garmin 2545 and long distance trips, can't calculate route

[jazzon]

Hi chaps,
I am planning a trip from london to the south of italy - which is one of the reasons why I decided to buy a sat nav. I have a garmin 2545 which works prety well I have to say, but today when I attempted to view the route from London to a place called taranto in the south of italy, the sat nav kept coming back with a "cannot calculate route" message (after attempting to calculate it for about 15 minutes). Thinking that there was something wrong with the town I had chosen, I changed my destination and tried to get to Milan. It took about 30 mins (!!??) for the sat nav to calculate the route - at least it did it - and then said "the route is too long. Navigation instructions are added as you approach the destination" which I assume I shouldn't too much concerned about. One thing I noticed though is that it doesn't let me save it.
Thinking that the fact that it couldn't calculate the rout to Taranto, and didn't let me save the one to milan was a memory problem, I did connect the device to the computer to check the memory, but I have something like 7gb free, so I would exclude that. DOes anybody know what it could be?
thanks

[sussamb]

There's no hard and fast rule about when GPS will give up trying to calculate a route, but it depends on length and complexity of the route. It has nothing to do with how much memory appears free on the GPS.

As a general rule I try not to ask mine to calculate routes much over 200 miles so you will probably need to experiment to see how you need to split your route into 'chunks' that the GPS can cope with.

You might find it useful to downlaod Garmin's Basecamp program. With your GPS connected to your PC it will read the map off your GPS and allow you to calculate routes and download them to your GPS, so you can use it for route planning.

[jazzon]

oh I see, I didn't know the satnav could give up the route calculation. I will definitely look at the basecamp tool, I have never heard of it but I will get hold of it. Is it easy to transfer stuff to the satnav? Also, on average, how big are the file to transfer, do I need to get a sd card or will I be ok?
cheers

[jazzon]

uhm, I tried basecamp, but it doesn't seem to be working properly, in that I can decide the route there (using viewpoints for example) but it just doesn't copy the map to the device. When I select edit -- send to, it does send it to the device connected and it even appears under "Internal storage" but when I switch on the satnav, it's not under favourites...

[sussamb]

I'm assuming you mean the route/trip as you can't send the 'map'

See the procedure here from Garmin FAQs

To access a transferred route in a zumo 350, dezl series, LIVE series, or nuvi 2400, 2405, 2505, 3400, 3500, or 3700 series device:

1.Touch Apps
◦Touch Tools on the dezl 560 series
2.Touch Trip Planner
3.Allow time for the device to automatically import the trip/route

These Trip Planner devices will take several minutes to automatically import trips into the Trip Planner. The import will automatically begin, but no message will appear on the device indicating that the import is happening. Once the import is complete, all transferred routes will be displayed under a category called Unscheduled Trips in the Trip Planner. Until the trips show up in Trip Planner, please do not turn off the device or connect it to a computer.

[Andy_P]

[sussamb]

Neither have I ... but then I don't own one

[MichaelCahill]

Just as an exercise, I tried calculating a route on my Nuvi 3590 from my home in Ireland to a place near Bologna, a distance of 2,107 km and involving 2 ferry crossings. It took about 20 seconds to return a result.

Without driving the full route, I cannot say if it is the best option in every sector but the turn by turn instructions for the parts I know (Ireland/UK/Italy) seem good.

[Andy_P]

Is the 2545 a particularily old or underpowered model? Or do we think there's a problem with this particular unit?
_________________
"Settling in nicely" ;-)

[sussamb]

I don't think so.

The 3590 is a more up to date unit. My older 1490 took over a minute but then said 'route too long'. The OPs 2545 is somewhere between the two.

[dales]

Jazzon,

My Garmin nuvi gives the same message as yours did, if I have the Navigation Avoidances set inappropriately for the journey.

Check that the garmin is not set to avoid ferries, toll roads, motorways etc.

Otherwise it will struggle to calculate a valid route - understandably!

Dales.
_________________
nuvi 2599LMT-D, oregon 700, basecamp, memory-map.

[declank]

BIG TIPS HERE FOR YOUR 2xxx Garmin Nuvi

I had a good number of problems planning GPX's files into the 2495LMT
Once you know how its not an issue.

Make sure your planned trip has no more than 50ish via points in the GPX 'Route'.

Tracks and waypoints don't seem to mean much to the 2XXX, it likes 'Routes'

Use Basecamp to plan your GPX. You won't see a detailed map unless your Nuvi with supporting map is plugged in.

If your GPX is waypoints or a track, convert this to 'Route' (Green).

When checking on the Nuvi, you should see egg timer where its importing.... once its finished you should see your route listed.

You can double click on the route and change the amount of via points or you can split the route if you'd like to keep the via points. If you have over 100 via points I'd prefer to reduce the number.

Let me know how you get on..... D

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