TomTom crash

[doneraile]

:roll:After a crash of my computer I was trying to load and back up my tomtom and accidentaly ejected/disconnected my SD card whilst this was taking place..
Now if I switch on my TomTom it shows two hands removing the SD card from the unit with a 'X' on it. If I then remove the SD card It tells me to put it back. Nothing works
My computer does not see the unit as connected even though it is.
Any Ideas (dont be too technical with replies)

 

[canderson]

Whoa. Since there are a dozen different ONE models, I guess we need to start by figuring out which one you've got. Some have internal memory, some have only the SD card, and some even manage both. Yours will be one of the latter two versions.

First thing then: What are the first two letters of the serial number of your particular "ONE"?

Second thing: I'm not sure how to interpret "load and back up". Does this mean that you still had your UK/ROI map on your PC (even after the crash), and is it still (ostensibly) there? If so, we can probably recover things. We'll need to know if you ever did successfully 'back up' your ONE at any time (and whether you used Home or Windows to perform the backup), and if not, if you ever used the Latest Map Guarantee when you bought the unit, or ever bought a map or map subscription for it. That will tell us where to look for your map on your PC.

 

[doneraile]

Whoa. Since there are a dozen different ONE models, I guess we need to start by figuring out which one you've got. Some have internal memory, some have only the SD card, and some even manage both. Yours will be one of the latter two versions.

First thing then: What are the first two letters of the serial number of your particular "ONE"?

Second thing: I'm not sure how to interpret "load and back up". Does this mean that you still had your UK/ROI map on your PC (even after the crash), and is it still (ostensibly) there? If so, we can probably recover things. We'll need to know if you ever did successfully 'back up' your ONE at any time (and whether you used Home or Windows to perform the backup), and if not, if you ever used the Latest Map Guarantee when you bought the unit, or ever bought a map or map subscription for it. That will tell us where to look for your map on your PC.

Hi. Thank you for responding, I do hope you can help a "silver surfer".
The first two letters are E2. (I did buy/download a "Western Europe" map & put a new 2GB SD card in at the same time)

I had had a new hard drive fitted after the original went down. The guy that did it was able to save some of my bits but not all, TomTom was one I lost.
I had connected my TomTom One and was setting TomTom up on my "new" computer, (I cannot remember exactly the true sequence of events ) I had got to a stage and It said I need to download updates or back up (not sure which). I was in the process of this when I accidently caught the USB cable which caused the TomTom to fall, I instinctively caught it but in doing so pressed the SD card which disconnected the TomTom from the computer.

On my desk top I have a TomTom Folder but I am not sure if it is for my old TomTom or the new TomTom Start 2 I have just bought. (I still prefer my TomTom One, It may be I havn't got used to the new Start 2 yet, but Hey Ho it's difficult to teach an old dog new tricks)
Will be away for a couple of days back on Monday am

Regards

 

[dhn]

E2 = A One (2nd Edition) which allows for a 2 gb SD card.

 

[canderson]

... right, and no internal memory to deal with, just the card.

My concern is that "load and backup" might have been quite the wrong order for the process. It is imperative that we find a copy of your maps somewhere on your PC, or that they still remain on the SD card for your ONE.

I will assume that you did finally get Home up and running on your PC. If not, you'll need to attend to that first.

Since we do not know what kind of update was taking place when all of this happened, let's start by hoping that the maps are still present on your device, and that was a firmware update.

Using your PC, look at your ONE and see if you can find a folder that contains your UK/ROI map (I'm only assuming that is what you had). It should be plainly labeled as such. If you spot that folder, please look into it and advise the names of the three largest files you find, and also whether you can see files ending in ".pna", ".dct" and ".meta.dct" there. If so, the problem may be fairly simple to resolve.

 

[associated76]

My GO 530 has completely crashed, now it will turn on sometimes, but I cannot get past the first panel and then I cannot turn it off - only by letting the battery run out. This has happened since I left it in the car overnight during the freeze. Can that be the cause, and can it now be cured? Thank you for your help.

 

[dhn]

In case condensation has gotten into the unit,m put the unit into a bowl of uncooked rice (seriously) for 48 hours.

Then see if things are ok.

 

[canderson]

@doneraile

OK - I'm not sure whether you purchased the W.E. map before or after your HD crash. It's important that we find some map somewhere for you.

