Garmin Etrex H Issues

[Holdenmc6]

I have had a Garmin Etrex H for 5 years or so now I believe I use it for hunting mostly but have used it for some random hiking and fishing as well. When I first got the unit it worked great it stayed locked almost always except under thick fur's and had a little trouble in heavy foliage in the summer.

 

Lately how ever things have gone way down hill. it takes anywhere from 2 minutes to 10 minutes to get a lock in my driveway which is wide open to the sky all around me. If I am in any amount of cover in the woods what so ever you might as well forget about it. You have to move around usually up hill away from any amount of tree cover to have any luck with a lock. and it takes much longer in the woods to get a lock. It's pretty frustrating.

 

Also I have found that it can not track at all. No matter where I walk to it won't stay locked long enough to track you anywhere. My buddy has the same unit and his will follow him everywhere with a solid track line everywhere we go. Mine doesn't seem to track me anywhere we go. I have tried carrying the unit in front of me carrying it around my neck, on my back in my shirt pocked clipped on to my shirt pocket. I even tried carrying it over my head for a while and nothing seemed to help.

 

I have never updated the software on this unit could that be the problem? I tried last fall before hunting season but never had any luck getting my computer to recognize that it was plugged in. so I tried other computers and didn't have any luck.

 

I now have the Etrex Legend HCx and I love it but I want to get the Etrex H working so my father can take it out with him. Any help would be much appreciated. Also my new unit works everywhere have not had it lose signal yet is there a better receiver in the legend HCx compared to the Etrex H?

[+randco]

Contact Garmin

[or-tracker]

Before contacting Garmin try hard reset: shutdown, press together PAGE, ENTER and POWER for couple seconds. After that device will return to factory settings and be patient to get first satellite lock.

Edited October 27, 2010 by or-tracker

[Holdenmc6]

Before contacting Garmin try hard reset: shutdown, press together PAGE, ENTER and POWER for couple seconds. After that device will return to factory settings and be patient to get first satellite lock.

 

I forgot to mention that I tried this. I meant to put that in my response but it slipped my mind. No change after hard reset sadly

[+Redwoods Mtn Biker]

Update the firmware, then let it "bake", motionless, under open sky for half an hour.

 

There are multiple ways to update the firmware. You can use WebUpdater or do a manual install...

 

http://www8.garmin.com/support/download_de...d=3753#Instruct

[Holdenmc6]

Update the firmware, then let it "bake", motionless, under open sky for half an hour.

 

There are multiple ways to update the firmware. You can use WebUpdater or do a manual install...

 

http://www8.garmin.com/support/download_de...d=3753#Instruct

 

do you have any good links that might help with getting the GPS to be recognized by my PC. I have struggled to ever get it to connect. I have tried searching for a solution on here and some other sites with no luck. I think it has something to do with locating the "comport" it's on but I have no idea how to do that.

[+ecanderson]

do you have any good links that might help with getting the GPS to be recognized by my PC. I have struggled to ever get it to connect. I have tried searching for a solution on here and some other sites with no luck. I think it has something to do with locating the "comport" it's on but I have no idea how to do that.

sigh... let's take this from the top:

 

1) Are you still using the original serial cable that came with your eTrex H, or by some chance did you change to a serial/USB cable along the way?

2) Does your computer have a physical serial port into which you can plug the cable? Does it have MORE than one serial port?

3) What operating system does your computer use?

 

Once we have the answers to those questions, perhaps we can get you connected again.

[Holdenmc6]

do you have any good links that might help with getting the GPS to be recognized by my PC. I have struggled to ever get it to connect. I have tried searching for a solution on here and some other sites with no luck. I think it has something to do with locating the "comport" it's on but I have no idea how to do that.

sigh... let's take this from the top:

 

1) Are you still using the original serial cable that came with your eTrex H, or by some chance did you change to a serial/USB cable along the way?

2) Does your computer have a physical serial port into which you can plug the cable? Does it have MORE than one serial port?

3) What operating system does your computer use?

 

Once we have the answers to those questions, perhaps we can get you connected again.

 

Sorry Ecanderson, I know this has come up more than it's fair share of times. I will post my answers but I will also look around again. The search function is a little strange on here it won't allow me to search for any word less than 5 characters which returns errors when I type in something like "etrex H". anyways;

 

1) I switched to the sierial/USB cable, yes I got the driver that I supposedly needed. It came with the cable but I also tried a few different ones from Garmin and Microsoft.

 

2) I have multiple serial ports.

 

3) I have windows XP SP 2, but I can update to SP 3 if needed.

[+Redwoods Mtn Biker]

Sorry Ecanderson, I know this has come up more than it's fair share of times. I will post my answers but I will also look around again. The search function is a little strange on here it won't allow me to search for any word less than 5 characters which returns errors when I type in something like "etrex H". anyways;

 

Try this search in Google, exactly as entered below:

 

"etrex H" site:forums.Groundspeak.com

[+ecanderson]

Sorry Ecanderson, I know this has come up more than it's fair share of times. I will post my answers but I will also look around again. The search function is a little strange on here it won't allow me to search for any word less than 5 characters which returns errors when I type in something like "etrex H". anyways;

 

1) I switched to the sierial/USB cable, yes I got the driver that I supposedly needed. It came with the cable but I also tried a few different ones from Garmin and Microsoft.

 

2) I have multiple serial ports.

 

3) I have windows XP SP 2, but I can update to SP 3 if needed.

Please verify that you really have a serial port. At most, an older computer will have two. We're not talking about USB ports here.

 

Assuming you DO have a serial port:

 

As the first order of business is to see if the eTrex H is still behaving well enough to use, would it be possible to simplify things and have you use the original serial cable to see if the firmware needs to be upgraded on that unit? If you still have the original serial cable, plug that into your COM1 port on your computer, and use that first with WebUpdater and see if you can get that accomplished. It will be painfully slow (the eTrex H will operate at 4800 baud), but there's no point in getting wrapped around the axle sorting out your USB/Serial bridge driver issue if this unit isn't going to behave.

 

I had a suspicion that you'd switched to USB - and that's another whole kettle of fish. You don't say if that cable has ever worked for you, and it sounds like it hasn't. Some work better than others.

 

If you can communicate with the eTrex H over serial and get it updated using Garmin's WebUpdater that came with the unit, and if it starts to behave normally, THEN it will be worth the brain damage we're likely to put you through to get the USB connection working.

[Holdenmc6]

Thanks for all the help so far everyone, the GPS is actually at my parents house right now so I can not access it or the cable but I will be heading there this weekend so I can get it then. However after punching in Redwoods google search I may have discovered that I have the older Etrex model and not the H, which I believe means the chipset is the older style and doesn't work well in dense cover anyway? Please correct me if I am wrong. If that is the case it's probably not worth even trying to upgrade the firmware? Anyways I will get back to this thread in a few days once I have the GPS in hand. Thanks again!

[+Redwoods Mtn Biker]

However after punching in Redwoods google search I may have discovered that I have the older Etrex model and not the H, which I believe means the chipset is the older style and doesn't work well in dense cover anyway?

 

Correct, the eTrex will not perform as well as the eTrex H under difficult conditions.