Zumo 550 is the memory that small?

[samson]

As a GPS virgin I looked very carefully at what was available and what I could afford. I saw some good offers for the Zumo 500 but after asking around I was advised to go the extra pile of beer tokens for the 550 which has a larger memory and would hold all the map info in the unit without resorting to SD cards.

Having succeeded in downloading the free upgrade for NT (version 2010.30) ( Second attempt by the way) I now find that when I want to load it into the unit, it offers me just a single region option. When I bought the mqchine it came with a CD containing the 2009 City Navigator NT Europe. Would that have fitted in the Zumo memory?

Currently I have only been able to load the updated UK and Ireland maps.I have seen other posts on this forum where people have stripped out unwanted programs and made space for maps, but that was usually when they had music or picture files as well. My Zumo is "clean."

If I did want to clear off some of the unwanted files, how do I go about it?

I have no problem with having the other mapping regions on an SD card and the same goes for music but I can't help feeling a bit cheated. I guess GPS units share a common problem with computers i.e. the software folk are churning out more and more complex and memory hungry programs that are outstripping the hardware in quick time. -- I couldn't afford a 660 but I expect that will hit the memory buffers soon!

 

[Tomcat]

I can only answer part of your question as I've never bothered to update the maps in my 550 - but yes, the whole of Europe fits on the 550's internal memory. It sounds as though you still have the original mapset installed, and the free memory left will only hold part of the new map set.

 

[Silver Rat]

Good Question.

I am interested in this post as I too, have exactly the same problem, when I went to download the 'Europe' maps onto the Zumo, I had to pick UK too!

What happens if I want to go a Europe trip? I still need to navigate through the UK to get to a Port!

the instructions don't tell you to strip out the old maps first. Is that what you have to do and if so, how?

Keith

 

[Sleepy]

I've had my 550 for a few years now.. when I first got it I was advised to clear some of the unwanted stuff out.

I connected the unit to the computer, opened up 'Garmin' and moved most of the voices to a folder in the computer's memory, can't remember the size gained, but each 'voice' was about 1.5mb, and there's quite a lot on offer.

I just kept the British voices, no American or Aussie ones either..

 

[samson]

Feeling a bit better about the thing now. Was a bit tired and emotional last night! I think the problem is that the free download 2010 NT version is bigger than the 2009 which came with the machine, so there is just not enough room. I have cleared off the voices apart from the nice English lady and also stripped out the foreign language help folders , which has helped a bit.
I haven't tried to load up the 2010 again but have been playing around with MapSource which is brilliant.

As everybody knows ( I didn't) with Mapsource you can create a route on the PC from any country in the palette of the downloaded 2010 version and save and send that route to the Zumo with which it can easily cope memorywise. It should also leave some space for add ons and clever tools. As I said in my earlier post, as these things become more detailed and complex they soak up more memory and manufacturers are unable to keep up with providing more and more "resident" memory.

Bearing in mind that the bulk of my riding is going to be in the UK I can cope with having the rest of Europe on an SD card so that while I'm away I have the ability to set up new routes across the range of European maps, So I may go that way.

I found the MapSource tutorial posted by the guy who does Best Biking Roads to be very useful for leading folk like me who are treading uncharted paths of new technology.

 

[Ted]

Just had the same problem with updating my 550. Nice man at Garmin helped me through it. Just need to make sure you have space on the 550 and your pc. You need 3.55MB. Plug in the 550 and check you have enough space left on the drive. if not just select and move the voice files you dont need and ether move to pc or delete them, then any music, pictures etc also move delete. Was suprised how much space it all takes.
Then just load up the maps as normal, did you get a CD or download? It takes ages (over 2 hours) to load onto the 550 but only a few min on to the pc. Just follow the on screen prompts, and pick "ALL Europe" when prompted to pick what maps to load, think its the first option. Just a warning if you have the download once it has downloaded to the PC and it tells you to click on the desktop to extract the maps if you are using Vista nothing happens for 20 or 30 min as it checks the program I kept thinking it had failed and nearly blew my top.... Just follow the promps and have patience, cup of coffee, butty.
If all else fails Garmin customer service is exellent, just have time to sit on the "freephone" number and follow there instructions.
Total time foe installing and ready to use was just over 3 and a half hours...

Hope that helps.