On your PC, please check to see if the following still exists:

My Documents/TomTom/HOME/Downloads/complete/map
We're looking for any folders inside the 'map' folder there that might contain one or more maps that can be installed.

On your PC, also check to see if the following exists:

My My Documents/TomTom/HOME/Backups
If so, what folders can you find there?

Last, on the device itself (ignore Home if it loads), and looking at it with your PC as a disk drive, see if you can spot either a UK/ROI or Western Europe map folder in the root of your ONE.

 

[doneraile]

... right, and no internal memory to deal with, just the card.

My concern is that "load and backup" might have been quite the wrong order for the process. It is imperative that we find a copy of your maps somewhere on your PC, or that they still remain on the SD card for your ONE.

I will assume that you did finally get Home up and running on your PC. If not, you'll need to attend to that first.

Since we do not know what kind of update was taking place when all of this happened, let's start by hoping that the maps are still present on your device, and that was a firmware update.

Using your PC, look at your ONE and see if you can find a folder that contains your UK/ROI map (I'm only assuming that is what you had). It should be plainly labeled as such. If you spot that folder, please look into it and advise the names of the three largest files you find, and also whether you can see files ending in ".pna", ".dct" and ".meta.dct" there. If so, the problem may be fairly simple to resolve.

Hi,
I have found a file called TomTom; Click Open; it opens a file "HOME" Click Open, It opens and shows 6 files 1(Back up; Size 894MB Folders "ONE") 2(Downloads ; Size 820KB Folders temp, complete) 3(Downloads Size 28.8 KB Files Tab Icons, Navigator Diis, Download cache) 4(Device, Folder Empty) 5( Sharing; Folder Empty) 6(Statdata; Size 5.36KB, Files Triplog DAD & DAT)
Cannot find any of the files you asked for?
Tried using my new Start 2 over the week end it is not a patch on my old TomTom ONE.

Regards

 

[dhn]

What is the name of the backup file in the Backup FOLDER you found on the computer?

 

[doneraile]

What is the name of the backup file in the Backup FOLDER you found on the computer?

Hi canderson,
Lukily the guy that sorted out my "crash has been able to find from my old hard drive my old Tom Tom. So clicking in the following sequence I got;- "TomTom" - "HOME" - BACKUP - "START" - "Backup01" - "InternalMemory" which contains a long list of files As follows;
.spotlight-V100 - art - bin - cp - gns - helpme - home images - licences - LoquendoTT5 - script - statdata - TomTom HOME Install.app - TomTom-cfg - voices - Western_and_Central_Europe_2GB - zip - Then there are others that do not have the gold coloured Folder Icons. They are, I assume, 'files';- antitheft - autorun - bootloaderversion - current map - (6 x "data_" files ) - InstallTomTomHOME - lowbattery - mcxt - PNDNavigator - settings - signpost_li - splash - system - tomtom - ttgo.bif - ttsystem - userpatch.

I looked in the Western Europe folder and found some of the files you said to look for. Am I in luck?
PS. Away tomorrow bach on Monday. Kind Regards

 

[doneraile]

Found my reply in my Spam folder, so do not know if you recieved it or not.

"Confussed dot com"

 

[canderson]

Yes, you are probably in luck. Even an old backup is better than on backup at all, and who knows, it may be a fairly recent one. You didn't say how long it had been. At least you have the Western Europe map back.

On your new PC, we will want you go ahead and recreate the entire layer of folders again just as it stood on your old hard drive, right down to the "Backup01", and place all of the contents of that folder from your old drive onto your new drive.

Then connect your ONE, let Home fire up and see whether or not it is able to see your old backup and restore it for you. There are alternatives, but this will be by far the easiest approach if it works.

If/when you are successful in getting your ONE running with the above method, then PLEASE use the following method to back up your one right away: https://www.tomtomforums.com/t17864-how-backup-contents-your-unit-computer.html

If you run into any snags, just let us know. As long as the map folder from your old backup is intact, we can get you out of this one way or another.

 

[doneraile]

Hi, Ok I have the file TomTom in MyDirectory on my 'new' computer the sequence of opening is as before.
I plugged in my TomTom and switched it on. All that shows on my TomTom is a picture of a TomTom with a cable comming out of its base to the corner of the screen. If I open 'My Computer' it is connect to Drive 'F' If I then Right click on that and then Left click on 'Open' a screen comes up saying 'The disc in drive F is not Formatted. Do you want to format it now?' ( I have answered NO and closed it) (When I do this it causes a warning to come up on my TomTom telling me 'Not to disconnect the TomTom), "Home" does not 'fire up' on my computer.

