Just ran an easy four miles tonight. No stats to share I’m afraid as my Garmin battery died within half a mile of leaving the house (I’m sure you’re all pleased you don’t have to wait for the dreaded Motionbased map to load anyway!)
I fear the low battery is something to do with the dreaded “Gold Contact Discoloration“. For those of you who haven’t got a clue what I’m talking about, there are four gold contacts on the back of my Garmin 305 GPS unit. For some reason, possibly sweat related, the one to the extreme left always turns black and won’t make a good connection in the USB charger/cradle.
Every week or so I scratch away at the black surface to restore the shiny gold contact, but as the week goes on the black “corrosion” slowly reappears and my computer connection gets worse and worse. It’s not a major hassle I suppose but slightly annoying when the battery dies mid-run because the unit hasn’t charged correctly.
Oh well, rant over, time to do Week 1 Day 3 of the Hundred Push Ups Plan.
My Garmin has been acting weird lately, but I haven’t had any of the corrosion problems. Instead, it won’t register as a USB device when I turn on my computer. Jostling it in the cradle just causes it to turn on and start looking for satellites. If I reboot the computer, though, then it works normally. I haven’t figured that out yet.
Funny you should mention that Blaine – I’ve had the same problem too.
Actually I’ve started using the USB cable from my digital camera as it seems to be a better connection. Frustrating at time when all I want to do is upload my GPS data….
Thanks for the comment,
–Steve