Zumo XT and Basecamp - Everything That You Need to Know

[Raf]

@jfheath
As I said earlier, I can assign the personal categories only in basecamp, not directly In Zumo.
Could this news be useful?

By owner’s manual Zumo XT.
“ Assigning Categories to a Saved Location
You can add custom categories to organize your saved locations.

NOTE: Categories appear in the saved locations menu after you have saved at least 12 locations.

Select Where To? > Saved ( Favourites).
Select a location.
Select I
Select ( three horizontal lines) > Edit > Categories.
Enter one or more category names, separated by commas.
If necessary, select a suggested category.”

[scottyuk]

Thanks for your efforts in making that guide. I've just completed going through it and I picked up a few really useful nuggets of info.

[jfheath]

Thanks @scottyuk . Glad you have found it to be useful.

@Raf - sorry a long delay before replying. Thank you for that. Its a long time since I read through the manual - and I wouldn't have spotted that particular bit because I would have been looking for the word 'Favourites'.

It is only very recently that I discovered that not all English Speaking Zumos use the word 'Favourites' on the 'Where To ?' page. USA uses 'Saved'. 'Saved Locations' is used in the manual and that is a much clearer term to use - but not very helpful when you are looking for the word 'Favourites'.

So - yes - very useful. Thank you. I have added that information to P74 of the website notes, and modified the changelog in post#2

[jfheath]

Following a couple of replies that I made to queries about MyRouteApp and the Zumo XT, I've squeezed in a new section 8 into the the pages of this article. Pages 72, 72a, 72b, 72c, 72d, 72e. The old section 8 is now section 7b ! The menu at the start of this thread has been modified accordingly.

This is all related to the use of MyRouteApp, and how the Zumo XT behaves with routes created using the app.

It isn't a set of instructions on how to use MRA - they have that well covered on their support pages. This is the stuff that you might need to know when using MRA with the Zumo XT - in line with the theme of the article.

I need to add pages on section on MRA's Points of Interests - which can be made to replicate the way that Garmin implements Waypoints / Favourites / Saved locations. But that can wait for a while.

The new section starts here

Any comments from long time users of MyRouteApp would be welcome.

[SteveH]

Great work jfheath - a most useful document.

I've searched all posts and your document, but can't find the answer to the following: I plan trips in Basecamp and then transfer the waypoints and routes to the GPS. My previous unit was a Garmin Montana and when transferring to the unit, the waypoint symbols all transferred as well (e.g. A "bridge" icon stayed as such, a "mountain" stayed as such), however when I transfer to the Zumo XT all my waypoints end up with the same icon.....a blue flag!!!

The strange thing is that if I create a new waypoint on the GPS unit itself, all of the icons that you find in Basecamp are actually on the unit - so why are they not picked up when transferring from Basecamp?

Is there anyway around this issue?

[jfheath]

Thanks @SteveH - and welcome to the forums from the UK.

You have the tiny blue flags showing up, so you must have set up the XT to work with Garmin EXPLORE.

You may or may not remember doing this - when you first start the XT it sort of demands that you do certain things and then tells you that the XT is not compatible with EXPLORE. This isn't correct. You will find a lot of detail, including the answer to your question in the section in the link below - especially from P66 onwards. But you will need to read and follow all of it for it to make sense.

Before you click the link to that section, I'll warn you that it will not make sense if you have not fully grasped a couple of key pieces of information.

1. EXPLORE is a collection of tools on different devices that work together. It is a feature on the XT, accessed from the Where To ? page; It is an optional configuration in the XT which affects some of the menus and behaviours of the lists if routes, tracks and places. To work properly with your XT, you need to have Garmin Drive set up on your smartphone (free) and you need to have set up an account at explore.garmin.com

2. Apologies if you know this already, but many people fall into the trap of thinking that a Waypoint is any point on a route. In the world of Garmin, it isn't. A waypoint may be used in a route, but typically in Basecamp, people will make routes with lots of route points (via or shaping), and none of them will be Waypoints. This is different from the way many routing programs use the term to refer to any plotted point on a route.

I go on at length about this as you will have noticed, but if you are in the habit of using the term 'Waypoint' to refer to any point on a route, you will become confused by what I say in the link below !

The Explore website does something really different with Waypoints. It keeps them separate from the route. They do not form any part of it. But they are plotted on the map in the correct position.

EXPLORE is not the same route planning software that BC is. It does not follow the roads - it plots straight lines between points and leaves the satnav to produce a road route. However, the smartphone / ipad apps have recently had a magnet tool added which allows the route to snap to attach itself to the roads (and footpaths and tracks - so you have to be wary of that feature. Ive not visited the website to see if that does the same.


