The Garmin "X" Collars

The TT15X is a track and train collar while the T5X is tracking only. Both collars are compatible with the Astro 430, all four Alpha handhelds, and the PRO 550 Plus. They can be tracked from multiple handhelds at the same time and can be run at the same time as TT10, TT15, and T5 collars.

Please note that Garmin's "X" collars are NOT compatible with the Astro 320 or 220.

The "X" collars have the same physical design as Garmin's regular size collars, but with several upgraded features:

Longer Battery Life -- up to 80 hours of run time using the 2.5 second update rate

Garmin Express Update Option -- you can update your "X" collar's software with Garmin Express

Sleep Mode -- you can put your "X" collar into sleep mode using Alpha handhelds, extending battery life even longer

Collar "About" Screen -- on Alpha 200i and 200 handhelds you can check your "X" collar's software version

---

Extended Battery Life

The biggest improvement on these collars is longer battery life.

Every time we talk with Garmin, battery life is a topic. With the "X" collars they have drastically increased battery life and added options to stretch it out even longer if needed.

We are seeing between 60 and 80 hours of run time off a single charge with a 2.5-second update rate. Setting your collar on a 5 or 10-second update rate will push it past 80 hours, and a 2-minute update rate will give you over 130 hours.

This will be especially helpful for folks with big running dogs or in lost dog situations. An "X" collar set in Rescue Mode drops down to a 2-minute update rate when the battery reaches less than 25% capacity, giving you the maximum possible time to locate a lost dog. More battery life = more time.

There are few things more useless than a tracking collar with a dead battery.

Keep in mind that this extended battery life option doesn't change my take on charging your collars.

I still recommend that you charge them after every use.

I want you to have the maximum battery life available if you need it. The only way to make that happen is to charge your system before each use. Also, keep in mind there has not been a change in the handheld batteries, so you will still need to charge them pretty much every night anyway.

Updating Your Collars with Garmin Express

With the "X" collars, you can now update both your collars and your handheld with Garmin Express.

This eliminates the need to have multiple programs installed to keep your system up-to-date. I prefer Garmin Express for several reasons, but not being able to update everything from one program has been a hassle. Now every new dog tracking product can be updated using Garmin Express.

Sleep Mode

The "X" collars have a Sleep Mode option just like the Garmin MINI collars.

Sleep Mode allows you the option of using your Alpha handheld to shut off both radios in the collar (GPS and handheld communication), significantly extending battery life. The collar searches every few seconds for a turn-on signal. Once you give the signal from your handheld, the radios turn back on and the collar returns to normal communication mode.

Note that you must be within range to activate the collar.

This is a specialized feature that really isn't going to be used by most of our customers. It's designed for situations where either you can't get to a dog in time to pick him up and are forced to leave him out overnight, or you are intentionally leaving him out and want to preserve battery life.

We have a few folks that like to leave their collars on their dogs all day while hunting, even when moving around in their vehicle, and Sleep Mode lets them conserve run time. I'm not sure if it's still necessary with the longer battery life, but the option is there.

Folks with livestock protection dogs will like the Sleep Mode feature. It will give you extra-long battery life while still keeping up with the location of your dogs.

"About" Screen

The "X" collars give you the ability to view your collar software data on your Alpha 200i or Alpha 200 handheld.

This means you can check the software version from your handheld without the use of a computer. Not a giant deal, but it's a feature that we had back in the Astro 320 / 220 days, and it's nice to see its return.

---

I'm extremely pleased with these new collars.

We always want more range, longer battery life, and more durability from our tracking collars.

While we only get one of the big three updated here, it's an important update -- perhaps the most important -- and it will make finding lost dogs easier.

---

Transcript from Steve's Video

So this is the GARMIN TT15X. If you're familiar with the TT collars, it looks exactly like the current version of the TT15. The X collars have three major differences. The first difference is gonna be battery life. And that's the most important difference here. The battery life on this collar is substantially better than what we have in the TT15s right now, and it blows the TT15 MINIs out of the water.

In a two and a half second update rate, you're looking at between 60 and 80 hours of run time off of a single charge. The variance in there is gonna depend on a couple of things. Whether you run your lights, how much you're stimming the dog. Depends on what you're doing.

There's a difference too, between straight run time, and then you turn it on and turn it off, you'll get some differences there. But it's substantially longer than what we've had before, and that's a big deal, especially in a lost dog situation. The other. Two things. One of them's a giant deal. One of 'em is one of those things where it just depends on what you do.

The next big deal is that you can update the TT15X collars through Garmin Express. Prior to the 15X collars, you had to use Web Updater to update your collars. And so now everything that Garmin has on the market can be updated through Garmin Express. So that's handy, cuts down on the number of programs you have to have.

And then the last new thing is that the 15X has the sleep mode function for the collars, which we've had that in the MINI 15s, but we have not had that in the regular 15s. So the 15X has sleep mode. For most people that is not a big deal. But for folks that have dogs that are, that are out a long time and they're either intentionally not recovering them at the end of the day, or they can't get to them at the end of the day and they need to be able to leave them out overnight, the sleep mode option allows you to power down the collar so that it's no longer using its radio functions. And then when you return to the area all you have to do is go back into it and wake the collar up.

When you're looking at the collar, you go into your menu and right here, we have adjust sleep mode. And so you select that and then you are gonna go, I'm gonna put this collar to sleep. And so if you watch it, it's going to shut down. Okay. So basically it is lost all communication with the collar and it, that way, your, your battery's just not being used hardly at all.

And what the collar's gonna be doing is that it is going to wake up and look for a wake signal. And so what's happening is there's a rotation. And what it's doing is instead of constantly broadcasting and pulling GPS signals, it's waiting to wake up for a radio signal. So when you get back in the area, you want to turn it back on, you go back into your menu and you adjust collar sleep mode, and we're going to wake and now it's gonna take a second for it to update.

There you go. And you'll notice that the GPS has not quite come on yet, takes a second for it to pick back up. But basically that allows you to power down the radio signals on the collar so that it's no longer doing GPS or MURS communication. And that's going to drastically improve your battery life.