Oregon Firmware 2.70/2.58 Available — Improved WAAS, Marine
Updated 12/8: New bug: 3D View does not work.
Updated 12/9: New bug: Relief shading always defaults to “Do not Show” even if set to “Show if Available” after power cycling
Updated 12/9: Some reported issues with the altimeter page not displaying data, although make sure the Track Log is set to one of the “Record” modes.
Garmin has released a new version of firmware for the Oregon available via Webupdater. Garmin identifies the following changes in 2.7:
- Added support for Garmin GB Discoverer maps
- Added ability to view marine chart notes for marine points
- Added ability to change the date for the tide and currents charts
- Added a display option in the setup menu to save battery power
- Fixed shutdown that can occur when you enter coordinates in demo mode
- Fixed a potential shutdown that can occur when panning the map that is showing satellite imagery
- Improved GPS accuracy when using WAAS
The major changes seem to be the ability to select the date for tide and current charts, a new battery saver option and a fix for WAAS. Based on some quick tests it also seems like Garmin may have fixed the issue introduced in 2.6 which prevented the Track Log setting from being set differently in different profiles. There was a similar issue around map zoom level settings that may also be fixed.
Webupdater also picked up language file updates for Arabic, Dutch, German and Hungarian when I upgraded to the new release.
Here are a few shots of the new date function available under tides and the new “Battery Save” option under Setup>Display. To change the date on the tide chart tap the chart with your finger to bring up the date selector, scroll to the date you want using the arrows and press the “check” button. Once you have changed the date a new “Chart Notes” button appears but the “Chart Notes” button is empty for the tide stations available in Topo 2008. If you have Bluecharts on your Oregon let us know what this new button does!
Update: If you enable the battery save option the backlight time out feature actually powers off the screen rather than just disabling the backlight. Tapping the screen or power button enables the screen and backlight again. Thank you Garmin!
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I have been able to successfully download and upgrade to the new release. I’ll be testing the release over the next several days to see if these items are fixed and if any new bugs have been introduced. Check back near the end of the week (or join our feed) for a recommendation on whether you should upgrade your Oregon or not.
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December 8th, 2008 at 7:22 pm
Wow, I wonder how much this will extend battery life!
December 8th, 2008 at 7:53 pm
I’m guessing quite a bit. I’ve got a set of batteries charging right now, once they are conditioned I’ll let the Oregon run through them to see how it compares to previous results.
December 9th, 2008 at 4:13 am
Does switching off display actually prevent the unit from wasting power by switching also redrawing the maps etc off?
MP
December 9th, 2008 at 6:15 am
I’m guessing that it probably is similar to turning off the monitor on your computer. The CPU is still doing everything it was already doing but you conserve the power required to run the display itself.
It is possible that Garmin went a step further and just put the GPS into some sort of logger mode where just the GPS and track log work but that would be more difficult to accomplish.
December 12th, 2008 at 11:16 am
Hello,
I tried the feature in car. It SEEMED to me that after I woke up the unit/display it acually showed what was there just before switching the display off. Then in less than 1 sec map “jumped”.
This might be real saver then
MP
December 12th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
I ran a battery test a couple of days ago with the battery saver mode enabled and the Oregon ran for about 22.5 hours. Garmin tech support says that the battery saver mode just disables the screen, nothing more. I’ve noticed that routing, alerts, tones, etc are still available when battery saver mode is enabled which is consistent with Garmin’s statement.
So unfortunately this new mode doesn’t save much over just having the backlight timeout enabled. In my tests the Oregon ran about 21 hours with the backlight turned all the way down which would be similar to having the backlight timeout enabled.
December 15th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
[...] 2.8 Recommended Dec.15, 2008 in Garmin Oregon Last Tuesday Garmin released firmware for both the Oregon and Colorado which seemed to be aimed at providing GB Discoverer support on both platforms prior to [...]