Garmin 2610 POI?

[woodly1069]

I have a new to me Street Pilot that I can't seem to find any local points of interest on. I got this unit from a friend who lived in a different state so maybe I just need to reset it for local stuff. The unit does know where it is and locks on to sats. but I can't see any fuel stations, restaurants or anything but streets. Any thoughts for a NOOB? I have never used one of these before other than my hikers GPS which does things like TOPOs. This whole traveling by GPS could be pretty cool and useful as I'm an old school thinker and still use paper maps...

[Seldom]

I don't have a StreetPilot, but are there detail level settings you can adjust?
Also, is the map a nationwide map that came with the unit or a third party map like you can get from OpenStreetMap?

[woodly1069]

I think it's the normal base map that came with the unit but I don't know for sure. I did hook it up and go to the Garmin site and it recognizes the unit and says the map is up to date...?

[Seldom]

Then try adjusting the level of detail (if there is one to adjust) and zooming in.  POI should show up at different zoom levels depending on their importance.  You should have to be closer to see pizza stores than airports.

[woodly1069]

Yeah, I have tried to zoom way in to less than a mile but every time I do a search it looks for the 2 mile radius, then on to 250 mi and then out to 500 mi. WTF? I think I copied some of my TOPO maps over to it by mistake and that screws things up because those have no details, just trails and water and elevations. If I can figure out how to remove those and get back to the base map I may be OK...I think?

[Boyd]

I used to have a StreetPilot 2620, which was the same unit but it included a 2 GB IBM Microdrive with full maps of the US. The 2620 did not have any pre-loaded maps. It included a blank compact flash memory card and City Navigator on a set of CD's (DVD's were not yet common back when this model was introduced). Since memory cards were expensive back then, the included one was pretty small. I think they may have increased the size as time passed, but 128MB is the number that sticks in my mind.

Anyway, this meant that you had to select a relatively small area of the City Navigator map (several states) and load that into your unit - a painfully SLOW process by today's standards since the unit has a 56k RS-232 serial interface IIRC.

Do you have your friend's City Navigator Disks and Mapsource on your computer? Do you have an old computer with an RS-232 serial port, or a USB to RS-232 adaptor? Actually, I guess you could remove the CF memory card and put it in a USB reader on your computer to greatly speed up the map transfer.

If you installed another map, that probably will have wiped out whatever City Navigator maps were already installed on the device. My 2620 stored City Navigator in a file named gmapprom.img, and you could load a second map (like a topo) as gmapsupp.img. But I suspect the 2610 uses a file named gmapsupp.img for everything.

See what files you currently have on the memory card. This old model doesn't support USB disk mode, so you will need to use the card in a reader to determine this. The 2600 series is not compatible with the new Garmin NT format maps, so you can no longer purchase a version of City Navigator that will work on it. Hope your friend gave you his disks. 

Read the manual here. This model came from the good old days when Garmin provided beautiful and informative hard-copy manuals in the box. I remember this one very well myself, it was printed on heavy high-quality paper with color illustrations. Unfortunately, those days are long gone.

http://static.garmincdn.com/pumac/StreetPilot2610GPS_OwnersManual.pdf

I'd say you have one of two possible problems. Either you erased the City Navigator map when you installed the topo, or your friend only loaded maps for his local area (since memory was so small) and you are not within that area. Either way, you will need the original disks, or another legal copy of the old-style City Navigator maps. These might be hard to find today, not sure.

[woodly1069]

yep, I suspect you are correct, but I have no disks . funny thing is the card is GIANT and is 4GB...I hope to borrow a friends disks if they are not too new

[Boyd]

You'll need the disks that were originally provided for the same unit, or disks that were purchased later as an update. Garmin City Navigator is copy protected and can only be installed on the unit it was purchased for.

There may be legitimate used copies of the non-NT version of City Navigator for sale however, since "back in the day", two licenses were provided when you purchased the product on disk. As I said, newer maps will not work on this device. Garmin stopped making the non NT City Navigator about two years ago.

You may find that this is all more trouble and expense than it's worth. As much as I loved my old Streetpilot, the technology has improved a lot since then. For example, I would lose the satellite signal when driving down a road with tree cover, and the unit was completely useless in New York City due to the large buildings. With "Black Friday" coming soon, you can probably buy a current model Nuvi for about the same price as a map alone for the 2610.

[woodly1069]

thanks for all the advice guys!