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Worked great under 2000 but not XP. Others say differently, so you're on your own.
It would be impracticale to buy a memory card larger than 32 meg without buying this product. This was on a 400 MHz Windows 2000 computer. I had the 32 meg memory card, and it took about 8 hours to load the maps in using a serial connection (cut the battery life in half while flashing). Now I flash a 128 meg card with the usb programmer, and the total time to load ~127 megs of maps (including indexing time) is about 13 minutes. If you have a faster computer, it may be able to index the maps faster. I highly recommend this product.
Initially it did not work, but a trip to Garmin's website enabled me to download the latest drivers. You may even choose to get a larger data card for your needs.
That's the difference between loading one region from my MetroGuide CD to an 8mb data card using this programmer instead of using the serial cable. It took slightly less than 4 minutes to load a 61.4mb file (9 maps) to my 64mb card.
From 22 minutes to 22 seconds. If you are in no rush and you don't change areas much, obviously the programmer is not necessary.
That included building the map set, erasing the former map set, transferring the files, and then verifying the files. This same transfer took over two hours in the past.
But if you travel to different places and rent a car, or you plan to make a long trip, save your time and batteries and invest in this programmer.I run it on Windows XP. No problems thereafter.
I have even downloaded the new USB drivers from the Garmin Web site (v 2.5.0.0). I really liked the Data Card Programmer on my old operating software Windows 98 & ME. The first time I used it, (USB driver version 2.3) my 32Mb card was destroyed only 720Kb was left useable. It is very fast and a must if you don't want to burn up batteries when downloading maps. However I have not been able to make it work with my XP software. While Garmin replaced the card and put out a new set of USB drivers (9/19/02), I still cannot get it to work with XP at least it no longer destroys the card. When they get the drivers fixed this is an item to buy.
Uploading and downloading info to your Garmin GPS using the serial data link may not take that much time if you only use the smaller data cards. I thought it wasn't working, so after a few minutes of trouble shooting, I realized that not only was it working correctly, but it was working very fast. For my next trip, I picked up the USB programmer.
It took about 10 minutes to fill up my 8mb card using the normal link to my eMap. On the serial link it took about 6 minutes. However, when you start getting up to the 32 or 64 MB range, the time it takes to use the regular serial link is ridiculous.
I tested it with my 8MB card and a few routes. Not really a big deal. However, when I got a 32MB card, it took over an hour to fill up my cross country trip details.
The USB was done in about 15 seconds. Very nice.Note: The 32Mb card took a little over 2 minutes to completely fill.
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