Official Answer: Nuvi - SD microSD Card Size - Garmin FAQ

I am not sure what happened to the FAQ either. The unit should be SDHC compliant (Able to support >2GB). If one selects a high capacity card and loads >8GB work of data, it has been reported in other threads that some units take longer to boot up as they read in the data.

I personally use a 8GB class 6 card filled to half capacity. The performance of the unit depends on the micro used. 8 GB cards a rather inexpensive these days. You can always purchase one ant try it out. If it does not work you can always purchase a Targus USB SDHC card reader and use it as a thumb drive or install it in another device.

I use an 8Gb card on my Nuvi 660 and it looks like the maximum number of mp3 files is 1000. There have been a couple of other posts indicating a 1000 file limit. Is it the 4.10 software or the Nuvi 750 that allows 2500 files?

Of course, 1000 mp3 files is still 50+ hours of music...

Since this list doesn't specifically mentioned the Garmin Nuvi 500, I e-mailed them and this is the reply that I received:

"Thank you for contacting Garmin International. The largest SD card that you can put on the unit is a 4 gig SD card. It will not hold anything bigger."

Also, although I can't find it at the moment, I seem to recall that somewhere in a Garmin Manual they actually referred to SanDisk and Kingston as preferred Micro SD Cards.

now. I remembered reading somewhere in here says that it will take 8gb.

Can anyone tell me what the maximum size of SD card is that I can use in my Garmin 255W.

I have heard that it is 2 gig and I have also heard that I can use any size.

I tried a 8 GB SDHC card on the garmin 255w and it can read the photos of it.

I have a Nuvi 885T and use a microSD card 8GB and it plays all of my music files, the only problem is that it does not play the whole album at once.(Individual album)(Even though I can choose by artist if i need to play the whole album)
I use the shuffle so that it would not repeat itself on long trips, but I have not exhausted the whole file yet on a trip

I put an 8GB SDHC data card in my 760.

It will present all the songs 1230 loaded on there, but tends to crash the device in the following ways:

If I 'play all' and set to play in alpha order it will crash when it has played around 136 songs, and is very dificult to get the MP3 player running again (as the Nuvi seems 'locked' on around song 136 (if i remember correctly)). I deleted the crashing track and reloaded and forwarded to song 136 and it did the same thing for another song, so not the music, seems to be the Nuvi.

Or, if I randomize all songs it will crash at some point and a new scan needs to be done before random playing again.

I was running on older firmware (pre-4.9) so may be fixed. I will report once tested.

If not I will drop to a 4GB card for stability.

Cam

Quote:

Question: What's the Secure Digital (SD) card recommended for my nüvi or zumo?
Answer:

As long as your nuvi or zumo has the latest version of software, it will be compatible with all SD and SDHC datacards. While SDHC datacards are available in a variety of storage sizes and speeds, we only recommend using a maximum of 16GB SDHC cards.

Endquote

I'm running an 855 with an 8GB Scandisc SDHC card. It's got 1861 songs on it with a total playing time of just over 121 hours. Took a little time to load
So far I haven't played it for more than 2 hours continuously so I can't comment on the freeze at 135 songs.
Only trouble I find is that I have to ensure that the unit has sufficient time to initialize after being turned off and disconnected from the power supply. Normal turnoff and leaving it connected causes no problem.
I'm still trying to find a way to select the group of songs that I want to play on a specific trip. Yes I know of play lists, but I don't like making a new play list each time. I much prefer the 13 disk CD player that I have in one of my cars. I can remotely select the disc, folder and song. Much easier than scrolling through pages of data. Yes, it's the same music on the SD card as on 13 CDs

I've been using a Nuvi 660 for over a year with a 4gb card without problem. When I tried using an 8 gb card it took forever for the unit to boot - so long that I will not use it.

I have a Nuvi 200 and I'm using a 4GB SDHC card no problem. At one point i tested 8GB and it worked too.

My 855 takes only about 30 secs, after the maps have loaded. Of course, if left connected to the car power, even when "Turned off", it never has to reboot.

jrozsnaki is spot on...forget all the jazz about a 2GB limit on SD Cards for your nuvi 6XX series GPSs. I just bought an 8GB SanDisk Mobile microSDHC Card with Adapter and configured it in my nuvi 660. I then uploaded my new nuMaps life time maps (garmin_rmu_cnnant2010_40.exe @ ~2GB) onto it and just began uploading mp3 files...all of which the nuvi recognizes and plays. And the unit takes only 20 seconds to boot up. No problems here...for now at least.

Chief Kinney

He! He! I am running a 1 year old firmware. I am curious to see how big an SD card I can use. For sure, my 2 GB card is working on my 760 virmware v3.10. Not sure if a 4GB HDLC card would work.

It won't break anything if you try and 4GB cards are relatively inexpensive enough to do it. I would hedge a guess that it would since the physical HW is more than likely on the unit that you have.

thanks for the info

The older Garmin handhelds are limited to 2025 map segments.

