GPS slow to find sattelites?

[graham]

My 4 yr old handheld Magellan Sportrack GPS is now very slow to initially lock on to the sattelites (up to 30 minutes).

Once locked on it stays locked on to several sattelites all day.

Any possible reasons or is it just tired ?

 

[Talbot]

probably in need of an almanac update. Leave it switched on for the weekend and that may fix it. (worked for me)

 

[graham]

Cheers Mark .I'll give that a try.

 

[Phoenix of Hamble]

Or might be an early sign that its on its way out.... mine started taking a while to lock on, and eventually, a year later didn't lock on at all....

 

[graham]

Sod off Neil. Marks reply is much more acceptable /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[Phoenix of Hamble]

Lol...... don't blame me when you get horribly lost in the middle of the Irish sea and have to ask a passing tanker which was Bristol is then.... /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[thurloo]

hi

Go to country list and re-initiate this worked for me still going 7 years later. regards dave

 

[graham]

Thanks Dave.i'll try that this afternoon,the handbook is on the boat but i vaguely remember reading something about that.

Cheers

 

[jhr]

I'm having similar problems with my Sportrak (same vintage or thereabouts). It also told me that I was going down the Beaulieu River, heading North at 20 knots the other day

.

I wondered if it was something to do with the internal battery dying the death, but I'll try re-installing the Country, as I prefer this answer to Neil's as well /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif.

 

[Phoenix of Hamble]

I really really hate eternal optimists..... /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

 

[Guest]

Various reasons ...

Internal database needs update - leave switched on and tracking sats for a few days. Usually happens if set has bneen left in a drawer / etc. unused for significant period.

Internal battery failing ... this leads to loss of internal data and as long as some power comes from it - switching on as above will work - till day the battery completely dies.... then change of battery required to get it working again.

Suggest that you power from 12v supply and forget batterys - they will not last long enough to update ... Also just because machine is tracking does not mean it's finished its update ... leave it for as long as you possibly can .... and try not to move around - leave it stationary.

4 yrs old is nothing and should be fine once sorted. My Meridien is a late 80's job and that still works ... apart from screen fades after a few hours ..

 

[Twister_Ken]

Dunno if the Magellan is the same, but my Garmin h'helds have an internal battery which powers the memory that holds the almanac data. That internal battery recharges from the AA's or better still from the boat's 12v feed. Make sure you power up and leave powered for long enough for that internal battery to suck in some juice. I think Garmin recommends a minimum of 24h.

 

[Guest]

Some of the older ones unfortunately are not rechargaable ... hopefully seen less and less now !
But of course recharge also fail after a while ..

 

[graham]

Thanks for the advice people. I re initialized it with country etc etc left it on and now its locking on straight away.Dont know if I have much confidence in it now though.May have to relegate it to a back up set.

PS it usually gets its power from the 12 volt DC system through a mounting bracket.If you take it off the bracket it automatically switches to its pair of double A batteries.

 

[Guest]

See ... thought you'd get there in the end !!

Back-up ? Second set ... plenty of hand-helds available cheap second hand ... and many with plotting capability. I have a proper mounted plotter and the basic eTrex as second back-up ... can even connect the eTrex to the plotter to provide data if plotters GPS engine fails.
The eTrex also gives me an emergency grab-bag GPS ...