 

[canderson]

Well, things can't get any worse by doing the format that is being requested. As far as we know, we can still salvage the maps, and that's all that counts.

Connect your unit to your PC with card inserted. Go ahead and either let it prompt you to format the unit, or select it and right click and select "Format" if you can do it manually. Format the device as FAT32, and do NOT select "Quick" format - let it do a proper format.

When complete, use the USB "Safely Remove Hardware" icon in the systray (down in the lower right corner of your computer screen) to properly disconnect your unit from Windows. Then go ahead and unplug it. Turn it off.

Reconnect your device to your PC and turn it on. Home *should* fire up on its own when the connected unit appears. If not, you will have to execute Home manually to get it running.

Once running, Home will see your 'empty' unit and offer update(s), (one of which) will be the application that we wiped out during formatting. Go ahead and accept just the application firmware (ignore anything else that might be offered). Once the application is downloaded and installed on your unit, once again copy the map folder that you found to the root of your unit using your PC's copy/paste function.

Using Home's feature for disconnecting, disconnect your device . Unplug it. Turn it off. Turn it on. What does it say now?

 

[doneraile]

No progress I am afraid. Just more questions.

Followed your advice up to the bottom of paragraph 3 above. OKd the Formating After a while a window came up "Windows failed to format Drive F" (SD card in TomTom)

Reconnected device;- HOME did not fire up. (I believe the only HOME I have in my 'Programs is the version that loaded inself on when I bought my START 2) I started up HOME manually from 'Programs' In the bottom right hand corner it said no device connected. (which there was. my ONE)
With the device still connected I tried by right clicking each icon to use 'send to drive F' Folder after Folder & file after file from the TomTom I have in MyDocuments, without success.
(I don't know if it matters but I notice the the TomTom File I have in MyDirectory cannot be found in 'All Progams' ) (Any milege in trying to put the TomTom folder into the TomTom HOME 2 I have in Programs, Bearing in mind that the HOME 2 does not see my old device at present) While I am away this week end I will try to purchase a new 2 or 4GB SDHC card. Just in case that may help, it will not be wasted if it's not needed.

Regards

 

[canderson]

Unless you are able to format the SD card while installed in the unit, we're not going to make any progress. I wonder if it's the SD card that's the issue, or the unit? Guess we will know soon enough.

As for which card to purchase (I agree, it could be the card), you'll need to exercise care with that. Your unit does NOT support SDHC cards at 4GB. You will want to find a 2GB SD card.

 

[doneraile]

Unless you are able to format the SD card while installed in the unit, we're not going to make any progress. I wonder if it's the SD card that's the issue, or the unit? Guess we will know soon enough.

As for which card to purchase (I agree, it could be the card), you'll need to exercise care with that. Your unit does NOT support SDHC cards at 4GB. You will want to find a 2GB SD card.

Hi, Managed to Format 2GB SD card outside the Tom Tom device. However no matter what I try, (I have reformated the 2GB SD card a few times) everything seems to fail.
NOW FOR THE REALLY GOOD NEWS. I raked around some "Junk Draws" on my desk and found the original SD card, (UK only, No maps of W.Europe). I put that into my TomTom and it works perfectly.
After the problems I have had, I am so reluctant to connect my TomTom with the original card in it , to my PC, although I know I should, as I would like to get my Western Europe maps back.
(I do not want to corrupt my old SD card with images that are already on my PC that may be corrupted anyway!!)
I would appreciate your comments and advice.

 

[doneraile]

PS I will go out and buy a brand new 2 GB SD Card which may take a few days as I am really behind with things.

Regards

 

[canderson]

First thing I would do if in your shoes - and assuming you don't want to do this while it's in your TomTom - would be to find a card reader or SD to USB dongle and get a solid backup of that original SD card somewhere safe on your PC!

Actually, there's no reason you can't do it while it IS in your TomTom since a backup using your PC writes nothing to the card. If Home fires up when you connect, just ignore it and use your PC to make a full backup of your unit per these instructions: https://www.tomtomforums.com/t17864-how-backup-contents-your-unit-computer.html

After that, we can take the information from your PC to try to build a nice, new 2GB SD card for you that includes your W.E. map and not touch your original while we're doing it.