Garmin 705

My family replaced my Garmin 305 with a 705. I was looking forward to its mapping ability and more reliable ANT+ telemetry. The Garmin fails on both as upgrades.

Mapping: The base map in the 705 is too coarse to be useful for cycling. It only includes major roads. Even at that, the fidelity on the roads is so coarse that I appear to be off the road most of the time. It looks like I keep missing the road and crossing it like a drunk who cannot pass a field sobriety test—I was going to say, like a novice who can't hold a line, but even a novice goes straighter than the 705.

By that fact that it only includes major roads, it has no ability to route on back roads. The map is useful for getting your bearings when you're lost, but the 305's ant trail map was only slightly less useful for that—it had no towns or labels. The map is useful to pointing you in the direction of your destination, but you still have to hunt for appropriate roads unless you like going on major roads. 

ANT+ telemetry: the 705 acquires the connection to the devices much better than the 305 did; however, it still has random erratic days. Look at my HR on motionbased (recovery ride bad hrm). Look for HRM in the description. From what I can tell, the HRM loves to show very high readings when I'm cold. I don't know if it's a galvanic skin response tricking the reading, a weak contact causing it to boost the signal and adding significant noise, or what, but it's useless when I'm shivering.

The 705 is faster at acquiring the satellite lock—it seldom takes longer than 30 seconds whereas the 305 often took up to 5 minutes. It also acquires the connection to the sensors before starting the ride; so, you at least know if it found them.

The 705 does not show the battery status whereas that was at the top of the 305 screen. This lack of feedback could be a problem, but the battery does seem to last longer. I'd love for it to show the battery status of the sensors. As it is, I have to guess that the batteries must be low by the erratic readings.