Suunto S6 problem

I've got a question for you Suunto S6 users. I've had one a little over a year, and on three separate occasions, when I recorded a day-long log, all I got was about 8 or 9 minutes of gibberish. For example, it thought I skied 8 runs for a total 3500 ft, from 8:15 AM to 8:23 AM.

The first time this happened, I pulled the battery out, replaced it and it worked normally.

I contacted tech support at Suunto, and they told me that if the sensor gets blocked it might not sense barometric pressure accurately, but that certainly doesn't address the problem. Do any of you have any information on this?

On the other hand, playing with techie toys kinda takes the joy out of skiing. I spent the weekend learning to telemark at Killington and have zip diddly squat for a log.

Anyone want this thing cheap?

Tom

pointpeninsula":3pg20pjl said:

On the other hand, playing with techie toys kinda takes the joy out of skiing.

Click to expand...

I agree, but that's one of the things I love about the altimeter watches (or even my GPS) - you hit a button and start it at the beginning of the day, then you never even have to think about it all. At the end of the day you hit the button again to stop it, and then the data are there whether you ever use them or not. I find it's much more useful for backcountry than regular resort skiing however. With regard to your issues, early on with my S6 I found that there were some outings where my altitude would somehow be out of synch with the time of day (based on the time recorded by my camera when pictures were taken) and I couldn't figure out how in the world that was happening. I'm not sure if you switch modes at all on your watch while it's recording barometric pressure, but I think that was what was doing it for me. I wondered if it was mode switching that was making my time and altitude get out of synch, so I started just leaving my watch in ski mode and haven't observed any problems since with a couple more years of use. It could be just coincidence that it worked for me, but it could be something to test if you are switching modes at all while the watch is recording barometric pressure.

-J

J,

You're absolutely right about the mode change. I ran two experiments yesterday; I recorded several hours of logs - on one trial I left the unit in skiing mode, and on the second trial I switched to time mode while the logbook was recording. Sure enough, the first log was several hours long, but the second only reported several minutes of data. That's a software deficiency in my opinion, and the manual doesn't address the situation, but I'll have to keep that in mind.

Tom

Update:

I contacted Suunto and they told me that I should absolutely be able to switch modes at will while the log is accumulating data. My unit is still under warranty, so when I finish the season sometime next month I'll send it off for repair.

I'll let you know how it turns out.

Tom

pointpeninsula":1ny9e68o said:

I've got a question for you Suunto S6 users. I've had one a little over a year, and on three separate occasions, when I recorded a day-long log, all I got was about 8 or 9 minutes of gibberish. For example, it thought I skied 8 runs for a total 3500 ft, from 8:15 AM to 8:23 AM.

Click to expand...

I just noticed this thread. I've had my Suunto S6 since mid-season 2006. I've never had any problems like the ones you've mentioned if that can reassure you. The only problem wasn't directly Suunto related (well, maybe a bit because they cannot run on Macs) - Virtual PC for Mac crashed and part of a season worth of data (Mammoth, Timberline in Summer 06 and Jay hike for turns October 06, etc). ](*,)

Thanks for the reply, Patrick.

I'd forgotten about this post. Suunto indicated that the unit was still under warranty, so I sent it back. They have an interesting warranty policy, I suppose. The tech verified that the problem exists, but because they don't have repair parts, the best they could do was replace the battery and O-ring and send it back.

At least they bothered to respond to me and try to correct the problem, which some companies won't do, so I'm not completely put off.

Tom

I'd think that if they're aware of the problem but can't fix it they'd replace the unit, no?

That would have been nice. They indicated that the unit is discontinued, which I suppose translates into none in stock, along with no 'repair parts'. (In reality, I doubt they'd try to do board-level repair on it even if they had parts.) The normal repair process would probably be replace the innards completely.

A new comparable unit would have been even better, but they didn't offer that, and I didn't press the matter.

Tom