The major problem is that everything that you can find about the Garmin data formats is reverse-engineered Garmin absolutely don't release their data formats. I should say that I have created maps and charts for use in Garmin kit (legally, I hasten to say), and it really is VERY demanding I'm pretty sure I haven't uncovered all the ramifications of tiling, map sets, custom cartography and so on - and I have 30-odd years experience in handling Geographic data. Certainly all the (reliable!) tools I know about are Windows only. You might find something Linux based, but if it's a Mac (which are no longer as virus free as they once were) then I think you really are sunk. If you are not too worried about legality and do the necessary web searching be aware that most of the tools around for cracking the protection are riddled with viruses! You have been warned!Ĭlick to expand.Then I'm afraid you are probably sunk as far as software goes - AFAIK, it is all Windows stuff. Experience shows that explaining it here will result in this thread being deleted rapidly by the administrators.

There are ways around this and an hour or two searching the web should tell you how to do it if you are not worried about legality. The charts are locked to the specific SD card and if you copy them to another blank card, it will not work in your plotter. You don't get a CD or DVD - just the SD card and that can be moved from one plotter to another at will. SD cards do include their own security mechanism (that's what the S stands for) - and the current Garmin charts rely on that instead. You can do away with the USB cable and let Mapsource write directly to the micro-SD card using a suitable adaptor on your PC, but the result is still locked to the plotter. Some of the more recent Garmin hand helds took micro-SD cards, but still locked the charts to a specific plotter. If you take the memory stick from one plotter and move it to another after you have uploaded the charts in this way, it will refuse to work. You use the Mapsource programme on your PC to load charting data into the plotter via a USB cable and the unlock code for your plotter is stored in the configuration files of Mapsource on your PC. Garmin charts are locked to either a specific plotter (in the case of the older plotters that took proprietary Garmin memory sticks) or to a specific SD card in the case of the more modern product range.

Jetmouse garmin