 

[Parky]

I had the same problem, so I just loaded Western Europe onto the internal memory, then stuck an 8GB SD card in and loaded the whole lot onto it using Garmin MapInstall, following the instructions on the Garmin website. The only thing that you need to remember is to select the SD card on the drop down in MapInstall. It takes ages to load up as it has to build indexes and a mapset.

I guess that I now have Western Europe on twice, but I don't think that matters. I also don't think it matters where the maps are, on internal memory or on SD card, the 550 knows where to look.

 

[Silver Rat]

Thanks for that Ted, I will have another go later on today to see if I can find out how to delete some stuff! I had heard that you have to delete the old maps first but you make no mention of that, so I presume the pogramme does that for you?

Keith

 

[edzt]

Thanks Ted from myself as well, followed your advice and it works.
Wouldn't let me update the whole of euroland, so loaded UK and Ire.
Didn't realize that it gets rid of the everything else.

Followed Ted's instructions, stripped out all voices from johnny foreigner and
next time the lot loaded

 

[Silver Rat]

Cheers Ted, I removed all the foreign voices and it worked! Europe is now my oyster!!

K

 

[Andy63]

I did the 2010 update which only allowed Western Europe.

I have done the same as Parky I put an 8GB SD card and loaded all Europe on to that,
I tried deleting all the voices but that didn't free up enough memory for some reason.

When transferring the Map data i couldn't find a select all button and had to individually highlight each area and had to zoom in to make sure some city areas weren't missed out (easily done)

Any hoo the issue i have now is that the Zumo switches off immediately after loading maps from the new card. Do I have to add the whole "Garmin" folder to 8 gig card?

If i take out the card and put in the original blank 1GB it works fine.

And once this is done do i need to redo the update for the all Europe on the 8GB card??

 

[Blackal]

Go to Garmin website and download "Mapinstall"

Install on your computer, and use it to update your maps.

It will install the entire mapset.

Al

 

[Andy63]

Have already done that!!

What I am saying is i updated the maps (western Europe) on the GPS a few weeks ago, then bought a 8GB card at the weekend have now put all Europe on the SD card so do i now re-run the update to update the maps on the SD card?

Can I run the update to the SD card slotted in my PC drive??

 

[Andy63]

Well what a total ball ache!!!
I ended up formatting the SD card again and copying the Garmin folder from the Zumo to the SD card!
But when I came to run the 2010 update to the SD card the drive letter representing the SD card wasn't in the drop down menu. Aaargh!!

I tried slotting the SD card in the SD port on my PC but my PC wouldn't recognize it even though it does when the SD card was slotted into the Zumo????

I had to copy the update to my external hard drive and slot the SD card into my laptop (which did recognize it) and run the update on my laptop even now i am still unsure if i have loaded all Europe on the SD card as it just ran the update from start to finish with no options of European areas.

I started this at 5.30pm and finally finished at 10pm and probably four hours the night before getting nowhere. Nice one Garmin you couldn't make it more difficult if you tried!!

 

[Andy63]

Ok well it has taken me most of the week but have suceeded in getting the All Europe maps on my SDcard and working.

Tried using Mapinstall and couldn't get it working thought it was a faulty card as my pc didnt recognse it.

So bought another one 4Gbit this time formatted it to fat32 and ran Mapsource. I highlighted all maps by left clicking the mouse and sweeping it over the maps, then clicked send to device icon at the top of the page the drive for the SD card was available highlighted it and 2 hours late Bobs yer gameshow host!

Once completed the SD card has a folder with 2 files :-
CNEUNT2010.30.gma 3kb's
gmapsupp.img 1,835,840 Kb's.

Total used space on the card 1.75GB

Easy way to tell if you have all detailed europe is to zoom in onto a eastern city I used Warsaw and if the road detail isnt there then you havent loaded it properly.

 

[Zorro]

facing the same problem...
can someone pls provide the link or instructions to deleting the unwanted voices, etc, to release space?
is there a specific type of SD card that the 550 take? i know there are different (physical) sizes
cheers

 

[Scott_Dog]

Everything you ever wanted to know - saved my GPS life a dozen times!

http://www.zumoforums.com/

I also have a 550, removed the files etc. It's all settled now, works a treat. The basemap is the UK, the rest of Europe on an SD Card (which must be formatted FAT32). Also have 3GB of music on the card.

 

[purds]

The updated garmin maps WILL fit onto the garmin itself (ie no need to put part on to an SD card) if you remove the unused files.