Anyway - heres the link. P66, 67 answer your questions. You can export your route to Explore, your waypoints will be transferred as well and you can set the symobols individually or in bulk. The same symbols are then used on the XT - but in addition to the normal flag via point and blue circle shaping point - which identify points on the route. EXPLORES waypoints are just induvidual points which happen to be plotted where the route goes. They are not part of it.

Personally, I hate EXPLORE and have disabled it. I am sure that it is an excellent solution for something, but not for any problem that I have. But the facility for planning something on the ipad or phone and for it to automatically synchronise with the XT is pretty good. I can see a use for plotting Waypoints, having them appear in Favourites and then using the XT to build a route from them. The problem for me is that the EXPLORE. doesn't seem to create routes. It creates tracks. I like the facility on the XT to display the time and distance to the next via point - for my pillion to see. You can't do that with tracks.

app.php/ZXT-P55

[SteveH]

Thanks very much for your detailed reply @jfheath.

I am aware of the difference between route points and waypoints, but appreciate your explanation on how Explore uses each. I've read pages 66 and 67 and will continue digesting your reply.

However, unless I've misunderstood something, it doesn't appear possible for a Waypoint with a particular symbol (e.g. Mountain) in Basecamp to be transferred to the GPS unit (either directly from Basecamp or via Explore) such that the symbol remains. I believe you are saying that I would still have to select the Waypoints on the unit and manually change each to the symbols I've used in Basecamp. This will be a real pain as I have +/- 2,500 waypoints dotted around 4 Southern African countries with at least 15 different symbols depending on the nature of the Waypoint.

[jfheath]

Thanks - glad you are on top of that, but it was worth saying - just in case - and also for anyone else tuning in.

That is correct. Basecamp to Explore results in all waypoints being given the same symbol/colour.
(I can't remember if you can set the default colour and symbol before import. Worth trying.
They can be altered in large groups within Explore.
When viewed on the XT the symbols are the same as they were in Explore.
But orange flags and blue discs are still shown on the route.

But no symbol from Basecamp gets transferred to the XT or to Explore as far as I have been able to establish - but I haven't spent a great deal of time on that.

[BashStreetKid]

So, after some deliberation I’ve committed to an XT.
I used to prolifically follow the old site till it was disbanded a few years ago, then registered on this site in its infancy in 1820….

What a wonderful resource you have created to help me learn - well done.
Can I just perhaps make a helpful suggestion that your four bullet point tips, at page 56, would probably be better in the preface…
Seems the XT is designed to be wedded to both Drive & Explore before it’s any use to anyone, or IIJM?

[jfheath]

What a wonderful resource you have created to help me learn - well done.
Can I just perhaps make a helpful suggestion that your four bullet point tips, at page 53, would probably be better in the preface…
Seems the XT is designed to be wedded to both Drive & Explore before it’s any use to anyone, or IIJM?

Thank you for the kind comment.

Or do you mean P56 ? (I'll edit your previous post).

I'll take a look at your suggestion - but my thought is that Explore is an option. You don't have to set it up, and although Explore needs Garmin Drive, Garmin Drive does not need Explore to work. I find Explore to be irritating in a number of ways, and do not use it. Other people like it.

The XT seems to hint that you have to set it up when you first turn on your XT. My notes hide it away as an option which can be set up later and which can be disconnected if you wish. Personally, I prefer not to have Explore set up, but in answering questions and in seeing if they have developed it further I often make the connection to Explore and then Disconnect it. I think I said somehwere that it offers me a solution to a problem that I don't have.

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Further comments - just for interest.


I come at the Zumos as a road navigation device, although the XT now offers many useful features as an off road device - particularly in view of the fact that you can navigate on tracks and trails that are not part of any map - but which still exist on the ground. Explore's ability to zoom in to satellite images is useful in this respect. As is the app for IoS and Android for creating 'Courses' which can be magnetically attracted to roads, tracks, trails and footpaths, rather than plotting a series of short straight lines. The magnet is a new feature which was added more recently to the 2 apps, but is not currently available on the website version.

However, in the early days of testing, I discovered that certain aspects of the XT navigation seemed to be broken after I set up Explore. Only by deleting the connection with Explore did I manage to recover from odd behaviour that I was getting. I have not noticed such odd behaviour recently aand my assumption may be wrong, but I remain very wary of installing Explore in the middle of testing other aspects of the XT and then only if I am happy to perform a complete reset.

I nearly always have Drive connected. I rarely have Explore set up. It isn't necessary, but it is a tad more difficult to remove than it is to set up.