Garmin 1000 – USB Mass Storage Mode

This past weekend, I decided to do a bike ride from Sun Prairie to New Glarus.
https://connect.garmin.com/activity/embed/816793841

I have ridden my bike from Sun Prairie to Madison plenty of times so I knew the route about half of the way. What I didn’t know was the best route from Madison to New Glarus, as there are many routes.

So I got a few routes from @chdbrwn via MapMyRide. I exported them out and tried to get them on my Garmin 1000. No dice. Hooked up to the computer, Garmin wouldn’t show up. Tried a few different computers, nothing.

Then it dawned on me.. am I using the right cable? Well, turns out I wasn’t. I have a ton of USB cables and I was using one of the many, which with the Garmin 1000, would charge it if hooked to the computer, but it wouldn’t show up as a device or sync with Garmin Express. Syncing is fine since I usually sync over wifi or via the phone connection.

I found my “official” Garmin cable and it showed up right away. Now, to get the files on there. Previously on the Garmin 810 you could just copy into “Courses” or “Rides”, etc and files would show up. Turns out on the 1000 you need to put the files in “NewFiles” folder on the device and reboot, and when it comes back it, the Garmin will process them and they show up on the device. Great!

But, the file I exported from MapMyRide turns out didn’t have any cues (basically turns), so I was riding just looking at the line on the map the entire ride.  I could have used RideWithGPS to add cues, but I tried their “Write to Garmin” and it wasn’t working, not sure it was putting things in NewFiles either.

Seems like turn by turn and mapping/routes shouldn’t be this complicated in the year 2015.

Bottom line, make sure you have the right cable, and also set up your cues on the route file before importing. Happy Riding!