NMEA Connections to ST2000+

[RiverRunner]

Bingo! 'The pilot must be in Auto mode' was throwing me off. Since I was trying to work this out at the dock, most of my tries were in Standby.
Out on the water in auto mode, everything worked fine. I could get the error message, and better yet Track Mode works! Is there any way to turn up the alarm sound level? When I reach a waypoint (if under power; the Yanmar YSM8 is loud) I can hardly hear the waypoint advance alarm.
One last question: some of the forums have been reporting problems with 'more than 4 character' waypoint names. I see no such problem (now). Has this always been just nonsense, or has something been done about it?
Thanks a bunch for working through this with me;
Best Regards!