked great and actually all still work fine now. The others don't get much use any more, but my 500 gets used for every ride I go on.
Garmin used to be great with replacements or repairs. Maybe things have changed.
I had a 705 for 6 years, now had a 1000 for 3 years, ne'er a hint of trouble with either, what are you lot doing?!
My 510 was a struggle initially with dodgy firmware that kept trashing rides in various situations. I'm on 4.40 now and even though there are a couple of newer versions I'm reluctant to update it as it just works for me.
Except for bluetooth, which is just utter crap. Never pairs with a phone. Doesn't matter what phone. Android phones, Windows even. 9 times out of 10 fails to pair and have to reboot the Garmin each time to stand a chance of it pairing.
Also, Garmin Express is banned from my computers. It forces firmware updates on you and I was having issues with my tablet not going to sleep properly and draining the battery, and Windows sleep study pointed at Garmin Express. So said goodbye to that.
mintimperial - Member
From here, hidden in the Guarantees for Faulty Goods section. We are still crushed by the oppressive jackboot of the EU, so you still enjoy that right, for now.
UK trumps EU warranty anyway and goes to 6 years. Though it's a lot more difficult after the initial 6 months. Then becomes down to you to prove the fault was there from the start.
I bought a 520 a couple of weeks ago, looked great and worked really well with my iPhone but distance and elevation were off compared to previous results from me and mates and the big problem for me was the maps. I'd spend ages plotting one, move it across only to find it cut three miles of it out?!? I only found when out on the bike too which was problematic. It didn't do anything more than my phone really so I took it back.
What are Polar ones like?
I fancied an edge 820 but guess the maps would do the same and the touch screen is meant to be temperamental, plus don't want to spend £300.
I'm considering a Bolt.
njee20 - MemberI had a 705 for 6 years, now had a 1000 for 3 years, ne'er a hint of trouble with either, what are you lot doing?!
Based on the responses in this thread, it's probably more a case of 'what are you doing to make the work faultlessly for so long?'...
😆
I forgot in my mini-rant above to mention that when I first got my Garmin, it read out on distance by exactly 10% when compared to my mate's Garmin. Because we weren't sure which one was reading incorrectly, I used mine on the drive home & it was 10% out on the odometer.
Fixed with a firmware update eventually...
My 510 has a great in built feature.. it over exaggerates elevation by 10-25% and makes me look like a riding god
Mine really over exaggerates the "Calories burned" so i eat too much cake....
Edge 200: Brilliant little thing. Bought 5 years ago, still going, somewhere. On the back of tht I decided I'd upgrade to a 500...
Edge 500: Quite good. Had the (programmed in?) bug when using it to navigate.
"off course!"
"course found!"
"off course!"
"course found!"
/breadcrumb screen goes blank for a bit
"off course!"
"course found!"
Died just out of warranty, but Garmin sent a refurb unit as a replacement for free which is still going (with that same course bug). On the back of that warranty support I decided to upgrade to a 810...
Edge 810: OK. Seems very clever, but has crashed twice while on long rides (I guess on short rides there just isn't as much time to go wrong!). Both times turning it off and on again got it going but wiped the ride data, which then had to be manually dug out while plugged into a pc.
Most unintuitive menu layouts ever.
Leave it to plot a route itself and you are guaranteed a magical mystery tour of all the back alleys, dried out river beds and fenced off footpaths in the local vicinity. That's probably classed as a feature.
The more you spend the worse it gets...
There's speculation about a 1000 replacement as it's a bit old now....
Replaced a Garmin Edge 1000 after 5 months with a Lezyne Enhanced Super GPS. Navigation on the Garmin was utterly garbage except it kept you fitter as navigation would break down after about 20 miles so you drive around finding your way which gives you longer rides - don't know if this is a feature....
The Lezyne is about a third of the price but three times better. Haven't failed me yet after 4 months. Turn by turn navigation uses arrows and street names. It works surprisingly well even though there are no maps.
The best feature: grap your phone, enter the Lezyne app, point to a destination, choose the route you prefer and hit go. The map (google based) is sent to the Lezyne via bluetooth and off you go. Dead simple and it works every time. Battery life is fantastic, needs a charge every 2-3 weeks, the Garmin was at least once a week. It syncs with Strava if that's your thing.
I would say that the Garmin was ok with performance data and it has good menus. I also liked the screen, the fonts and the layout. But with crappy and slow hardware I'm amazed they can sell them for the price of a mid-range smartphone that is much more advanced. Even more amazed that the world leader and innovator in car navigation can't put a decent map on their bike gps products and guide you back to your route.
Turn by turn navigation uses arrows and street names. It works surprisingly well even though there are no maps.
does this work well off road?