Garmin woes

[Unregistered]

I have become less and less enthralled by my Garmin 205. I seem to have considerable problems in maintaining a satellite connection which means that I cannot get any useful information regarding pace etc. During the 16 mile run on Sunday I thought I would give it another chance - sky was bright and clear, the route didn't involve any particularly long distance under trees or beside tall buildings.

It took ages to find a satellite to begin with and I always feel so stupid hanging around outside the front gate glancing furtively at my wrist before starting off. I used to try leaving it in the back garden to start it off and then whizz round the side of the house, but we live in a three story victorian jobby and with the couple of seconds it takes to leg it around the side gate to the road the satellites had flown off and i would have to start again. Sunday was no exception, I kept getting the weak satellite response even when running down a road devoid of trees but with just a tiny passing cloud over head. Is it faulty, or am I too short at a little over 5ft 3ins to wear it? I really wanted some feedback on pace over the longer distance. The route which we roughly estimated to be 16 miles was only measured at something 14.7 miles by the Garmin, but I later measured it both by car and on the OS map with a wheel and using the gmap pedometer (overkill?) and it was at least 16.8.

Should I contact Garmin? The only other similar gps system I know of is on the boat belonging to the dive club that Mr SW is a long time memnber of, that works perfectlly and as soon as it is turned on