2019 Garmin NAVI Map Update - Clock Error

[moeller80]

I recently purchased the Garmin 2019 NAVI upgrade from my 2015 GL1800.

The maps updated correctly and the time is accurate but the default date is now Oct 1999.
My NAVI turns to dark mode in the middle of the day since there are fewer lighted hours in October.

Any suggestions?

[moeller80]

I just spoke with Garmin and a few others have had the same issue with the date reverting back to October 1999.
Engineering has been issued a service ticket and will likely have a solution within a week or so.

I was told a replacement SD would be issued so if anyone is having the same issue please contact them to put you on the replacement list.

Garmin: (855) 607-2536

[WingAdmin]

I just spoke with Garmin and a few others have had the same issue with the date reverting back to October 1999.
Engineering has been issued a service ticket and will likely have a solution within a week or so.

I was told a replacement SD would be issued so if anyone is having the same issue please contact them to put you on the replacement list.

Garmin: (855) 607-2536

When they first created the GPS system, they weren't exactly foresighted. They assigned only 10 bits to store the week portion of the date since epoch. What this means is it doesn't store the date as a calendar date, it stores it as "x weeks since epoch" and the epoch date was arbitrarily set to Jan 5, 1980, I suppose that's when GPS went online?

10 bits means you can store numbers up to 1023.

1023 weeks = 19.6 years. So every 19.6 years, it rolls over from 1023 to 0.

That happened for the first time on August 21, 1999, and the second time it happened was April 6, 2019.

Garmin, TomTom, and many other GPS manufacturers didn't bother thinking about this problem (or more likely, their lazy programmers just couldn't be bothered), so they didn't write the code in their GPS units to handle it. Now that the week counter has been reset back to 0, these GPS units think it's 1999 again.

It's inexcusable that they didn't fix this problem LONG ago. It was no secret that it was going to happen.

[C-dub]

This is probably a dumb question, but what happens when you change the date to the correct current date after it defaults to 1999 on startup after installation? Does it still show October 1999?

[AZgl1800]

if go to settings and change the date, it should stay, as long as, the backup fuse for memory is good, and the battery is good.

[moeller80]

I tried to change the date but to do so I had to start on Oct 3, 1999, and press the day button 1023 times plus the days today to catch up.

I'll await the update. It only affects the day /night mode on the display.

[AZgl1800]

I tried to change the date but to do so I had to start on Oct 3, 1999, and press the day button 1023 times plus the days today to catch up.

I'll await the update. It only affects the day /night mode on the display.

Then I would advance the hours so the Day/Night mode changes "almost on time".
screw the actual date.

[C-dub]

I ordered mine a few weeks ago and it is supposed to be here Friday.

For those that have installed theirs and had the date issue, have you reinstalled the old card until the fix is available? Did that resolve the date issue? Or did you just go with the updated maps and will wait for the fix to resolve the date issue?

If I one has tried this and mine does have the date issue after I get it I might try reinstalling the original card and find out myself.

[moeller80]

While I removed the new SD card and reinstalled the 2015 maps, the 2015 maps and dates were accurate. I then placed the 2019 Map update and it continued to have the date start back to October 1999

[C-dub]

All right. MY card arrived yesterday and my wife and I had a 340 mile loop ride planned for today from Dallas to over near Weatherford, then up by Possum Kingdom to near Wichita Falls, then around Lake Arrowhead Park and back home. I wasn't going to plug to new card in for fear it might mess up the whole thing and the trip might be a bust, but I figured what the heck.

I took the old card out this morning and plugged the new one in following the directions included and it worked mostly. I have my clock set for a 24 hour clock and each time I turned it back on after stopping somewhere it always came back on to 2123 and therefore it always started in "night" mode. However, after about a minute or less it figured out where it was at and switched to "day" mode and the correct time. I figure it hooked up with the satellites to do this. I even tried this without going into the map once and it still figured it all out. I takes longer than it did before, much much longer. I did forget to check the system date, so maybe I'll go back out to the garage after eating, turn it on, and see what it says.

[C-dub]

After getting to work this morning I remembered to see what the date was. It took me a while to find it in the GPS setup. It does say 1999, but I didn’t notice how to change the date.

EDIT: Well bugger! I just got home about 30 minutes ago and found the only way to change the date was minute by minute. Holy cow!

I'll be calling Garmin Monday to make sure I'm on the list to get the update and find out how that will occur. I guess it'll have to be a new SD card because there's no other way unless they want me to plug the card into my computer and download something from their website that will update the card that way.

[C-dub]

I just got off the phone with Garmin and the person I spoke with said he hadn't heard of this problem before.

He then went to ask around and low and behold now claims that a whopping 4 others have called to make them aware of this issue. He took down my information and NAV system ID and said they would e-mail me when they had a solution and what to do. He also said they did not have an estimated time line for the fix yet since it would depend on widely the effect and severity of the problem. That sounded to me like, based on the now 5 people they claim are affected that they'll get to it sometime in the next 4-6 years when the next update comes out if Honda will still even authorize it.

This bites!

[C-dub]

I received a file in an e-mail from Garmin a few days ago. I couldn't get to it until today after work. I deleted the files they indicated and copied their new file into the GPS folder on the map SD card. Plugged it back in and appears to have the date and time correct at startup. I'll check more in the morning and see when it switches to daylight mode. So far, though, it appears to be fixed.

[Viking]

The may have only received five or six phone calls about this, but they have for sure gotten a lot more than that in emails. When I emailed them about it when they first informed us that it would occur, back last April, probably, they emailed back and said they had received hundreds of emails about it at that time and they did not want to comment really till after the rollover so they could see how many units were involved in errors. My truck unit has no errors and it is at least five years old, so they did take care of some of the problem in newer units (if five plus is newer).