Can't Restore Favourites

Joined
Mar 26, 2009
Messages
5
I recently "upgraded" my 920 for the first time since April 08 (probably "ever") to v 8.302.

Then I noticed that the "voice over FM" had gone - so I followed instructions elsewhere to roll back to 8.010

My maps are "old, and so the roll-back worked without problem ... but now my Favourites are missing.

Each time I copy the MapSettings.cfg file to the Western Europe (WE) directory it gets wiped before I can use it.

Oddly, my US favourites are fine, just the WE ones.

I have looked in this forum and tried "safely removing hardware" - but that makes no difference.

I read about the "work around" - to access the favourites from my PC using "Home". However, when I run Home to operate my TomTom it simply comes up as if there are no favourites ... even thought I can "see" the MapSettings.cfg file in my Explorer window ! Trying to add a new favourite simply creates a new MapSettings.cfg with the one new favourite.

I have even tried switching to the Guam map, creating a Guam favourite, copying my WE MapSettings.cfg files and then re-booting. When it comes on (in Guam) the new Guam favourite is still there. I can even see the correct MapSettings.cfg in WE.

But if I switch maps to WE it blanks my favourites file.

It seems to be that the act of booting up in WE, or switching to WE blanks my WE favourites out.


HELP !!!



Regards

Graham
 
I read about the "work around" - to access the favourites from my PC using "Home". However, when I run Home to operate my TomTom it simply comes up as if there are no favourites ... even thought I can "see" the MapSettings.cfg file in my Explorer window ! Trying to add a new favourite simply creates a new MapSettings.cfg with the one new favourite.

Are you saying you use Explorer to copy an old mapsettings.cfg to the new WE map. Open Home. Manage maps to get to the WE map and when you go to Manage Favourites, it is greyed out?
 
The newer software and maps have messed up the MapSettings.cfg file on a large number of devices, if you still have the old file with your favourites stored in it simply open this on the PC using POIEdit which you can download from Here

Edit the locations you don't need such as Home location and some of your recent destinations then use File/ Save As ov2 file format, your favourites will now be converted to a POI file. Another little tip is to save the file name with the underscore character at the start of the file name:

"mikes_favourites" makes finding the POI file on the device difficult as you have to scroll down the list.

"_mikes_favourites" (note the extra "_" at the start) puts the file at the top of any POI index - Mike
 
Are you saying you use Explorer to copy an old mapsettings.cfg to the new WE map. Open Home. Manage maps to get to the WE map and when you go to Manage Favourites, it is greyed out?

That's right.

I used Windows to copy the entirety of my TT to my PC. I did this last year and I also did it just recently, both before AND after my "upgrade" to 8.302. So I have three "images" of my TT at different times.

The "Favourites" are greyed out - even when I can "see" that there is a "valid" (i.e. largish) file called "MapSettings.cfg" in the "Western_and_Central_Europe" directory.

This file gets "reset" to a smaller blank file of 3k (like "MapSettings.old") when I :-

Change maps using "Manage Maps" on the TT
Restart the TT with WE as the default map
Attempt to do anything to favourites using Home on my PC


And yet my US map Favourites (and the dummy one in Guam) are both unaffected.




Graham
 
your favourites will now be converted to a POI file

Thanks for that tip Mike. Can I call it "Plan B" ?

I would rather get my Favourites back, if that is possible. But if it isn't, your advice sounds like a pretty good work-around.




Thanks

Graham
 
Are you using Home to see that the icon is greyed out for Favourites?

You can try this...... forget about Home completely.

1. Connect the unit to the pc.
2. Use Explorer to copy a backed up mapsettings.cfg to the specifc WE map folder (or whatever the proper name of the map folder is).
3. Disconnect the unit PROPERLY from the pc using the Disconnect icon in your notification tray.
4. With the unit in your hand and still on, can you manage Favourites now (i.e, is it active ?)
5. If so, delete just one favourite from the list. Turn off the unit. Turn it back on. Have your favourites 'stuck' this time?
6. If not, go to Mike's plan B! :)
 
Are you using Home to see that the icon is greyed out for Favourites?

Yes.


You can try this...... forget about Home completely.

1. Connect the unit to the pc.
2. Use Explorer to copy a backed up mapsettings.cfg to the specifc WE map folder (or whatever the proper name of the map folder is).
3. Disconnect the unit PROPERLY from the pc using the Disconnect icon in your notification tray.
4. With the unit in your hand and still on, can you manage Favourites now (i.e, is it active ?)
5. If so, delete just one favourite from the list. Turn off the unit. Turn it back on. Have your favourites 'stuck' this time?

That's what I started out doing.

The problem is, no matter how I disconnect (including using the proper "system tray" procedure) and whether I turn the TT off myself or let it reboot when it is physically disconnected ... it always goes through that long-ish boot process (with the status bar) at some point and this seems to destroy the favourites.



BREAKING NEWS

Bearing in mind that I have updated from a very old, to a very new (8.302) and back to a slightly older (8.010) o/s ...

I decided to try my oldest copy of MapSettings.cfg from last April ...Hey Presto ! It works perfectly well !




Thanks for you kind attention guys. I may call back some time (hopefully not for a while :))




Regards

Graham
 
I would still consider switching to using a custom POI file instead of using Favourites, when you get around to updating your map or software again at some future point you will be faced with the same vertical rock face (its much easier if you have the prior knowledge than trying to retro your old missing favourites file)

Custom POI files can contain thousands of locations within a single category, unlike the favourites which are limitted to 48, also Custom POI files can have phone numbers stored against each entry which can prove quite handy at times - Mike
 
Mike, you make a very strong case.

Whilst I don't have that many favourites, the abilty to manage them better is attractive.

I could create separate POIs for friends/family and key locations. By naming them "_1_Family" and "_2_Key Locations" they would appear as the first and second POIs. Neat.The ability to edit them more easily and transport between various versions of the TT o/s is very attractive too.

Am I right in thinking that there are no downsides to using POIs in this way ? In other words, is the "Favourites" category used by TT really just a specific POI category ?

Did I also notice that my speed camera alarm sounds have come back to life since I got MapSettings.cfg live again ? Does this file also contain info about the actions for "Warn when near POI" ?




Regards

Graham
 
I am only speaking from experiance, I abandonded using the favourites options quite some time ago, there is no real downside to using the POI method to store locations other than it might take an extra press of the screen to locate the information you need (a small outlay compared to jumping through hoops every time the Navcore changes and deletes your favourites).

As for Speed Camera warnings, yes the settings are stored within the MapSettings.cfg file along with favourites and recent destinations - Mike
 
I have another method of doing this.

I open the mapsettings.cfg file from my backup using POIedit. It will tell you the coordinates. I turn on my TomTom device and manually add the favorites using the GPS coordinates options and they are back. I also do this for the HOME location.
 

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