zumo 396 glitches

[cachs005]

Just returned from a long trip and noticed some glitches on my zumo 396. First of all on the 5th day i encountered some rain and the gps stopped working with the mount connectors. I couldn't test the connector since i didn't have the meter with me so i strapped it to the mount and connected the gps via a usb cable. i managed all holiday like that.

Now for the glitches. Glitch 1: i noticed that when passing under tunnels, the vehicle icon continues to move in a straight line not follow the curvature of the tunnel, most of the time ending in empty space or other streets and having to recalculate. i never did it before. I first encountered this problem in Austria/Germany/Italy

Glitch 2: sometimes we i was doing mountain passes or curvy roads, the vehicle map would veer off the street and go into empty space and after some point in time it rejoins the road.

Glitch 3: I use trip planner for my routes and use a waypoint for the start and a waypoint for the finish, with shaping point in between. If i need to go somewhere along the road (eg a petrol station) and search for and Add as next stop, the gps would calculate and sometimes add a ridiculous amount of distance left. Example if distance remaining is 100km and i add a petrol station as my next stop, the gps would recalculate the distance remaining sometime to 300 or so which would be absurd. I would zoom out of the map and mark a straight line in the middle of nowhere.

I have been using zumo 396 for some years and i don't want to get rid of it since i find it very easy to use. If anyone has any idea of what might cause the glitches mentioned it would be of great help to rectify them

[jfheath]

Just returned from a long trip and noticed some glitches on my zumo 396. First of all on the 5th day i encountered some rain and the gps stopped working with the mount connectors. I couldn't test the connector since i didn't have the meter with me so i strapped it to the mount and connected the gps via a usb cable. i managed all holiday like that.

Good compromise. Best not to leave it like that though - the vibration will affect the circuit board connections for the USB socket.

Now for the glitches. Glitch 1: i noticed that when passing under tunnels, the vehicle icon continues to move in a straight line not follow the curvature of the tunnel, most of the time ending in empty space or other streets and having to recalculate. i never did it before. I first encountered this problem in Austria/Germany/Italy

That's normal. There is not satellite signal, so it doesn't know exactly where you are. It knows you are in a tunnel, but it has to assume that you are traveling in the same direction and at the same speed as when you went in. From your comments I guess it doesn't bother following the road.

If you speed up when you are in the tunnel, the Zumo will not know that you have sped up. Watch your indicated speed when you emerge into daylight - and in order to get to the tunnel exit from way back in the tunnel where it thought you were in just one second, well that has to be a speed well into 3 figures !!

Glitch 2: sometimes we i was doing mountain passes or curvy roads, the vehicle map would veer off the street and go into empty space and after some point in time it rejoins the road.

Steep mountain sides, tall building, city centres, busy motorways with high sided vehicles - all have an effect on the stanavs ability to fix your position. Mountains in particular. A smilar thing applies to the situation in the tunnel. Except the satnav can probably see one or two satellites still, but you need 4 or 5 in order to get a good positional fix. It is bound to make errors.

It's worth remembering this if you rely on your speedo for an accurate speed. Your satnav doesn't know how fast you ARE going. It can only work out how fast you have been going in the last few seconds - and for that it relies on a good positional fix. If it cannot get one, your position and your reported speed will be wrong.

Glitch 3: I use trip planner for my routes and use a waypoint for the start and a waypoint for the finish, with shaping point in between. If i need to go somewhere along the road (eg a petrol station) and search for and Add as next stop, the gps would calculate and sometimes add a ridiculous amount of distance left. Example if distance remaining is 100km and i add a petrol station as my next stop, the gps would recalculate the distance remaining sometime to 300 or so which would be absurd. I would zoom out of the map and mark a straight line in the middle of nowhere.

I have been using zumo 396 for some years and i don't want to get rid of it since i find it very easy to use. If anyone has any idea of what might cause the glitches mentioned it would be of great help to rectify them

I assume that you have a Via Point at the start and end and just Shaping points (blue discs) tomark the rest of the route. 'Waypoints' is the term that Garmin has alwasy used for its Saved locations - and they can be set as either Vias or Sahping points in a route. Vias appear as Ornage flags on the Zumo map.

I'm not certain what is going on here - becasue I don't know how the 396 behaves. I'll assume that it is similar to my 595.
1. It might have been affected by how you found the petrol station. Becasue you need to set where it is going to search. Probably the last time that you used the search is when you were at home - so that is where it will look first. I'm not saying this is what you did - but something like this is a possibility. You find a list of petrol stations and thye are displayed with arrows and mileage, and you choose one that you think is close by. It may be close to your home, but you don't spot that. You select it. You add it as the next stop. GArmin often uses the word 'Stop' to mean a Via point. That doesn't mean it is adding a new via point into your route - not as you picture it anyway. It means it is going to take you there NOW, and then bring you back. So the extra mileage might be the distance back home and back again. So 100km left. 100km away from home. Its taking you back home (100), back here (100) then to the rest of the route (100).

The issue may stem from that initial search.

At the top of the screen that is presented when searching for something - is a white search text box - inviting you to type something in.

And - it almost goes un-noticed - hiding in plain sight at the top left of the screen, is either a blue box which says something like "Searching Near MyTown" - which reads as a statement of fact rather than an invitiation to press it and change it to something else - which is why it often gets ignored.

OR

There is a small blue box with a teardrop shaped Icon. This is far easier to ignore.
But it means the same thing - Whereabouts do you want to search ?

Whichever one you see, press it and make sure it is searching : either where you are now, or your active route (my preference). Choose one that it ahead and not to far away, and add that as a point to your active route - or as the next Via.

Then check the distance to the end and check the preview map to make sure that it hasn't messed up.