njkayaker

So what? How does this help people who are interested and paid money to have these features?

Troul 

I just prioritize what I would have more accurate over the rest.

njkayaker

Yeah, like everybody. But useless to everybody else. Bizarre.

Steve B.

FWIW, on the FB Garmin 10XX group, used to be the 1030 group, now added the 1040, of about 12-15 posts there are about 6-7 from folks using the 1040 and all with assorted issues, sensors not reliably connecting, cannot load iQ apps, Strava issues, etc.... so definitely a bunch of teething issues. It usually takes a few months for Garmin to collect all the reported issues, fix and release updates. The original device uses have been known as Beta testers for years with Garmin devices.

TakingMyTime

I have a love/hate relationship with my 530 and Garmin. The thing about the problems with Garmin products is that they seem to come out of nowhere. The thing can work great for months, even years and then for some reason whether it was a firmware/software update or just the Gods acting up... you lose a feature or two and then you're at the mercy of their customer service. I love what they do but it's just soooo frustrating when something happens.

Steve B.

Well its not just Garmin. Ive used a Karoo 2 for a year. They were generally rock solid on rides but recently I'm reading on the FB page of a lot pf folks experiencing crashes and spontaneous shutdowns mid ride. Wasn't happening a year ago, suddenly cropping up a lot. Software updates as always to blame,

Badger6

njkayaker I think you’ve missed my point. I am not suggesting that it is unimportant or odd to know the gradient one is riding on, but to expect that kind fo data on a near instant basis is just not going to happen in a consumer grade device.

If I was on a 12% grade and it was telling me I was on a 3% grade that would be disconcerting. In my experience, so far, the gradient displayed is pretty close to what I think I am riding on based on several hundreds of thousands of kms ridden over the last 40 years. I am specifically addressing the complaints that have been floating about that the device “lags” in describing the gradient being ridden…Garmin has specifically stated that there is a 5-15second lag (ostensibly due to the algorithm it uses to calculate grade). I put a question mark after tilt sensor because I honestly don’t know if it has one, I do know it has some sort of of gyroscope or magnetic compass, but I used the question mark to denote a question, not a statement, though I am skeptical it has one because calibrating them can be tricky and uncalibrated. I point out the gyroscope/magnetic compass because prior Garmin’s, a Wahoo and a Karoo I used always had a bit of a lag (5-10 seconds) when changing course (following a curve and more so when going around a traffic circle or turning a 90° corner), and now the lag is much less.

Yes, there are some issues being reported with the 1040, Steve B.. No, it is not a beta version.

pdlamb

If I were designing a GPS, I'd stick to the GPS for distance and the barometric altimeter to calculate grade. Gyroscopes or accelerometers are ridiculously complex and expensive to get the desired accuracy, and a tilt sensor would be sensitive to mounting. I've come to accept that my GPS slides a bit, even with the sticky rubber mounts, when I ride over a stretch of bumpy road: no, Mr. Garmin, I'm not suddenly climbing a 40% grade. GPS and altimeter? That's just a small software addition, no extra hardware required.

njkayaker

The problem is with what you wrote.

You suggest that it was "odd" by calling it "something magical".

You are making this up. No one is asking for "near instant basis".

As I keep saying, all that people are "asking for" is that the 1030+ work like the 1030. This isn't hard to understand.

Gyroscopes and compasses are not the same thing, None of the devices have gyroscopes. The 1030 doesn't have a magnetic compass; the 1030+ does. Neither is using a compass to determine elevation.

The ancient 800 didn't have any such lag (5-10 sec) determining change of heading. Even when going fairly slow.

If you are moving at sufficient speed, GPS makes a compass completely unnecessary. It's really only there to determine orientation when stopped.

njkayaker

They don't have gyroscopes or tilt meters. They aren't using accelerometers to determine elevation.

Badger6

5krunner and a few other online reviews claim a gyroscope is on board. I’m also well aware of the difference between a gyroscope and compass, I wasn’t even close to suggesting they're the same.

Check out Ray's reply at #318 to #317. BLUF: it is implied to be present by the statement that it's not in use.

Badger6

Rather than use hardware, it appears to use a calculation (anyone remember the “rise over run” stuff from Algebra?) that ostensibly uses inputs from the barometric altimeter (y-axis) and either the GPS or wheel sensor (x-axis). I’m not shocked at all that it is not instant. In fact, this evening, I stopped while going up a steady 5% grade to take a phone call on my commute home and I happened to have a data screen with a data field showing the gradient as a numerical value, and while I stood there it went from 5% to 0 in about 15 seconds. I finished the call and started moving again, and in about 15 seconds it had climbed back up to 5%.

JohnJ80

I believe most of them use both the GPS and the barometric sensor together. They do a good job keeping the other technology honest. I had the Wahoo ELEMNT when it first came out and the grade would jump when a semi went by me on the road at speed. They were relying solely on the barometric sensor and the air pressure change when the semi went by at speed gave that sensor fits. Then they did a little digital filtering and kept it honest with the GPS and all of that went away. GPS, on the other hand, is pretty bad, even awful at vertical positioning and not terrific at speed calculation. but it is stable based on position. So a barometric sensor can be used to get accurate data in the short term inside of the GPS error.

