#1 I agree it is a software bug, and not a physical problem.

#2 The Nav system is monitoring your current position all the time, whether you have the system on or not, whether you have a disc in or not.

#3 Yesterday, I wanted it to plot a very long route, but all on the disc, from Wichita KS to the Mankato MN area. During the "10 minutes of calculations" ( which is horrible IMHO, how come google or yahoo can do it in 10 ms? ) I lost all audio. No AM/FM radio, no CD changer, nothing. I even turned off the power **** and turned it back on in 5 seconds.... no audio. I was really convinced I blew the AMP or something, as this went from fine to nothing. NOT like a loose or intermittant wire.

As soon as the "10 minutes of calculations" were over, my radio audio suddenly came back on, and sounded normal.

And no, the "mute" button wasn't on... and it appears the mute wasn't stuck, since I lost audio at the moment I hit "Find shortest route" and audio came back the instant it was "done calculating manuvers". Oh, that was the first time I saw the text message "calculating manuvers" also. Do you guys see that one?

Weird. First time this occured. But again, sounds like a software glitch to me. Also, about 1 month ago I lost all the "history" in my "address book" and I did not disconnect any battery cables, and my radio presets were fine. My adress book entries were steady for like 2.5 years, then gone.
-John

 

You may be right about it monitoring position without a disc... but I find it curious that if that is true... why can't it keep the compass direction on the screen when the disc is out?

 

I'm sure it CAN but it just is told not to.

Again, a software issue.
Just like every FEH can have a water temperature display.
It is there, working 24/7, just the car is told not to show it to you without the diagnostics mode.

 

My belief that it doesn't track without a disk is based on my observations that if I leave the disc in, the next time I start the NAV program, the system shows me right in the correct location when it starts. If I take the disc out... drive somewhere else... then put the disc in. From memory the previous location where the disc was in last will be shown until it gets a new fix. I could have sworn thats how mine acted, but I'll have to verify that to be sure.

I may indeed be wrong... I've been wrong before, I'll be wrong again. I'll check it out when I leave work.

 

Well... on the way home it certainly seemed to track with the disc out for a short while at least so it appears that the GPS is on all the time or its using dead reckoning... more likely the first.

 

Even my Garmin can spend nearly 10 minutes if it is totally lost. It needs to re-acquire multiple satellites, and recalcuate its current location. For what I assume is good reason, it does indeed take that long for all that to happen.

BTW, if I blind folded you, toss you onto an airplane, take you from the airport to a windowless room with a PC, I bet it will take you with google and yahoo more than 10 ms to figure out your current location.

 

Walt, you mis-understood. That's not at all what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about calculating the miles, after your position is already known. My FEH knows were I am, becuase the moving map is current, and accurate, but it still takes 10 minutes to get the miles from Wichita to Mankato. All that territory is on one disc I might add.

My FEH "boots up" and finds my current location within seconds.
Every Time.

I have a 1996 model Garmin. GPS45 I think it is.
It has a B&W screen, tracks only 8 GPS max. and does take 10-15 minutes to do a cold start. Most newer models do a cold start in 30 seconds to 120 seconds.