Problem with map update on 2820

[canucklehead-biker]

Recently purchased a used 2820 from another forum member. Good shape, looks brand new, quite pleased with it. Put it on the bike last weekend to give it a try, and looked for an address in a not-all-that distant town... which the unit didn't recognize. WTF?! Tried some other locations - same deal. Weird. Took the trip, and it always seemed to know where we were but couldn't find addresses in any place in Alberta outside of Calgary.

Maybe the maps are corrupted... so today I got around to registering the unit with Garmin, and looked for updates. Said the software was up to date, and that there were two options available for the latest map update for that unit: a one-time or a life-time.

Hummed, hawed, and bought the lifetime. Started the update process and at some point during the map installation it hung up and I got an error code saying that the contact with unit failed and to try again. So I did. Same thing. Tried to navigate through the Garmin help/support online, couldn't find anything helpful. Sent a note to Garmin customer support, which apparently could take a few days for them to respond.

Ok, so rather than wait, I tried again, and this time when it was at the 'download' stage went into the advanced tab and, lo and behold... it says I don't have enough memory to load the complete north american maps! WTF?!?! :glare:

Ok, tried Canada/US... still same message, not enough memory. Dropped down to the "Canada and border states" option and now it says it will work... continue the update. The Download size showing is the same (1802.1 MB) with this supposedly smaller map set as before when i wanted everything, which makes no sense to me - if there wasn't enough room for 1800-odd MB before, why is there now? Strange... :blink: but continue the process.

So after a long wait, the download completes and it says its 'Preparing Update'. That seems to go well and it switched to step 3, 'installing map'. An hour or so later the install finishes and the unit reboots... go to set my home location... and it doesn't recognize Alberta (or any other Canadian province) !... WTF? :angry2: Doesn't have any POI's loaded for Canada either...

Opened up MapInstall, and started selecting a bunch of maps to load from the graphic. Seems there's no way in Hell to load all of North America on that unit, consistently run out of space long before I can select all of them.

So here are my questions:

1) How much free memory is a 2820 supposed to have? (the manual doesn't say)

2) How can I free up memory? I've already deleted the half-dozen or so MP3 files since I use an iPod and don't really need the music player on the GPS. Is there anything else I can safely dump from the unit to give me more space for maps, POI's, routes, etc?

3) Is there anything else I should be doing that I'm not doing?

Hoping someone here can point me in the right direction.

Thanks,

Griff

 

[Bungie]

Well then, I think I'll hold off updating the maps in my 2820!

Let me know what Garmin says.

 

[RaYzerman19]

Don't know much about the 2820, but if Zumo is similar........

To free up memory, delete all navigation voice files you don't use. Also delete any vehicle icons or pointers you don't use, they display your position on screen. Mp3 files are usually stored on an SD card, and don't affect internal memory.

The 2010 or 2011 maps are now so huge you had to choose your region "Canada and border states" for e.g.

However, if you're still having problems, best just to get Garmin on the phone and walk you through it rather than wait for their email.

 

[SkooterG]

As above, delete the unnecessary voice files, though they won't be that much. How many MP3s (if any) are on it? Yzerman has got it wrong with regards to the 2820. No cards, only internal memory. When you connect to your computer you should be able to go to 'My Computer' and see it as a type of drive. Right click on it, hit 'properties' and see what the available space is.

Besides deleting voice files, you may need to go in and delete map files, especially if there is more than one.

Calling Garmin won't be a bad idea either.

I have the lifetime update for my 2820 and have updated several times without issue. It does take a while however. I also have approximately a half meg of MP3s on it also.

 

[Ignacio]

Started the update process and at some point during the map installation it hung up and I got an error code saying that the contact with unit failed and to try again. So I did. Same thing. Tried to navigate through the Garmin help/support online, couldn't find anything helpful. Sent a note to Garmin customer support, which apparently could take a few days for them to respond.

I think you said the magic words that likely are going to relegate this into a required intervention by Garmin.

From memory that's the type of update that says in bold letter not to power off the GPS...and even though you didn't...if it failed for whatever reason....the GPS likely is stuck beyond the ability of mere mortals to resolve.

When Garmin talks to you they'll likely remote to your GPS with a very low level shell program (think DOS screen for GPS) and flash it or reset it.

I had this happen to my 2730 some years ago.

 

[canucklehead-biker]

Thanks guys,

I went in an looked at the Garmin like it was an external drive, and deleted the (very few) MP3 files that were in there, as well as the voices I don't need. There are no vehicle icons on the 2820, so that's not a problem.

Then I went into the Garmin via MapInstall and physically selected the detailed maps I wanted, hit reload, and went to bed. This morning I at least can find Alberta, so that's solved, but it bugs me that on a long, meandering cross-continent tour (which I'm planning for next spring/summer) I will at some point have to upload a new set of maps to the machine. If that's the only solution, then I guess that will have to do, but it sucks.

Another funny thing though: looking at the GPS right now, still connected to my computer. Even though I deleted the music files... this morning they are back on the GPS inside the music player. Curiouser and curiouser... files that won't die...

Griff

 

[McRide]

Check the user manual. I believe there is a hard reset procedure that will likely clean out or at least defrag the memory. If you still have some talking voice options, Jill from Australia is a hoot!

 

[SkooterG]

If you still have some talking voice options, Jill from Australia is a hoot!

