Updating an old 550

[OldEssexMan]

My 550 has gone the way of all things and, currently, is proving problematical. I will send it off for repair to repair-my-device.com who have done great things with it in the past but, in the meantime, I need a substitute.
A colleague has given me his 550 that he no longer uses and I am looking for ways to update the maps. My own 550 has the maps on an SD card and I naively thought I could just pop it in to the 'new' unit. It won't accept it, I just get "cannot unlock maps" coming up on screen.
So, what's the best way to update the maps on the new unit, they have not been updated ever since 2014?

Also, if I do manage to get updated, I would like to put the new unit's maps on an SD card to get the whole of Europe. It's ages since I did this on my old one and I can't remember which files to delete from the Zumo to remove any clash between the maps on the unit and the SD card.

[sussamb]

Yes, the map will be locked to your Zumo so won't work in your friends one. You will need to update it using Express but note the restriction on the 550 model. See this FAQ https://support.garmin.com/en-GB/?faq=b ... KUAt8x67J7 that also explains how to install the maps to a SD card

[carolinarider09]

I tired to look at the Garmin website and after waiting 30 seconds it still had not loaded. I have an active 550 that was repaired by Palmdr a few yeas or so ago. It has Lifetime maps. This is how I upload/add new maps to my 550. Last done a few months ago. This assumes that the 550 has a Lifetime map subscription for that device. As noted above, it is linked to the device.

Here is how to update the maps on a Zumo 550 with lifetime maps. It requires an SD Card (I used an 8 gig card) and access to a computer with Garmin Express loaded and two USB connections so you can connect both the Zumo and the 8 gig card.

You connect the Zumo (I took the SD Card out of mine) and the 8 gig card (freshly formatted in FAT 32) to the computer and copy all the files from the Zumo's memory to the SD Card. In essence cloning the Zumo's internal memory.

You now eject your Zumo 550 from the computer, leaving the SD Card connected.

Once done, you can launch Garmin Express with the SD Card still installed and it will see it as your Zumo 550.

It will ask if you want to update maps (if new maps are available) and you just tell it to go ahead (well you actually have to use the mouse)

In about two or so hours, the new maps will be updated to the SD Card.

Now you have to do the following in the Garmin Folder on the SD Card

Rename the map files (in the Garmin Folder) from gmapprom.img, gmapprom.gma and gmapprom.unl to gmapsupp.img, gmapsupp,gma and gmapsupp.unl. You will need to do this after Express has finished installing the map on the SD. The map files must remain in the \Garmin folder on the SD card.

I then deleted all the other folders (except the Garmin Folder) from the SD Card, ejected the SD Card from my computer and put it into my Zumo 550.

Start your 550 and the maps will be downloaded or should I say, linked, to your device.

I just did this and now have the 2019.10 maps for North America on my device (lower 49). I am now going to go back to the SD Card and put the Audible and MP3 folders back on the card and re-load the music I had there.

[sussamb]

It's saying site is down for maintenance, hopefully up shortly.

[OldEssexMan]

Thanks guys , all very helpful.

[carolinarider09]

Thanks guys , all very helpful.

You are welcome. If you can, would you please update this "thread" as to the outcome of your endeavors. It would/should be very helpful to others to close the loop.

Thanks.

Jim

[OldEssexMan]

An update. Because I needed to get the loan unit up and running quickly I took the obvious route of signing up for a lifetime update on the Garmin site. Again for convenience, I updated the maps direct to the unit, selecting British Isles only. It updated with no difficulty. I very very rarely need any rest-of-Europe maps so that will do for now. At some time I may get around to increasing the coverage and using an SD card, thanks for your suggestions.

[carolinarider09]

And thanks for the update. Always helps to know the steps taken and the outcome so we all can benefit for your "experience"

[CRracer]

I'm currently in the process of trying this. I had an extra SD card laying around at work that was from a 2018 GM vehicle. Formated the SD card to fat32. It has 14.9GB of free space.

I verified the 550 sees all of that space.

Now with that SD card in my laptops SD card slot, and my Zumo hooked to laptop via USB, transferring zumo contents to SD card.

Connecting zumo launches GE, I closed GE prior to copying all files. Not quite half way through copying, GE started up again(don't know why). Closed it again, files still copying.

The map being copied is the last update I had updated on the zumo. It'll be 2015.1. I'll see if it'll install entire map as opposed to the lower 49 sw, that is currently on the zumo.

[CRracer]

Little update.

SD card mounted in laptop and it only had lower 49 sw 2015.1 portion installed.

I had the option to choose change map coverage. I chose that as opposed to reinstall. Normally choosing this would bring up a pull down menu to select a part of the map to install (due to the 550's limited memory). However, with the SD card having ample room, there was no choices to be had, so I just let it go on it's way downloading(I don't even recall having the option to install to PC, which always caused it to fail anyways). It actually finished. I ejected the SD card, then reinserted. It promptly opened GE, and now GE says my map is full coverage of North America 2015.1.

I duplicated the SD card to a folder on the desktop(this takes about 2 minutes versus the ~45 minutes it would have if using zumo connected via USB). My map .IMG file size went from ~<1gb to over 2.2gb.

I still can't get GE to install map to PC. I wish I could just copy the dang map files from my GPS to my PC and have it work...