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This was posted by Noblehops at ADVRider.com yesterday. Link here.

Noblehops on ADVRider.com wrote:
You may see this elsewhere, apologies in advance. This was a PITA to sleuth out and I want to ensure that the community and search engines can find it: If you’re experiencing connectivity problems between your iPhone and a Garmin XT2, a very patient Garmin support tech and I may have finally found out why: During the installation of Tread you may have been prompted to install another Garmin app called Explore. That has some overlapping functionality with Tread, and apparently competes for the Bluetooth connection, causing the phone and GPS to constantly lose their connection to each other. This was driving me NUTS during 10,000 miles of touring I did this year.

The solution is to uninstall both Tread and Explore from your mobile phone, delete the pairing on both devices, and then restart both devices. Then reinstall Tread, pair the phone again when prompted during setup, login to your Garmin account when prompted, but DO NOT install Explore if you are prompted to do that. I was not, and I am not certain I know how or when Explore got installed previously. I may have done that separately.

A Garmin support doc describes a bit of this incompatibility, here:

https://support.garmin.com/en-US/?faq=3 ... lkw0tzKJDA

Hope this helps somebody else. I’m not yet perfectly clear if any core functionality is lost without Explore, that article seems to say that although there are slightly different capabilities between the two apps, the core functionality of creating and uploading routes and whatnot are within Tread. I will use it more and if I learn anything important, I’ll report back.

Its fair to say that my issues are not due to this specific fault - I wondered that - as I had both Smartphone Link AND Explore apps loaded as well as Tread, so I deleted them a while back. But it may well be that other BT connections in my phone may be conflicting with Tread.

Also same thing posted on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/M8qPxGF4Chh9t2aG/

Yes, it is the only way to avoid Bluetooth interruptions, but you lose the ability to send gpx from your phone to the XT2. Imagine you are with friends, and they send you a gpx via WhatsApp. Do we have to start sending via USB cable, OTG cable, or micro SD to the GPX? It's absurd.

I have an open incident with this with Garmin support. As soon as the Explore cloud syncs an item from Basecamp, the Bluetooth interruptions start. I've gone crazy trying to find out what it's due to.

At the moment I also have the Explore cloudless pairing, but Garmin needs to fix this. It is not possible to design Tread and leave users without being able to pass via bluetooth gpx that we have stored in Basecamp for 15 years. Garmin disaster.

Aren't they just saying that the issue was caused by having both Tread and Explore open at the same time.

of were they saying that the link to Explore should not be set up.

It sounded like the former.

I'll go back to advRider and ask the question,

Ya, that was my post. Thanks for relaying it here. I have yet to explore the functionality of transferring GPX via Bluetooth.

I believe I was incorrect including reference to the XT - I got that from the Garmin tech article. My understanding is that the XT does not use Tread.

My unit is an XT2 and this discovery follows literal months of testing, swapping out components, reinstalling SW, and more. Garmin is 100% aware of it.

More as I learn it, but it would be good to edit the first post and delete the reference to the XT please.

Hi @Noblehops

Welcome to ZumoUsers - and thanks for letting me post your message here.

I've deleted the references to the XT as requested.

I have Garmin Explore on my phone, but am 99% certain that I've not linked the XT2 to it, and haven't used it to transfer data. So am I right to guess that I'm in the relatively happy place that the BT connection issues won't / don't affect me?

I don't think I've seen any BT problems, just the Tread and how it messes with shaping / via points and routes.

Oop North John wrote: ↑Sun Dec 01, 2024 6:12 pm I have Garmin Explore on my phone, but am 99% certain that I've not linked the XT2 to it, and haven't used it to transfer data. So am I right to guess that I'm in the relatively happy place that the BT connection issues won't / don't affect me?

I don't think I've seen any BT problems, just the Tread and how it messes with shaping / via points and routes.

The problems I had were related to the XT2 and the iPhone losing their BT connection, most noticeable when playing music, or if using the phone. So if you don't do that, you may not have noticed if the phone was disconnecting or not.

