+txknight Posted June 10, 2006 Share Posted June 10, 2006 I just bought a Garmin 60CS and bought new batteries for it. After 30min of use, the batteries died. I put new ones in again, and nothing happens. Is the Garmin 60CS just a massive battery drain (despite supposedly being able to last 20hrs on new batteries), or do you guys think the batteries just expired at the store? If the batteries expired, how can I be sure that I'm getting batteries that haven't expired? TXKnight Quote Link to comment
+Runaround Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 What brand of batteries? Quote Link to comment
+BlueDeuce Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 Try the batteries in something else. Quote Link to comment
+Team JSAM Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 put the batteries in a dig. camera and if it powers up then its your gpsr Quote Link to comment
+Munin Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 I just bought a Garmin 60CS and bought new batteries for it. After 30min of use, the batteries died. I put new ones in again, and nothing happens. Is the Garmin 60CS just a massive battery drain (despite supposedly being able to last 20hrs on new batteries), or do you guys think the batteries just expired at the store? 30 minutes seems waaaaay short - even if you had the compass enabled and backlight on high I'd expect you to get more runtime than this. (As a test, I powered mine up a while ago and turned on full backlight and compass. It took 35 minutes to drop to the 50% point, and another 35 minutes to drop to 25%. That's using 2500 mAh rechargeables in a 76CS, which has the same guts as your 60CS.) My first thought might be to double-check that the non-functioning batteries are installed the right way. Ummm, not that I've ever made that mistake or anything. (*cough* *cough*) It...ummmm...happened to a friend of mine. Yeah, yeah, that's the ticket! I might next check that you've got the GPSr set properly for the type of batteries that you're using - hit Menu Menu Setup System and check the Battery Type setting. Alkaline for non-rechargeables, NiMH for rechargeables. If the setting is wrong, the GPSr may miscompute the battery life remaining and shut down prematurely. Next idea is to make sure the backlight is off - if you look at the little icons along the top of the display you should not see one that looks like a lightbulb. If you do, just briefly press the Power button to bring up the backlight setting, and then press it another one or two more times to turn the backlight off. The backlight is a major battery drain, so use it sparingly. If the compass is on, there'll be an icon at the top that looks, well, kinda like a compass. (Okay, maybe more like an eyeball - but it's supposed to be a compass. ) You can toggle it on and off by pressing and holding the Page button. Leaving the compass running isn't quite as bad as the backlight, but it still has a noticeable effect on battery life. (For the compass, just remember to calibrate it whenever you switch batteries, then turn it off and toggle it on only when you need it - it doesn't have to be running continuously to function properly.) The 20 hour lifespan is based on no backlight, no compass, no WAAS, and enabling 'battery saver' mode (which drastically reduces the rate at which it scans the satellites - generally not a good idea for geocaching). If the batteries expired, how can I be sure that I'm getting batteries that haven't expired? If you've got a multimeter in your toolbox, test the voltage on the batteries and see if they're low. Or as BlueDeuce and Team JSAM suggested, stick them in something else - a flashlight can work well if you know how bright it ought to look when running on good batteries. If you're using brand-new rechargeables, they usually take a few charge/discharge cycles before they start taking a full charge, so for NiMH don't get too concerned until you've run them through a few cycles. Regardless of whether you got alkalines or NiMH rechargeables, don't set your hopes too high if they're steeply-discounted off-brand/no-name brands. Sometimes there's a very good reason why a box of 100 "UberCell Incredible Mega-Maximum Batteries" is selling for $1.50. Quote Link to comment
+Renegade Knight Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 I just bought a Garmin 60CS and bought new batteries for it. After 30min of use, the batteries died. I put new ones in again, and nothing happens. Is the Garmin 60CS just a massive battery drain (despite supposedly being able to last 20hrs on new batteries), or do you guys think the batteries just expired at the store? If the batteries expired, how can I be sure that I'm getting batteries that haven't expired? TXKnight Sounds closer to the GPS has an issue or a short than dead batteries. The easy check is to try a different brand of batteries. Quote Link to comment
+txknight Posted June 11, 2006 Author Share Posted June 11, 2006 Funny thing is, I just put the batteries back in a moment ago, and they seem to work fine. The GPS gave a full bar of health for the battery! Sam Quote Link to comment
+dumketu Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 (edited) I just bought a Garmin 60CS and bought new batteries for it. After 30min of use, the batteries died. I put new ones in again, and nothing happens. Is the Garmin 60CS just a massive battery drain (despite supposedly being able to last 20hrs on new batteries), or do you guys think the batteries just expired at the store? If the batteries expired, how can I be sure that I'm getting batteries that haven't expired? TXKnight I just has something similar happen. I switched out some batteries that were going dead for fresh ones. When I turned on the unit, it worked for about 10 seconds then died. Switched out bateries several times with the same results. Finally, I managed to get to the menu and turned GPS off. The unit stayed on and so I turned GPS back on. Everything works fine now. Not sure what the problem was. I would be interested to know if anyone else has had this problem. There was a thread on strange battery behavior earlier, I wonder if this might be related? Brian Edited June 11, 2006 by dumketu Quote Link to comment
+altoviola Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 I had a similar problem with a Garmin eMap. Brand new batteries lasted about 15 minutes. I swapped them out for another set of new batteries, and those died in less than a half hour. I wasn't using the backlight or anything. When I brought the batteries home, they tested at full power *shrug*. I'm having amazing luck with some new lithium batteries I'm using in my etrex legend. I've used it for a solid 10 - 12 hours (sometimes with backlight) and it's still reading 100% power. Those batteries run almost $20 for an 8 pack, but it sure is worth it! Quote Link to comment
+scavok Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 I have a 60cs and if I go and buy dollar store brand AAs, or even regular energizers or duracell that look like they have been sitting on the shelf for a while, the GPS drains them in less than an hour. I invested in some 2500 NiMH AA's (a 4 pack for 10 bucks) and a charger (also about 10 bucks). I cached today for about 6 hours straight on a single pair of those with the barometer, WAAS, and compass running while beeping with autorouting. I then came home, popped them in the charger and will do the same tomorrow Quote Link to comment
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