• This topic has 13 replies, 8 voices, and was last updated 7 years ago by gray.
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  • Using a Garmin 520 at night !
  • paulmgreen
    Free Member

    Ok .. STW people…… i am very happy with my Gramin 520 in the day….. but at night there are sooooooo many button presses and clicks to turn the display back light on!

    Am i being dim (pun) or is there no single button press to turn it on – and keep it on ??

    ianfitz
    Free Member

    I’ve not used that version but on my 800 you short press the on/off switch. That takes you to a screen that has the screen brightness options on.

    Hopefully it’s similar on yours?

    paulmgreen
    Free Member

    yes… that gives the % setting ……. but thats all…..

    you seemingly can’t just press a button or option quickly that will turn the light on

    bob_summers
    Full Member

    No way that I’ve found either, aside from just leaving backlight on. Battery life is way down from the 500 though, so I’m loath to shorten it further.

    Dibbs
    Free Member

    Seems pretty straightforward in the owners manual (Page 2).
    Press any key to turn on the backlight.
    From the Status page press Brightness > Brightness to adjust the brightness, press Brightness > Backlight Timeout to adjust the timeout.

    https://static.garmin.com/pumac/Edge_520_OM_EN.pdf

    paulmgreen
    Free Member

    That’s not actually how it works!

    You can only adjust the brightness. You have to go all into the settings to adjust time or to stay on. As bob say above other option is to leave it on all the time is settings but then it zaps the battery in day time rides.

    Garmin seem to have made a basic usability error

    cp
    Full Member

    That’s weird, a tap of the screen on the 800 pops the backlight on

    Edit, oh, the 520 isn’t touch. Err, there not a setting that makes any button illuminate the screen? Weird!

    mrblobby
    Free Member

    Can you not just leave the backlight on all the time? Out for a couple of hours with the backlight on the 820 last night and it used up about 20% of the battery.

    mrblobby
    Free Member

    Might have been mentioned but you can also get a remote for the Edge. You can program one of the buttons to activate the back light.

    deadkenny
    Free Member

    Backlight off, helmet light. Simple.

    paulmgreen
    Free Member

    Leaving the backlight on all the time is fine, but weekends I’ll often be out for 4 hour rides so I shouldn’t need to keep going into se things to turn off for daytime rides ….. All of a sudden it could easily just 3 rides and battery is flat in the event I forget to charge it

    I find it hard to see why the software guys at Garmin have over looked this …..se thing the brightness is a single click but you have to navigate several menus to keep backlight on

    The Garmin knows the time so it would surely be easy to programme it to stay on in the dark !?

    mrblobby
    Free Member

    The 820 pretty much does that as it has an auto brightness feature and changes with light levels. Does the 520 not have that?

    gray
    Full Member

    Don’t think the 520 has a light sensor. Nothing to stop it using the fact that it knows the time and its location to figure out if it’s likely to be dark though. Tomtom car units do that.

Viewing 14 posts - 1 through 14 (of 14 total)

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