Zumo 550 Lifetime Updates

[Stids]

Thank you very much for that.

I will take a look at that tomorrow (it's Thursday night here in Aus) once I go to the workshop and get the ZUMo off my bike.
Will post the results!

[Stids]

Hi Prescaj,

Well I have done as you suggested (although I couldn't actually find an 8gb SD card here, smallest was 32gb).

WIth just the xml file on the card Garmin Express picks up that there is an update, but wants $189 Aus for the new maps.

I'm guessing I should be calling Garmin again, although they claimed it was to do with the mapping used over here.

Be so good to hear if any other Aus users are having problems.

[Stids]

Hi everyone,

Another thought about my ZUMO not updating...each time I connect to my Windows 10 pc the first thing I get is that it cannot read the drive Garmin, and gets me to run a repair scan. That ends very quickly with the message no errors found and explorer then opens up as normal.

The unit starts fine on the bike, maps load and navigation works fine, so I assume the data on the internal memory is good.

The other thing I have noticed is that out of 486 Mb of space there is only 29.6 Mb free. Could this have any effect on updating?
There is an SD card fitted to the unit, but with nothing on it at the moment.

The Garmin was bought in Australia in about 2011, has been used with purchased maps in the USA and Italy. I cannot understand why it has suddenly stopped updating.

[sussamb]

29Mb is getting a bit low. Can you check the size of the GarminDevice.xml in the Garmin folder on your device? When memory is that low often the xml file isn't written correctly and you'll see it reports a file size of 0kb. If it's 0 then that's the issue.

Even if not I'd free up some space on your device by removing unwanted text, voice, vehicle, keyboard, help and EULA files and then try an update again, ensuring you use the latest version of Express.

[Stids]

Hi, I have checked the size of Garmin Device .xml and it is 27kb in size.

It seems to date from 01/04/2007, which is 3 or 4 years before I bought the unit.

I've deleted some voice files and now have 64.7Mb free.

express still gives me the following when I ask it to check for updates Map Update available, see pricing...

[sussamb]

If it dates from then I suggest you delete it, then reboot your device, that will recreate the xml file. Try Express again. If still no joy you need to talk to Garmin Product Support, it may be your account with them is corrupted.

[simoncrewe]

Hello to all. I used to be a member of the older forum but I see that is now defunct so I've re-registered here and It's good to see that it's full of lively and informative discussion.
I've owned a Zumo 550 for many years and bought the Lifetime Mapping feature in the days when new maps would fit directly onto the Zumo and when the maps got too big (Western Europe) I managed to use the cloning method to put them on to an SD card including changing the file names as necessary. That's worked well and I've successfully navigated around Europe using Mapsource to set way points and to drop the little man from Google Maps into the road to have a look around at the views and the road surface, the latter being important when touring the Pyrenees.

Anyway, I'm rambling so I'll get to the point. I recently bought another Zumo 550(BMW) in better shape, as a backup to my existing 550 which is getting a bit crotchety, but it's on 2008 mapping and doesn't have the Lifetime Mapping feature and Mr Garmin wants about £75 to provide it. Being an adopted Yorkshireman and well used to singing the anthem," Ow Much?!" chanted ad nauseam, I'm looking at ways to get around paying up. I'm thinking of swapping the Device xml on the BMW unit for a copy of the Device xml file on the original Zumo with the latest mapping with a view to fooling Garmin Express into thinking the BMW unit is in fact the original unit. I'm thinking it's not going to be as easy as that but I'd welcome thoughts from M' Learned friends. Regards to all.

As you have admitted that you are from Yorkshire & tight, why not download Open Street Maps (OSM) they are free - you can't get much cheaper!

[jswat]

I have been successfully using the cloning method on my 550's with NA lifetime maps. However, on my most recent update, Garmin Express would only load "Canada and Border States" instead of all lower 48 states. Has anyone else had this issue? Any way to get back to all NA maps? Thanks.

[Fallguy67]

I have a 4gb SD card that I load maps onto. When I tried to update to NA2022.2 yesterday, it said I didn't have enough room for the entire map. So I left of most of Mexico.

[MSTOCK27370]

I have been successfully using the cloning method on my 550's with NA lifetime maps. However, on my most recent update, Garmin Express would only load "Canada and Border States" instead of all lower 48 states. Has anyone else had this issue? Any way to get back to all NA maps? Thanks.

I have several Garmins and each one of them shows a different map availability when I look at them in Express. Even with the devices not attached to my PC, the NUVI 54LM shows US & Canada, the 590 shows full North America, the 450 is Canada and border states, the 550 shows lower 49 NE. I bought all of the Zumos used, and I don't understand why Garmin shows all of these different maps available. I'm able to handle it very easily.

I load the USA and Canada map to my PC - install option computer only. I then attach my 450 (or 550) to my computer and run Express with install option computer only. Since the US/Canada map is already installed on my PC it doesn't load the map again, but it goes through a couple of minutes of process. What it does is UNLOCK the map on the attached device. So, I must do this step to both my 450 and 550 if I want to load new maps on them. I then copy the garmindevice.xml file to the SD card (Garmin folder), disconnect the Garmin, and then take the SD card out of the Garmin and load it into the PC card reader slot. Eliminate every other file from the SD card except the garmindevice.xml file. Then I run Mapsource and send the maps from the computer to the SD card. Because of the xml file, Mapsource thinks the SD card is the 450/550. It allows me to copy the entire map to the SD card. Took about 20 minutes on my PC for 2022.20 earlier this month. I think that Mapinstall will do the same thing, and I think that Basecamp will allow you to do the same thing. I haven't tried those.