[Ricketty Rabbit]

I wanted to set the address of a hotel I'll be staying at in Davis, California, and save it in "favourites" while I am at home here in Canada. That way, I can jump in the rental car at SFO and drive away without having to type in the hotel address.

I went out to my patio so my Garmin can get a clear shot at the satellite.

I started with "where to" and pressed "address".

I tried changing country to USA. It prompts with "Wyoming" (I'm in BC, nowhere near Wyoming. I was using it in Washington 2 days ago. It seems to have Alzheimer's.)

I touched the "change state/province" bar and spelled out "California" (yes, I spelled it right - did this several times). It prompts with "Connecticut" after I enter the C, but no other state names. I returned to the alpha input screen and finished typing in California. It returns with the message "No matches found".

I tried searching by City but there's no Davis CA or UC Davis CA to be found.

I tried searching "near a different city" and found "Davis CA" near Sacramento, CA, which is correct. So it has Davis CA in the database, but it apparently can't find California as a US state.

This is quite unbelievable since I have used this devise in the Bay area before. So yes, it "knows the way to San Jose".

Has anyone experienced anything like this? Any suggestions on what it happens? Is there a better way to set the address of my hotel in Davis CA in my "favourites"?

Thanks,

 

[57]

It prompts with "Wyoming"

On that page, at the bottom should be "Change Country", press that, then on the QUERTY page type "U" and the US or US Virgin Is should come up, you should then be away to the races.

One trick that I've found somewhat useful is to not spell out the street or other information completely on the QUERTY page before pressing "done", this will then bring up a list of candidates.

It's a bit of a trick to know when to stop to keep the list not too long.

For example, Bayv - for Bayview, etc.

Sometimes this comes up automatically if the list is short enough and the GPS is fast enough.

Of course, once you've got your destination, you can click on POIs to get your hotel, restaurants, etc. I've programmed in my favourite Buffalo Restaurants, Hotel, etc and I haven't left TO.

 

[57]

Another option:

Where To:
POI
Near
A different city
Enter City
Lodging...

 

[Ricketty Rabbit]

On that page, at the bottom should be "Change Country", press that, then on the QUERTY page type "U" and the US or US Virgin Is should come up, you should then be away to the races.

Doesn't work. Pressing "Change country" brings up "Canada" or "US".

I press US. It goes back to "Select city in Wyoming United States".

I press "Change State/Country" then "spell state or province".

I type "C" and it comes up with only one choice - Connecticut. So I go back to the keyboard again and type "California". No matches found.

So mine has clearly forgotten the way to San Jose . . .

 

[Jake]

It is possible the map index is scrambled. Happened to me once. I did a reset and I was able to find places again. Each model reset is slightly different so you might have to Google that sequence.

 

[Dlpnut]

Glitch

Also if you are using City maps and have them enabled, try the seach after disabling them.

 

[Ricketty Rabbit]

I Googled the coordinates of the area, and was able to find Davis CA with ease that way. I have a customer service request in to Garmin to see what they suggest.

Thanks for your help.

 

[57]

Did you try the post 3 option? (if available on your model - I have a 1350)

 

[Ricketty Rabbit]

Yes, but it didn't work either. However, I got in touch with Garmin and they confirmed that my mapset includes only Canada and Northern US States. They suggested I install the "correct" mapset.

So I re-downloaded the maps, and chose "Canada/US". No good - not enough space on my device for this map. WTF! I told it to remove everything on my device, but still not enough space! This is ridiculous! A GPS that comes with Canada and US maps, but once you update them, there isn't enough room for all Canada and US! What a ripoff!

So now I'm in the process of downloading a reduced North American set of maps. It has most of Canada (except for the far North-East), all the Western and Northern US, and pretty well all by the confederate south.

I am astonished that Garmin advertises a GPS with full North American coverage, but which doesn't have enough space for all the maps. Talk about bait and switch . . . I'm not impressed with Garmin.

 

[Ricketty Rabbit]

I finally found out how to fix this problem.

Too bad Garmin doesn't put a note somewhere in their literature . . . you have to know what to ask before you can find out about the problem.

The voice files in dozens of languages take up a lot of memory in the GPS. If you want to fit the entire North America map in the device, you have to delete unneeded voice files first. Only then will the entire NA map fit.

I successfully deleted the voice files I don't need and now the NA map fits. And the device can finally find its way around the Bay area.

Thanks for all your suggestions.

 

[Jake]

Why not slip a mircoSD card in and fill 'er up. I put a 1GB card in mine so I could hold the entire dataset. It came with a 256MB card. I think the last edition might have tipped over 1GB so 2GB would be advisable.

Edit: Didn't see your last post.

 

[57]

I just purchased my 1350 earlier this month and I downloaded the latest maps - I believe the file was over 1GB. I didn't need to do anything file or memory-wise, but I did notice that there wasn't a lot of room left in memory. I checked and Davis California is in my files.

Thanks for the voice files tip - I may need that at some point. There's probably other "junk" on there I don't need, but I did heed the warning not to delete files that may be needed to operate...

 

[Ricketty Rabbit]

My full North America map download was 1.98 Gb.

 

[57]

Thanks to the trailblazing done by Ricketty Rabbit, I also removed some of the voice files (leaving English and French) and I was able to download the US/Canada version which was about 1.23GB. Before I removed the voice files, I would have only been able to download Canada and neighbour states.

When I "get info" on my Garmin when connected to my computer, it shows 1.77 GB total with just over 200 MB available now that I've deleted most of the voice files. I guess I couldn't download the full NA map without adding memory?

- What am I missing with US/Canada instead of NA? I have the 1350 LMT.
- Ricketty, what's the memory on your 1450?
- Can you see the size of the map file on your Garmin? I had a look around and couldn't actually see the map file - perhaps it's "hidden"?