So anything bigger than 2gb is wasted on the older handhelds. The Dakota, Oregon, and Colorado do not have the 2025 map segments limitation.

It's been working fine. I won't tell the 760 that it may not work though

I'm using a patriot sd 16gig on my nuvi 775. working flawless.

I'm using an 8GB Sandisk SDHC on a 760, with a combination of music, additional maps and tour guides on it. It's maxed out for space as I fill up all the spare with music. So far everything has worked fine. Boot up time varies occasionally but it's never been longer than a couple of minutes and is usually much less. There are over 1,000 music files on there and the player has never crashed, but I've never played them all the way through in one session.

Thanks for the info. on the SD cards I have wondered what the limit is. I have a 4 gig card in mine and it seems to be working just fine.

Just installed it not that I plan to use close to the limit. But I was glad to come across these posts.

We purchased European maps on an SD Card for the Nuvi 760. Although the Nuvi did not show an error message, the maps did not load. Turns out that the card has 4Gb capacity and the original firmware expects 2Gb or less. We downloaded the new firmware version 4.9 to the Nuvi from the Garmin website which fixed the problem (we had version 4.5 dated 2008). None of this appears to be documented anywhere and Garmin does not list this item as an enhancement to the firmware. Hope you dont encounter the problem but if you do, try the new firmware.

As long as the unit has the latest version of software, your unit can use the following maximum card size from the table below. You can use the WebUpdater program to download the latest unit software.

Unit Series Maximum Size of SD card
nuvi 16 GB
zumo 16 GB
StreetPilot C500 2 GB
StreetPilot C300* 2 GB
StreetPilot i-series* 2 GB

StreetPilot 7200 / 7500 2 GB

Depending on the model of your unit, it may use either a full size SD card or a microSD card. If you are not sure which your unit requires, please refer to its documentation.

*Note: If you have an OEM dealer device please refer to the series above that fits your device. StreetPilot C300 and i-series units do not currently support the SDHC (High Capacity) cards.

Last modified on: 06/04/2010

From the Garmin support site. Located Here: http://tinyurl.com/6pvfen

Question: What is the largest Secure Digital (SD) card that my nuvi, zumo, or StreetPilot can accept?
Answer:

As long as the unit has the latest version of software, your unit can use the following maximum card size from the table below. You can use the WebUpdater program to download the latest unit software.

Unit Series Maximum Size of SD card
nuvi 16 GB
zumo 16 GB
StreetPilot C500 2 GB
StreetPilot C300* 2 GB
StreetPilot i-series* 2 GB
StreetPilot 7200 / 7500 2 GB

Depending on the model of your unit, it may use either a full size SD card or a microSD card. If you are not sure which your unit requires, please refer to its documentation. Keep in mind the larger the card and number/size of files on the card can slow the units ability to draw the mapping.

*Note: If you have an OEM dealer device please refer to the series above that fits your device. StreetPilot C300 and i-series units do not currently support the SDHC (High Capacity) cards.
Last modified on: 09/09/2010

From Garmin, 21 March 2012:

As long as the unit has the latest version of software, your unit can use the following maximum card size from the table below. You can use the WebUpdater program at the following link to download the latest unit software version: http://www8.garmin.com/products/webupdater/howtoinstall.jsp

 Unit Series = nuvi series
 Maximum Size of SD Card = 16GB

All devices that support SDHC (High Capacity) cards will support up to class 10 cards.
 
=====

Authors' note:

A Class 10 SD card will be five times as fast as a (cheaper) Class 2 card. (The class of an SD card will be indicated by a small "C" logo with an even smaller class number inside.)

As you install larger SD cards in your GPS unit, and put bigger files on them, your search times will increase.

The perfect balance is to have a fast SD card that is just large enough to hold your map set. If you need to have two map sets, say USA and Mexico, get two SD cards and put one map set on each card.

I have an 8GB Lexar Platinum II Class 6 SDHC card in my nüvi 650; as I recall, it has the entire Garmin City Navigator North America NT 2012 map set (with no music, etc.: that is what my factory sound system and iPod adapter are for). The performance is great!

As a general rule, I try to avoid "bargain basement" memory for my digital devices. It is better in the long run to pay a little bit more upfront and get better performance and reliability over the long run. Quality DOES count.

All nuvi models will support SD cards up to 8GB in size.

https://support.garmin.com/support/searchSupport/case.faces?caseId={ebe0eac0-049f-11dd-dc9c-000000000000}

P.S. @ jrozsnaki

I tried sending you an email via your contact tab and the message came back stating that the address wasn't valid.

Great to hear that! I was wondering....

But was there any post from Garmin regarding the SPEED of the SD card that the Nuvi's would support?

