Any GOOD experiences with Garmin refurb units?

Post climbing gear-related questions, offer advice. For classifieds, please use that forum.
User Avatar
MoapaPk

 
Posts: 7780
Joined: Fri May 13, 2005 7:42 pm
Thanked: 787 times in 519 posts

Any GOOD experiences with Garmin refurb units?

by MoapaPk » Thu Jul 18, 2013 11:54 pm

My Garmin 62stc had the power button fail after 15 months of use -- purely mechanical, it just started requiring harder and harder presses to turn on the unit. I could still communicate with the unit via the USB connection.

I've known several other people who have had the same issue with recent garmin units; this just seems to be a problem of poor manufacturing and quality control.

In any case, I sent the unit in for replacement by a refurb ($110 plus shipping). While waiting for the new unit to come back, I talked with several people who had bad experiences with Garmin refurbs.

When I got the refurb unit and turned it on, it immediately came up with "cannot unlock maps." I called garmin, and they said this was a common problem with stc units, they forget to unlock the 100k maps that are supposed to come with a 62stc, or just corrupt the unlock code. WTF? Don't they do the minimal, most basic checking of the unit -- e.g. making sure it turns on without errors, before sending it out? It doesn't take a genius to know there is something wrong with a unit when it displays an error message immediately upon power-up.

I've collected perhaps 5 stories from people who had serious problems with their refurb units. Is this a remarkable coincidence, or has Garmin added unspeakably bad QA/QC to their reputation for unspeakably bad manuals?

User Avatar
Ben Beckerich

 
Posts: 385
Joined: Sun Jan 02, 2011 3:24 am
Thanked: 67 times in 52 posts

Re: Any GOOD experiences with Garmin refurb units?

by Ben Beckerich » Fri Jul 19, 2013 5:44 pm

Dunno... I have a Garmin Etrex 20 that I bought new that likes to point its arrow in the opposite direction from where my waypoint is. I have to be careful I make sure the "distance" is getting smaller, not bigger, when trying to navigate to waypoints in whiteouts. Love technology!
where am i going... and why am i in this handbasket?


Return to Gear

 


  • Related topics
    Replies
    Views
    Last post

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 0 guests

cron