I’m always amazed at the absolute (but ill-placed) faith people put in GPS. It’s better than any positioning system we have had to date but it’s not all that accurate and the error is fairly random. For fun, start a “kitchen table” ride with your bike computer and let it run for a few hours. For not moving a millimeter, it thinks it had quite a journey albeit in a frenetic path around where it was placed. Some of the excursions as it switches over from satellites or by signal strength can be quite large.

Accelerometers are available that are highly accurate, tiny and cheap. Your cell phone and smart watch are full of them. MEMS technology is radically changing sensor technology by using semiconductor processing. So it’s very possible to put pretty sophisticated sensors in consumer electronics. In point of fact, I would bet that Garmin is using a MEMS accelerometer for fall detection among other things.

Steve B.

Seattle Forrest

​​​​​​I did an 8 hour hike last week. Started at a known elevation, so I calibrated the barometer manually. I have a page set up (on my watch) with a lot of elevation data including what the barometer and GPS think. For most of the hike they were within 20 feet of each other. Over the last hour they began to drift apart as the weather started to deteriorate. The GPS was consistently about 50 feet lower. I could tell from the way they drifted apart that the pressure must be falling.

I think modern GPS has improved drastically on this. This was under heavy tree cover, with multi system mode.

Top field is elevation from the barometer, bottom is from GPS. (The two on the left are the min and max, middle zero is the grade.

njkayaker

In what? I guess the 1040? You aren't being clear about what you are talking about.

Yes, that's how it works.

I suppose the barometer could be slow to react (but I don't expect that). The GPS is certainly fast enough. The calculation is trivial. So, it remains unexplained why it's slow. It's possible that it's slow related to smoothing the data over a "longer" period of time.

So, it looks like there might be one in the 1040. But it's not being used yet. So, it's not being used for elevation or whatnot.

njkayaker

I doubt many people are putting "absolute faith" in GPS.

Some people have enough trouble realizing maps can be wrong.

This might might be an issue for measuring grade (which is measuring over fairly short distances) but for other uses (like tracking position while riding), it's greatly reduced.

Badger6

Based on the variety of statements I made, I think it is quite clear, friend.

Trsnrtr

Yep. My K2 has gone totally bonkers, but to be fair, I've never had a Garmin* that didn't go nuts after a year.

*I've owned multiple 305s, 500s, 810s, 820s, 830s 1000s, 1030s and they all went to crap after warranty. My third 1030 can't keep a sensor no matter what.

Seattle Forrest

I've never had that kind of trouble with any of the 8 Garmins I've used for cycling. What are you doing with yours? I hope you got the problems sorted, Garmin has amazing service whether you're in warranty or not. They just replaced my friend's $850 watch years out of warranty because the strap broke and the watch fell 10 feet onto a boulder.

Trsnrtr

Nothing unusual. I average about 7,000 miles a year. I do ride in all kinds of weather. Who knows?

Some of the ongoing problems were that 305s used to break battery connectors. I think Garmin replaced at least three of those. The 1000s and the 1030s all developed a rebooting problem eventually. The 800 series ones all just refused to do anything. Garmin was happy to replace all of them with refurbs but the replacements would die sooner or later, too. My latest 1030 is a replacement refurb for another replacement 1030 refurb that barely lasted a month.

I guess I’m jinxed.

Seattle Forrest

I saw you replied to me and reread my post, I don't mean to imply you're doing something wrong and breaking your devices. I'm a software developer and "what are you doing" is shorthand for "tell me the steps that reproduce this problem." Sorry for probably wording it like a jerk.

Steve B.

You don't need to do things wrong to have Garmin issues. They do a good job of developing their own issues and passing those along to the unwilling user. I've actually been lucky, had an 810 that crashed almost always, but had I not ignored the web chatter about these issues I would not have purchased. I did unload it, so made some money back on it. My 1000 and 1030 have been very good, I only had some issues with my 1030 once when it would not update to the next TBT data on a ride. That was an annoying issue that resolved itself, no clue how, maybe an issue Garmin was aware of and fixed quietly in an update. Other than that it's a great unit..

Trsnrtr

I didn’t feel that you were being a jerk, not at all. I wonder why I have so many problems, too.

The funniest thing that I had was a 1000 that started showing “Walking” in a header at the top of the map page and also wouldn’t show many of the roads. It happened after a map update. The support guys at Garmin tried to fix the missing roads and get rid of the “Walking” header but finally gave up and sent me a 1030.

JohnJ80

Semantics. Coming from my days of offshore yacht racing in all weather, like any good navigator, I'm always skeptical of the gear. The people that have "faith" in the navigational systems and no skepticism have an annoying habit of finding the rocks with their keel at the most inconvenient times. The same goes for maps/charts. Skepticism is always a good idea.

Yeah, but it's pretty surprising when the error gets off. Ride in a slot canyon, for example, and all the accuracy can go to hell rapidly but there is no warning on the display of most devices. I'd put that in the category of "reliability", I guess.