Install New Map without TomTom Home?

Encountered some difficulties updating my maps through Latest Map Guarantee. TomTom HOME got through downloading the North America maps (it took several hours), but then always got an error message for Western Europe etc.

I gave up on the Western Europe maps, and installed North America using the regular update maps section of HOME. This worked okay at first. But my settings and favorites were missing, so I manually dragged my backup copy of the mapsettings file onto the right place on the TomTom. Now the device goes into an endless loop when starting up, so I'll have to restore the backup using either TomTom HOME or my manual backup.

Once I'm back to square one, I'm wondering whether it might not be better to just manually install the new map files by dragging them. Is this possible (and which files to use?), or do you have to use TomTom HOME to install maps?

Two issues here: a) the looping and b) whether maps can be installed without use Home.

Second answer first....see the post further down for manual installation
(revision: to reflect the fact it is possible).

Next, the looping.....

If you delete mapsettings.cfg from the map folder using Explorer, and then shut off the unit. Disconnect the unit properly from the computer and restart. The application will recreate a new mapsettings.cfg file and you should not encounter the looping problem

It used to be that users could simply copy a mapsettings.cfg file from a backed up map to a new map to retrieve saved settings such as favourites, recent destinations and the like. Recent applications seem to have put an end to that procedure by rewriting the code in the file or something.

So, what many people are doing is this:

1. Download POI Edit from poiedit.com
2. Create a custom poi category on your unit. Like _My_Favourites (The _ at the beginning will allow for the category to appear first in the list if you want to manage poi's.
2. Load the backed up mapsettings.cfg file into Poi Edit.
3. The application will list each of your favourites. Save each item as a poi point and save in the custom category file you created.

Now then, use Explorer to move the custom.ov2 file into the new map folder and all your favourites will be there. Further, in the next map update, just copy this custom ov2 file from current map to new map.

Ah. Very helpful, thank you!

POIEdit seems only to be for PCs. Do you know if there's a similar program for Macs?

Take a look and see if you can find PoiView

I had the same problems as described and wrote to Tomtom Support. They gave me this method of doing a manual install of the downloaded map (translated):

It worked

Yep, I should modify my post since indeed there is a manual method for installing the maps. Ususally not the best way to do it but hey, if it works and Home doesn't .....

You still need HOME to download the map and serial-number-specific activation file.

After that, you can manually copy the download to the device if HOME doesn't do it properly.

Correct. It was the install aspect I modified. It does concern me that some may not do the manual procedure properly, though. When Home DOES fit the new map, it does so seamlessly.

I had issues installing my new map through Tom Tom Home, it kept failing so I went ahead and manually copied it into the device as explained in previous posts.
Now the issue I have is that Tom Tom Home doesn't recognized that the map was installed. It shows there is a map but doesn't know that it is the map that had been downloaded previously so it is unable to check for updates automatically.
Is there anyway to correct this?