I've had a Vista for about four months and really like the features. However, when using it for more than a few hours, it will turn itself off. I find this quite frustrating, especially when I wait through the boot and acquisition process six or seven times in a day.
Below are what I hope are most of the salient points related to this issue. Any feedback or suggestions are most welcome.
- The shutdowns occur more frequently, but not exclusively, when the signal is weak or diminished by trees.
- The shutdowns occur more frequently, but not exclusively, when the unit is hanging on the neck lanyard rather than held horizontal in my hand.
- The shutdowns occur more frequently, but not exclusively, when the batteries have been in use for two to six hours.
- The shutdowns occur more frequently, but not exclusively, when I am walking. It does occur at rest. It has never occurred while in use in a moving vehicle.
- I use alkaline batteries and the shutdowns have net seemed affected by the brand I am using.
- The powersave feature is turned off in the setup.
- The firmware has been upgraded. I have also performed a hard reset at the instruction of Garmin support staff.
- I have sent the unit back to Garmin for diagnostic testing and had it returned with a clean bill of health. The problem continued to occur.
Another behavior, which may be related, is that the signal strength and number of satellites acquired at any given times is nearly always less than my older yellow Etrex unit.
I am hoping that the vast pool of knowledge and experience here in the forums will shed some light on a solution.
Thanks in advance for your comments.