Charge 5 Dementia?

[CAR49ers]

A week ago, my Charge 5 would stop recording my golf round early in the round.  This has never happened before in over two years!  Three days ago, I restarted it after a round, and the clock was off by six hours and twenty-one minutes! I have reset the watch multiple times using both the Settings/Reset in the watch and using the three taps with the power cord.  The watch will not capture the correct time, and as a result, the watch freezes when trying to sync.  The watch is recording most information, including sleep, but at the wrong time, and not Daily Readiness, any of the Health Metrics, nor Stress Management.

I have ordered a Charge 6; however, I want to know if there is a solution for my Charge 5 before I open the new box. Any assistance or advice would be greatly appreciated.

[RiekoC · Accepted solution]

Hello @CAR49ers 

Although I'm not sure that this will work, you could try removing your Charge 5 from the Fitbit app and adding it back as a new device. I'd also restart the Charge 5 after disconnecting it from the app. 

Please let us know if that helped. 

[CAR49ers]

Holy-moly, Batman, that might have actually worked!  I need a day or two to verify that the Daily Readiness, Active Zone Minutes, Stress Management, and Health Metrics all function correctly, but at least I have the correct time again.  Be back at you in a couple of days.  Thanks

[CapeCodLady]

I can't count the # of times this has happened to me & the battery has died. I wouldn't find out till the next day that the time is totally off by hours. Anytime the watch goes under 15%, it loses its battery quickly. Now I do my weekly charge on Wednesdays, rather than the weekend. I usually get 7 days on a full charge & I keep the syncing mostly off, no GPS, no messages, etc. Return the other watch...😊 FB used to be the #1 tracker for health, but the ratings have been going down. Good luck!

[CAR49ers]

Well, I am roughly 24 hours into the recommendation of restarting the device as a new Charge 5, and everything appears to be working correctly.

After reading that Google had acquired FitBit and was moving away from FitBit to the Google Pixel watch, I was ready to give up after nine years as a FitBit user.  I am hoping that Fitbit will be around for a while, but all good things come to an end, I guess.  When this Charge 5 dies for real, I guess I will move on to something else.  But, in any event, thanks for the help on this one.

---

Thanks, CapeCodLady.  I think this problem is resolved, but my battery doesn't last nearly as long as yours.  However, I will struggle through that issue.  At least, now I can see the correct time again, and the functions I rely upon seem to be working again—life's little problems.

[RiekoC]

Hi @CAR49ers 

Thanks for letting us know that setting up your Charge 5 as a new device fixed your time issue and you're seeing your stats again. I'll have to remember that for other users experiencing a similar issue. 

Have you tried restarting & recharging your Charge 5 for the faster rapid battery drain? When my Charge 5 started having rapid battery loss, I restarted and recharged my device multiple times over several days. As soon as I saw a rapid drop in battery, I restarted my Charge 5 and put it on the charger until it was back to 100%, often doing this multiple times in a day. Eventually, this process got my device "unstuck" and the battery went back to lasting 6-7 days. Although there's no guarantee that this will work for you, it might be worth a try.

[CAR49ers]

Status Report:

The good news is that it appears all the functions are working correctly, even my Afib indicator last night!

The not-so-good news is that the watch no longer tracks my 4-hour round of golf!  I have been using the watch for four years in the Arizona heat and have never had a problem until a couple of weeks ago, which caused all the other issues.  The watch starts fine, and somewhere between 30 and 120 minutes, the watch goes to the blue diamond of dementia. Both Monday and Tuesday, the watch automatically started functioning again when I got home.  Today, the blue diamond disappeared and the watch screen went blank and would not return until I hooked up the power cord showing 51% charge and a sync.  On all three days the watch did not retain any of the time I had it in Golf mode.  Is the watch now overheating and indicating a slow death?  Any ideas?

[RiekoC]

Hello @CAR49ers 

Thanks for the update. 

I'm wondering if 4 years in the Arizona heat has finally taken a toll on your Charge 5 and it's now overheating, causing it to shut down. There aren't any troubleshooting steps that I can think of at this moment. If I do come across something that might help, I'll report back. 

[CAR49ers]

😆 I guess I should become a FitBit problem solver as that was my
assessment also! I will keep trying different things and let you know if
anything works.

Charlie

[RiekoC]

Hi @CAR49ers 

There's a real long shot that I'm not at all sure would work for your situation. A user had an issue where their Charge 5 was only showing the flashing Fitbit logo. They were able to restore their Fitbit by subjecting it to freezer temps. This thread (<-- click) details the steps they took. 

I'm most likely totally off base mentioning this, but ya never know until you try. 

[CAR49ers]

Well, that is interesting, but I will have to wait until Tuesday when I
play again with the temperature will be around eighty when I start
and ninety-five when I finish.

I played Friday under similar temperature conditions, and the watch held
the "Golf" mode for the entire round! However, I did not post because
two variables were different from recent rounds. Besides the temperature
being about fifteen degrees cooler, I also charged the watch to
approximately eighty-five percent from the time I got up until I left for
golf. So, was it the lower temperature, the higher charge, or a
combination?

At the end of the week and a few more rounds I will update my findings.
BTW, thanks for staying on top of this for me.

Charlie