New C-80 Problem

Grumpy · Posted: Fri Aug 25, 2006 5:22 pm Post subject: New C-80 Problem

My C 80 has functioned well for nearly 9 months.

Recently it started having the occasional "brainfart" and got itself "lost" for several minutes.

Then it started "forgetting" the settings that have been lovingly inserted into it's tiny brain and losing my page set up and other things.

This progressed to it deciding that we were always in Miami when it stated up until the GPS figured out that we were actually on Whidbey Island. Minor error !!

So I finally gave in, read the manual, read the posts on this site and went to Raymarine support page. From that, I concluded that the most probable course of action was to update the SW since it was clearly well out of date compared to the 3.18 version now available.

Thanks to much good advice on here and the Raymarine site, I navigated the shoals of despair of FAT32 vs FAT16 and actually did a flawless down load and upgrade of the system. Took out the upgrade card and pressed the "reboot" button... up comes the Raymarine starter page and that was the end of that. It just hung there for ever. Couldn't even do the factory reset trick.

Soooooo I went back to the web and got the older 3,17 version of the SW and "upgraded" it back to that.

Now I have a totally blank screen and no reaction to any combination of buttons, resets etc. There is life in there though, I can see green light around the scrolling button !!

Just to add to my joy it is of course, Friday afternoon with a perfect weekend coming up.

Anyone got any ideas ???

I should know better, I have been putting avionics on airplanes for 35 years.

Merv

Pat Anderson · Posted: Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:12 pm Post subject:

Exactly the same thing happened to me when I upgraded the firmware on my C-80. The Raymarine interface is not very good for this, and I too pushed the reset button, which is the natural and logical thing to do, with the same result. I later heard it was covered in the readme or something, but of course I did not readit.

What I did was shut the C80 off by powering down the battery switch - drastic for sure. Then I removed the CF card with the upgrade firmware on it, and inserted my regular Navionics chart card. Finally, I turned the battery switch back on, and turned on the C80. The upgrade had in fact taken, and all was well...

Grumpy · Posted: Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:28 pm Post subject:

Pat,

Thanks for the advice... but... I think I have found a new gremlin as in my case all of the above happened WITH the navionics card in place so I am afraid it has "gone over to the dark side". Only hope it didn't fry the card as well.

Switching off the breaker is now the ONLY way to get the little green light around the scroll button to go out !!

So I have temporarily nailed up my old Garmin 176 (which anyway gets better GPS reception and lower errors even inside the cabin) and I will have to fit my BI-focals upside down to look at it while I wait for RayMarine to answer their support call. (0815 to 1700 EDT only )

Merv

flapbreaker · Posted: Sat Aug 26, 2006 1:59 pm Post subject:

I had a situation where the c-80 would hang on boot up when my house battery voltage got too low. I thought I had some major problem until I figured out my battery problem. Check your battery.

Grumpy · Posted: Sat Aug 26, 2006 7:45 pm Post subject:

Flapbreaker,

Thanks for the thought. Tried it today after about 1 hour at 18 Kts and later on the pad with the Battery charger on. Just in case.

All I get is that little green "booger" behind the scroll knob which must be the caretaker waiting for Monday and Raymarine service to come back to work.

Didn't let it spoil a nice day though and took a trip up to the West side of San Juan Is. and watched Orcas for a while. Made me feel much better about it. Amazing what can be done by the "Old" method of compass and chart. Heck, there could even be undiscovered lands out there......... unknown to Navionics and CNN !!!!

Merv