uploading more than one map to my meridian marine

I have the blue chart cd and mapsend directroute and was wondering if anyone
had figured out how to put more than one chart/map on the card at a time.

The instructions give me an option to upload to a "card programmer". Is
that the same as a USB 2 Card reader?

Thx,
Cliff

I don't know about BlueChart, but I use Mapsend Topo. It is possible to
define more than 1 region in Mpasend Topo 3D, then request upload to GPS. I
have a Magellan Explorist and a Meridian both with SD cards. Mapsend will
say that there is more than 1 region defined, and ask if it is to be saved
to disk. After Mapsend generates the single image file in program
files/mapsend/export , it is possible to use a conversion utility to split
the single image into the regions origianlly defined and load all onto the
SD card via the card programmer (SD card read/write device). Then it is
possible to select which of the detail topo regions you want to load from
the card after it is inserted back into the GPS.

Cliff W Estes wrote:
Yes. Just make sure you have one for the card you are using. Also, each
map section can only be max 64 meg in size, but you can have many files.
If the filename is more than 8 characters long, it is truncated by the
GPS (Meridian) into abcdef~1.

The BlueNav Charts are licensed to have only one chart on a
registered SD card at a time. You can put more than one DirectRoute
map on an SD other than your BlueNav SD card in two different ways:

A. Mark and cut your individual region one at a time and choose
Store to Hard Drive. Each region will be stored on the hard drive
in the \Export\Images folder with same name as the region. You can
save these to an SD card using an SD card reader/Write (USB Card
Programmer) using your operating system. Long file names will be
truncated to eight characters.

B. Mark and cut your individual as above but choose Send to SD Card.
The file will be saved on the SD card as Detail00.IMG. To prevent
the next copy form overwriting that file, rename it using the SD
card reader/writer and your operating system as some name with the
.IMG extension. You would have to do this after each file.

Method A lets you copy all the files in one step without having to
rename them. The operating system would have prevented you from
having duplicate file names when you first saved to the hard drive.

You would change maps using the Card Utilities Menu on the GPS
device.

The MapSend programs such as Streets, Streets and Destinations and
the older Topo program would let you combine up to four regions into
one map to send to the SD card or to the SD card in the GPS device
using the serial cable.

If you already have a map on your SD card which you saved through
the serial cable, make sure you rename it first if you are going to
be using Method B.


--
Earl F. Parrish

Cliff W Estes wrote:


Yes, you put the SD card in the reader and it will be seen as a
removable drive from Windows Explorer (not Internet Explorer).

I have not used BlueChart but when you create maps with DirectRoute if
you save them to a folder in the hard drive you can later copy them to
the SD card. Doing it that way is also much faster than writing to the
SD card with it in the Meridian.

If the GPS is plugged in when you create the region map (*.img) files it
will assign your Meridian's serial number. If the GPS is not plugged in
I think it will prompt you to enter the serial number. And the serial
number needed is the one seen from the About.. screen from the Setup
menu, *not* the serial number on the label in the battery compartment.

You can put as many *.img files on a SD card as will fit. I have a 1Gb
card with most of the U.S. on it in a number of 64mb +/- files.

You have to select the map region you want to use (you can only use one
at a time) from the Detail Map menu on the Meridian (with the SD card in
place of course).

I think Magellan's intention is that the MapSource CD's only be used
with one GPS. But it appears to me that if you build the map regions
files and enter the GPS device serial number by hand you can build map
files for more than one GPS. But you'll have to keep track of the files
as they will only work on the device with the proper serial number.

Jack

--
Jack Erbes in Ellsworth, Maine, USA - jackerbes at adelphia dot net
(also receiving email at jacker at midmaine.com)