Nightmare Go 300 Pc-link Problems Options

[cawley1]

Hi,
I have just got a couple of Go 300 units from my brother who has recently bought Garmins, but like an idiot -who did not know what he was doing- I managed to delete the 'data.chk' from the SD card that was woking fine (the other was not) and now I have two useless TomToms!
I have copied the 'data.chk' from the non-working SD card, but although the 300 will now boot, all the touch icons appear to be in the wrong place, some are blanked out etc - in other words, completelly useless!

I decided to fresh install the software from the TomTom application that I got from their website, but to make matters worse, I cannot get my PC to 'see' either 300 under TomTomHOME 2.2.2.83, on my desktop Vista boot, it's XP boot, or my crappy old Pentium 3 laptop, despite using various USB cables, USB ports etc (all I want to do is re-download the software, I will figure out the map stuff if I can get the software back onto either of the original SD cards, or the 2-Gig one I was trying to upgrade one of them to!)

When I connect the USB cable on any of the above boots/systems, I can see the SD card in the TomTom as a removable disk under Windows Explorer, but in TomTomHome the 'device' tab at the top is not highlighted, while the other three tabs all are - I don't know if the 300 should be asking me if I want to connect to a PC on it's touchscreen, but this never happens, regardless of what SD is in the slot, or even nothing at all, all I get is a picture of the back of the 300 with a USB cable coming out of it. I have tried resetting BOTH 300 units and tried on both PC machines, but it is still greyed out and the 300 hardware is never 'seen'.

I have tried so many variations of hardware and software, I must be doing something wrong (assumed the Laptop would work, but it didn't), what can I try next?!

Please help!

[Andy_P]

Ok I'll make a start with a couple of observations and thoughts.

1. data.chk has nothing to do with screen icons, it's the sound effects file for POI warnings. So that's not the reason your display is screwed

2. The only way I know that the menu icons can be moved into a new order is if you have a custom menu file installed. The file for that is called "TomTom.mnu", delete it and the menus go back to normal.

3. As you can get windows to recognise the Go's as a new hard drive, you MUST do full backups of both machines RIGHT NOW, using Windows explorer to copy the entire SD card contents to a safe place on the PC. Instructions are in the "How to..." section of this forum.

4. Once you've done that. you've got two choices - get a new version of the software onto the unit EITHER using Home OR manually. To continue with the Home option try #5 and #6. For a manual install try #7...

5. The reason Home may not be "Seeing" the Go's could be because the software on them is too old for Home v2 to recognise (another bit of crappy programming by TomTom).
Download the v1.6 version of Home from HERE using the RIGHT HAND selection "for Rider and Navigator 6". Hopefully that will recognise the software on at least one of the machines and let you update.

6. Try DELETING all the LOOSE files on each Go (NOT any folders) and also delete the contents of the "program" folder in "My documents/ TomTom Home/ Downloads/ Program". THEN connect to Home. (Here are fuller instructions:

1. Reset your TomTom device: http://www.tomtom.com/6965 and connect it to your computer.
2. Open My Computer in Windows, or Finder in Macintosh from your desktop and turn on your TomTom device.
3. On your screen a new removable disk appears, this is your TomTom device, click on the disk to open it.
4. You will see a list of folders and a list of loose files
5. Delete all of the loose files. IMPORTANT: The folders with their content must NOT be deleted.
5. Close the window when all files are deleted by clicking on the [x].

Next we will reinstall the application via TomTom HOME.

First, go into TomTom Home and click on file > exit.

Now go into my documents on your PC > TomTom Home > Downloads > Program. Delete everything that is in this folder.

Now start TomTom HOME on your computer again
TomTom Home should automatically check for updates and prompt you to install them, if not:-
2. Click Install to TomTom.
3. Select the Application update.
4. Click on 'Device - Disconnect Device', then turn off your device when it is done installing and disconnect it from your computer.
---------------------------------

NOTE: The above was written for Home v1. For Home v2, replace instruction 2 by "Click on 'Update my device'..."



Alternatively, for a manual install, try this:
7. Delete all the loose files as above (not anything in a folder) and then got to THIS PAGE and download the v6.525 version. Unzip the files (right click and select "extract all" in Windows XP) and follow the simple instructions in the readme text file, to paste the 5 other files back onto the Go's SD card (not inside any folder).

[cawley1]

Hi Andy,
I can't thank you enough for this help!
I did the manual install to my 2GB Sandisk card and it seems to be working fine, I will have a play with it in the morning.
I have also formatted both the original cards (I already backed up the 'good' one after I deleted the data.chk anyway) and have installed the software manually from the webpage in your link, then copied the folders from the backup folder on the hard drive.
Can I ask here which folders I need to keep, as I want these installs as clean as possible (I currently have Great_Britain-Map, itn, Licenses, schemes, Script, TomTom-Cfg, voices and zip).
I also noticed that with nothing changed TomTomHome just recognised the 300 I had attached for the first time!
Cheers,
Paul

[Andy_P]

Have I answered this somewhere else?

Very weird... I did a long reply last night, detailing all the folders you have and what I used to have on my Go300, and what each was for.
But it's not here now, so either I lost it before I posted it, or I posted it in another forum?

Anyway, I'm afraid I can't go through it all again (especially as I'm not at home where my 300 backups are), but suffice to say, your folder list looks just right to me and there's not really anything you should delete.