Garmin Explore 2 Map question
 

Thought I check in here so I don't mess up!
I need to change the maps on my Garmin from Europe to North America. I changed to Europe, for last year's tour, using Garmin Express. But that was last yeat and too many miles ago!
So any advice would be great!
Thanks

If I recall correctly, you downloaded the Open Street maps for your Europe trip from the internet. I do not think you used Garmin Express.

I would suggest you do teh same thing you did last year, download a current map of where you want to ride here and install it the same way. I think the procedures you followed were a few threads in this forum, you could look for those for the procedures to follow.

If I am thinking of the wrong person that did that last year, sorry. My error.

Wrong person!
I used Garmin Express.

Use the manager option in Express.

I was hoping you would show up! Thanks!

So it is connected and in the process of removing the Europe maps and installing the US map.
Will report back.

I just added Western Europe to mine about a week ago, I connected the unit to my computer, which opened the Garmin software (that I never use really, so forget what I did last time)

I cannot access my computer, but this time it was pretty straightforward, managing maps was intuitive, I could easily see that I had north america and Latin America also, so to free up space I got rid of the Latin America maps, and this freed up enough space to easily put Western Europe in (while still having north america)
It did not take that long to transfer Western Europe, maybe 20 mins? and it's been working fine here in Scotland.

A few years back when I did this, it seemed more complicated, and I had to remove the n America stuff to have room for the Europe stuff.
I must not have noticed the Latin America maps that time.

I'm sure it will work out for you

We must have a slow internet because it is taking 2.5 hours to remove Europe and add east and west US.

I think Garmin throttles it so it doesn’t slow down other things you might be doing.

(The idea is to do something else and be patient. It’s not like it’s something you are doing that often.)

That it takes so long is why I recommend using custom maps for trips.

My quick and straight forward experience does not seem to support that theory, I strongly suspect it is the internet speed.
I left doing this job until the last minute and was rushed, so don't recall the file size of both the North American and western Europe Garmin files, but was pleasantly surprised that it didn't take hours (but was ready to leave it and do other trip prep).
Our internet is fast, but not optical cable fast or whatever the fastest stuff is in our area--- but again, I have no recollection of real world download speeds of our internet

Garmin’s estimates for this tend to be quite long but I’ve never seen it take anywhere near as long as the estimates. But I’m not sure it’s as fast as it could be. I’m mostly suggesting Garmin might be doing something other than doing this as fast as possible.

(I believe Garmin downloads the map files to your PC and then copies the files from there to your device.)

There are regular complaints about it being too slow. It shouldn’t matter: it should be easy enough for people to find something else to do in the meantime.

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If this is any sort of issue for someone, they can learn to create custom maps (using one of numerous free websites) for just the region they plan their travel to. Since these regions are typically much smaller than the Garmin maps, you don’t have to remove your home map. This approach would also let you do trip preparation ahead of time and keep your device usable for local rides. And it avoids needing to swap maps back. (Newer Garmin devices have enough space for all the maps.)

Another advantage of this is that you can often get more recent updates than Garmin provides (especially useful in the unusual case of wanted to get your own update to OSM). One downside of this is that the maps look different. Another is that you have to be comfortable copying files. Newer Garmin devices also use MTP to connect to your computer, which makes things more complicated.


This approach is easier after doing it once. I’m partial to the bbbike.org site.

njkayaker, thanks for the added info.
To be honest, I really don't use my GPS much, and really am a luddite with more than basic stuff.
I got my GPS very much with the intention to put existing trip files on, which is basically what I've done and been happy with, it doing that job perfectly the last two or three years.
I know a lot of you do your own routes and whatnot, but I've never taken the time to get into that, but am open to learning new stuff sometime.

I was just glad that putting in the Europe stuff was pretty easy and I could be wrong on how long it took, but it wasn't a lot more than what I guessed.