I am in :wub:

I've asked her to marry me on several occassions, but she ignores my question simply gives me more directions.

 

[canucklehead-biker]

If you still have some talking voice options, Jill from Australia is a hoot!

I am in :wub:

I've asked her to marry me on several occassions, but she ignores my question simply gives me more directions.

What I'd really like is the voice of the original Q on the James Bond flicks, who would have that tired, exasperated tone whenever you took a wrong turn or went off route... "Really 007, do be-HAVE!!!...."

Currently I use Emily the Brit ... at speed sounds like Judy Dench (new M), without all the bitchiness. Or my mother. Either way, it get's my attention, which is the point.

If I could get a voice that sounded like "Bitchin' Betty", the voice of the on-board computer/FCS from my F-18 days, that would be the ultimate... (ALTITUDE...ALTITUDE...)

Griff

 

[canucklehead-biker]

Ok... so I futzed around with this on my own for awhile, and only made things worse (isn't that ALWAYS the way?) :angry2: and then called (and finally got through to) Garmin tech support, where I was (eventually) transferred to someone who understood how the interface between the 2820 and the Mac works. Here's the solution, partly from my own experiments, partly from the Garmin boffins (note some of this may not be applicable to Windows users, but I suspect most of it is).

While the update is going in, it creates a file that supplements, but doesn't replace, the pre-loaded map files on the unit. If you look at the device as a removable drive on your computer, you'll see a couple of .img files, these are the ones that I'm talking about. One ends in "prom.img", the other in "supp.img" The "prom.img" file is the preloaded maps.

The key is to get rid of them so that the new stuff can use the available memory. One thing I couldn't figure out from before was why it was that despite dumping stuff, the available memory never changed :blink: (and the mp3's were still available in the music player, despite not showing up in the gps when it was loaded as a removable storage device on the computer. By the time I finally got through to Garmin, my available memory had actually shrunk to only 11 MB, despite not seeing any .img or other files on the device. :dribble: That's about enough space to load a map of Rhode Island I think. Maybe not even enough for that. Not very useful.

Well, it turns out that even though I deleted the .mp3 files, maps, and all the other crap, they are actually still on the device in a hidden file (called .trashes). You have to empty the trash on your computer with that file showing in order to get rid of them (at least on the Mac). Garmin neglects to mention this in the user manual, and I never found any reference to it in any of the help/support forums either. Of course, I should have known to do that but I'm not an actual computer geek, so I excuse myself.

There's a convoluted command line string you can do to make all these hidden files show up on the computer; I had to remember a bunch of command line Unix shit, using a terminal window (Mac OS X is Unix-based). The command string (in a terminal window) is:

> defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE <enter>

> killall Finder <enter>

The Finder re-initializes and now there's a ton of stuff visible that you probably never wanted to see. Among all that previously hidden stuff the .trashes file: it was FULL of crap. The mp3's I thought I'd dumped, the extra voices and languages, and 4 different corrupt .img files from the various failed downloads!

I dumped the trash can with the Garmin mounted as a drive, and sure enough, when I went to download the 2011 update (again!), there were no memory issues; the map updater defaults to wanting to load all of North America, including the Mexican basemap! :yahoo:

The update took awhile, but it stepped through the process without hanging up, and when completed, I restarted the gps... and I had all the maps I was after. :yahoo:

The new full 2011 map file is 1.8 (ish) GB, and the 2820 has 1.9 (ish) GB of internal memory... so still room for POIs, routes, etc.

Folks who are running out of memory on the 27xx/28xx Streetpilots might want to give this a try. For folks with the 26xx Streetpilots, this won't work, because they don't have the option to look at them as though they were a removable drive (or so I'm told).

I suspect this may be a way to load European maps on your North American gps (if you happen to tour Europe and don't want to rent/buy a GPS over the pond) and vice versa, which currently Garmin says you can't do. But if you ditched the preloaded files, and dropped in a new set ... :eh-smiley:

I'm not sure of a way to back up the existing GPS, so be advised that if you do this you're working without a net. (It SHOULD be possible to clone/image the Garmin so you have a backup and would be able to restore it if you messed up but that's beyond my limited computer skills. If any of the true computer wizards on the forum want to want to have a look at that, and develop a procedure, I'd certainly be grateful to you. Maybe as simple as mounting the Garmin as a removeable drive and making a copy to your hard drive?)

Since messing with the internal files has the potential to turn your beloved Garmin into a brick if you mess up, I'll throw in the caveat that you should only try this at home if you're familiar with and comfortable with moving/deleting/renaming files and that sort of thing. If all of the description above leaves you reaching for the Aspirin bottle... this probably isn't for you.

Anyway, that's it. Hope the hassle I went through on this helps someone else in the future!

Griff

 

[rogdeb]

Great info Griff :clapping: Stuff I'll possibly need one day. Thanks.

 

[SkooterG]

Yet another reason for me to hate MACs.

No issues with a 'trashes' file on a PC. When I delete something, it's deleted.

Glad you got it all worked out.

 

[Bungie]

Mucho thanks for the update Griff.

I'm gonna leave my maps alone till this winter when I'll update them. I've bookmarked this thread just in case.

 

[canucklehead-biker]

It sure was a head scratcher... but I'm glad I got it working, and hope it can be useful for the rest of the collective.

Griff