Ah.. gotta love Garmin

[benb]

I'm not riding much lately. Mostly doing weights, and a little running. Trying really hard to put the "off" in "off season" this winter. Having very good results weight lifting so far.

But this week I rode the trainer 2X. Two rides in a row I have an update for my Garmin Edge 1000.

Update 1 (Monday) - Erases Activity Profiles. Can't figure out what if anything it improved. I've had this happen before, really annoying.

Update 2 (Yesterday) - Erases Activity Profiles, Erases all Sensor Pairings, Bluetooth broken until the phone is deleted and added back in again. (Which is a painful process that requires doing everything in the right order.) Again, can't tell what if anything it fixed or improved. I rode the trainer 40 minutes, I think I messed with the Garmin longer than that to get it working again, and I didn't even bother rebuilding my profiles.

They are doomed if another company with decent software skills decides to compete. It's not like the hardware is terribly unique in the Edge units other then the admittedly great use of transreflective LCDs that are visible outside.

To be fair I have a Fenix 3 and they don't usually mess up the software on that like this.

[livingminimal]

I've never had any of these kinds of issues with a 745 (I think?), 500, or a 520.

Worst problem I've ever had with Garmin are the USB cable connections and tabs breaking off. Never software issues.

[DfCas]

Garmin Connect seems to be updated on a daily basis. They bug me with popups on my desktop computer. I may find another site to upload to and store my ride history elsewhere, now that I have an Elemnt.

[unterhausen]

I've never been tempted to use their website. I have only uploaded 5 rides, ever, all to ridewithgps. If I ever get a power meter, that will obviously change. Well, maybe I would just upload to golden cheetah and skip the web.

I have often thought that Garmin is taking a risk with how bad their software is, but I think all the other companies have worse issues and lesser functionality. My interpretation is that it's a lot harder to write the device software than it looks.

[benb]

I'd love to see inside their process.. I'm a software engineer.

My guess is they have an ancient code base and have little test automation?

Their problem set is easier then updating a smartphone or something like that, and pretty much no one has to put up with this level of pain when their smartphone updates.

They have a big bad case of producing too many devices too. Consider Samsung vs Apple. Samsung makes 10x more models of phone than Apple does. Apple eliminates a bunch of variables that lead to bad software that way. This is true in general of iOS vs Android too, but in general Android gets this right far more often then Garmin does.

I don't really use Garmin Connect (website) for anything. I just need the phone app to sync the device and push stuff to Strava and Training peaks.

[livingminimal]

I don't really use Garmin Connect (website) for anything. I just need the phone app to sync the device and push stuff to Strava and Training peaks.

Same, I was actually kind of surprised when I randomly logged into my GC account like a month and saw that it does have a lot of features.

[benb]

I used it a bit with my F3 to see the activity tracking (walking, stairs, etc..)

I'm not really wearing my F3 anymore though as it's way too big and uncomfortable.

[doomridesout]

Garmin Express has 'mandatory' updates requiring a full reinstall to have the damn thing upload automatically...

I'm out as soon as my 510 bites the bullet. Surely the Lezyne can't be any worse on the UI/software side. Garmin squandered their first to market advantage when they failed to get the user interface side of things up to speed when other competitors started lining up.

[guido]

I had no issues with the latest update for the 1000...

[R3awak3n]

I had no issues with the latest update for the 1000...

same here. very strange problem. I had not updated mine in like 3 months and plugged it in like 3 weeks ago. Took an hour to update cuz of the maps but no problems on my end.

[vqdriver]

i had the same experience with my latest 810 update, erased all my profiles and customizations, just went back to factory settings. aaarrrgggh.

benb - ios is a clusterF with each update requiring a patch and further update (if the first didn't brick your phone) i left the apple universe pretty much after jobs died and couldn't be happier with android.

[SoCalSteve]

I had no issues with the latest update for the 1000...

I update all the time ( whenever it calls for it ), never an issue, never deletes anything, always works perfectly after. Very happy with my 1000! Don't use many of the features, but the ones I do use work perfectly, every time.

[thegunner]

i use garmin connect, mostly because the 520 syncs with my phone via BT and uploads to strava directly. sometimes i think their software is *less than stellar* but sometimes they surprise me.

*also someone who has never had an issue with an update