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Profiles are a very powerful feature of Garmin's newer outdoor/handheld devices. These models have a lot more menu options to customize their operation so it can take awhile to get them setup just the way you like. But after you do, you can create a profile and give it a name.

Ah, OK - so it's like a set of macros or saved setup files. We've used those for years in my industry (TV production), and I guess we've finally gotten complicated enough with GPS technology to warrant having those in the design.

As mentioned above, none of this is possible on any of the Nuvi series.

<sniff> Only a few years old, and already "obsolete"... 

BTW, you need to realize there are two categories of maps - "routable" and "not routable". Most topo maps on this site are not routable.

Yeah, sorta figured that's what was going on - so thanks for the confirmation.

On the Nuvi, if a map isn't routable then it will create the best route it can using its basemap. But the basemap is really crude and only contains a few of the biggest roads.

No kidding - once I got to my own neighborhood it was convinced that I was "Off Road".  ;-)

Basically, that topo map will only be useful to show your position on the screen.

Which is more than fine, I really just wanted to see if I could get the topo to work on the Nuvi. Don't think I'd ever take it hiking, but it's nice to have that option available.

Garmin's 24k topo map series are routable, FWIW.

For the price that they charge for those, I'd dang well expect that...  ;-)

If Nuvi's have profile settings, they sometimes cause data types not to show on the hand-held units.

Just for my own education, what are profile settings and how are they used?

I grabbed the entire map in MapSource and uploaded it to the Nuvi (size = 425,912 KB), and that worked just fine - so maybe it doesn't work with only a portion of it?.

It doesn't overlay over the City Navigator map, but turning that off and Topo on shows the contours over the base map which is a lot more than I had before. Doesn't work great for driving (the routing is a lot more crude, more like several straight line segments vs. following the road itself - CN must have some sort of "snap" function to keep the vehicle icon on the road), but I think I can live with the either/or choice.

I was basically just looking for something different to look at during the commute (and also to learn a little about the local topography along that route), so I'm glad to finally get that working. Kudos to the author, that must have been a LOT of work to compile.  :-)

Profiles on the Nuvi? Nope.

The Nuvi 205 actually does a better job with topo maps than most of the newer models. But this sounds like several other threads where people somhow only installed one of the two mapsets.

Curious where I'd find the option to only install one of the two - unless i missed something, there's only one install file for that map (?).

http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/view/523/

just be sure you're looking at the area you actually did send. 

I'm reasonably sure of that - though this is SoCal, after all...   

How large is the gmapsupp.img file on the Nuvi?

It's 32,344 KB (32.344 MB) according to Windows Explorer (and the CA Topo 2011 is the only "extra" map on it) - does that sound about right?

Are you certain that you've send the whole map to the GPS? How large is the gmapsupp.img file on the Nuvi?

Thanks for the reply. Didn't send the entire map, but selected the parts for SoCal in MapSource and sent that - do I need to send the entire thing? If so, I can give that a try. The Nuvi is in the car right now, but I can pull it later on and get the gmapsupp file size for you if my question doesn't solve the problem.

you have to uncheck citynav. for the topo to show

Please see above: "even with only CA Topo active all I see is the base map and no contour info."

Has anyone been able to use the CA Topo 2011 on a Garmin Nuvi? (Model 205, if that matters). It seemed to install OK, and I can see it listed on the Map Info page. Not sure if it's supposed to overlay the default map (City Navigator) or not, but even with only CA Topo active all I see is the base map and no contour info.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.