The problems with Tread or the XT2 struggling with imported ROUTES are well-known and not unique either. Most of the very experienced people I have spoke with have settled on a different workflow, exporting their routes from their route planning app as “tracks and POI”, in GPX 1.1 format. (Explicitly NOT as a route). Then the track is synced to the device, and converted to a route on the device, which adapts it to the maps and preferences set on the device.

I just tested this workflow again with a route I created in MyRouteApp (on my tablet). I created a route, saved and named it, and then downloaded it. At download I was prompted to specify a format, I selected GPX 1.1 (track, POI). That dropped a GPX into a subfolder that MRA creates on install called MyRoute-app. There are several ways to get that into Tread, I just used the Import function, navigated to the folder where the exported GPX file was, and it imported it into a collection I specified. That synced with my phone and the XT2 wirelessly and without my prompting. Then select the track file on the device, hit the wrench button upper left, and convert it to a route.

Just did it, it worked perfectly, without a laptop, card or cable, so I am satisfied that it’s doing everything I wish. I’m still unclear about what functionality Explore was adding, other than maybe an easier drag-add-drop way of importing stuff in and out, but I can live with that, if that’s the case.

Yes - using a track to create a route works. The XT2 will not alter such a route - unless you deviate AND you have auto re-calculation turned on. If that happens it finds a way to the closest point of the route (which in some circumstances may be behind you - and that too displays RUT behaviour !).

I have tried and tested all ways of getting a route into the Tread XT2 without the route being changed.
Typical behaviour is that Via Points stay more or less in the same location. They are moved lsightly but not in a way that affects the route.
The route between two Via Points is often relocated onto a faster road (or whatever routing preference is set). The shaping points are moved so that they lie on the new route.
It makes no difference whether the route has the original line plotted (eg from BAsecamp) or not (eg from MRA 1.1).
The same thing happens with a route that has been exported from Tread as a GPX file.

I have had 100% success if I take a GPX file and export it to the tread app on my phone, and let it synch. For my tests, it has never failed.
Others have noted that this method too results in a route change - so I have to believe those results. Mine seem to have been a fluke. More to do on that - if I can be bothered.

The route does not change immediately. It changes when the route ahs been fully synchronised with the Explore Database. That can take a few miuntes.

If you install Tread so that you don't 'Enable Storage', then that too seems to prevent the route from being changed. From observations, It cannot synchronise, therefore Tread App cannot see it and the route stays as it is. Doing this allows Weather, Trafic info to come through from the Tread App on your phone. But on my phone, the XT thinks the phone line is still open when both ends of the conversation have hung up. After about three minutes it disbales Bluetooth and then restarts it. Mainly connections are re-established. Turning the XT2 off at the button at the back - short press - and turning on again achieves the same result.

Garmin have all of the test data and my video of this behaviour happening. I very much doubt that they will do anything as a result. I am just gointg ditch Tread, and continue to use Basecamp. Everything then works just like the XT1 - but with no weather and no traffic. Phone calls behave. I can see what the weather is like. The traffic info is often incorrect - and seems to be shown only up to the next Via Point anyway.

Problem ignored and I can stop worrying about it.

Noblehops wrote: ↑Sun Dec 01, 2024 6:52 pm

Oop North John wrote: ↑Sun Dec 01, 2024 6:12 pm I have Garmin Explore on my phone, but am 99% certain that I've not linked the XT2 to it, and haven't used it to transfer data. So am I right to guess that I'm in the relatively happy place that the BT connection issues won't / don't affect me?

I don't think I've seen any BT problems, just the Tread and how it messes with shaping / via points and routes.

The problems I had were related to the XT2 and the iPhone losing their BT connection, most noticeable when playing music, or if using the phone. So if you don't do that, you may not have noticed if the phone was disconnecting or not.

Thanks, I use my XT2 as a music source to play into my helmets BT headset. Something working as advertised!