I enjoy coming here and browsing other GPS sites to continuousy discover and learn new things. When I come across something I consider of value I copy and paste it in a word document which I keep for futur reference.(My document at this time is 22 pages long !)

t923347 from POI Factory wrote the following on another website which is worth noting considering his vast knowledge and GPS experience.

"If you were to purchase an SD card then any size up to 16GB would work in your Nuvi, and most people probably use a 8GB card as it's big enough for a full map update with lots of room left for POI files and anything else you want to put on it. A 4GB will be fine but with the low price of these things now, you may want to go bigger. Class doesn't really matter as that basically only comes into play when writing to the card. With the Nuvi you will normally only be reading from it so any class should do. I personally use class 2, 4 and 6 class cards and can't tell the difference when using them on the GPS. You can use either SD or SDHC cards on the Nuvi but since all SDHC cards should come preformatted in the FAT32 format and the SD card don't necessarily, you can save yourself some format time by using SDHC cards. Brand doesn' really seem to matter all that much, although I'd be skeptical of very low prices cards on e-Bay, which I have found are prone to failing quickly."

I certainly hope it answers your question.
Cheers

By speed I assume you mean the class of the card (class 2,4,6,etc.). It's my understanding that this affects write speed and since the Nuvi is "reading" from the card, any class should work equally as well.

Personally I use class 2, 4 and 6 cards and on 4 different Nuvi's and can't really tell the difference.

It might be time for me to move up to an 8 GB micro SD card. I sent my Garmin Nuvi 350 in recently and they sent me a refurbished unit under the warranty. City navigator only allowed me to put part of the country on the device, but I am putting the lower 49 states on a 4 GB micro SD (in an SD adapter). With memory being so inexpensive, this might be a good time to move up to an 8 GB micro SD. (Or I might wait 3 months when I buy a LifeTime Map and move up to 2013.4 during late January/early February 2014!)

I think it is also time to delete a number of non-English voice files, add some POI file, and maybe even a custom vehicle icon.

Thanks - I had my old email in my profile - it is fixed now and I did get the PM you sent.

Anyway - I have used a 16GB with no issues in my 3760 just to see if it would work. I do not need more than 8GB though. The FAQ was originally posted with the most up to date info form Garmin's web site and the max size appears to be device specific. I read that the max microSD card for the handhelds in 32MB - If it has changed it should be updated.

HI..late to the discussion..But I just purchased a 4GB SDHC for my nuvi 465T.

I will be downloading my new maps to it.

1) Will I experience any problems because I'm using SDHC instead of just SD?

2)Is response time slower by using a card?

I formatted the card so its ready for the new map.

3)Besides the map what else should be considered to put on the SDHC... Pictures and music are not something I will consider.

If my comment should be somewhere else, please let me know.

Thank you in advance.

1. No.
2. No.
3. Custom POIs if you are short on space on the device. Although putting them on the card can come with issue.

MM...thanks for the quick response.

Custom POI's can have issues per your response.. Like ?

Thanks

I'm using a 32GB card in my 750 and it works fine, I'm using it because I had it. I have the last map update (NA 2013.3) on it as well as my custom POIs and the audio books I like to listen to on long trips. I don't know what issues MM's is talking about, I've never had a problem with anything.

Maybe the issues are related to my Nuvi465T ?

Thanks for your i/p.

The main problem with custom POI's on the SD card is that with some models you will get a prompt every time you boot the unit asking if you want to copy the POI's from SD card to internal memory. On some models there is a workaround to prevent this, on other models not. I am not sure about the 465T. This is not a show stopper but can be annoying. In general, it is probably best to store custom POI's in internal memory.

AlanB....thanks.. I agree if you have the room.. Put custom POI's on the internal memory...

Me neither - I put my POIs on mine, the only thing that comes to mind is the screen that asks if you want to transfer your POIs to the main unit. This was on all the units I had. None had issues.

Read what alandb posted.

I have 1832 songs on my card, using about 6.5GB in 17 folders.

found some answers in this thread - SDHC is okay, good experiences with 4, 8, 16 and 32 GB although some delays may occur waiting to load datasets.

thanks!

There is a simple work around for this, at least there is on the 75x series Nuvi's. The first boot after you load or make changes to POIs on an SD card asks if you want to transfer them to the main unit. If you answer "YES" then it asks for each new or changed POI file. Answer "SKIP" for each one and it won't ask again until you make a change to that file. This may not work on any other Nuvi model but I suspect that it will.

The class rating on SD cards is for both read and write speeds. Class 4 is 4 MB/sec, 6 if 6 MB/sec and so on. Your device will only read or write at its own speed if its speed is slower than the card's. So a device that is able to read data at 2 MB/sec will only accept data at that speed. My 750's performance seems to be the same with a basic 2 GB card as with a 32 GB, class 10 card.

Not all units support this. In fact many units do not.

This refers to the speed at which data is written to the card - the speed at which data is read is relatively the same which may vary from system to system (unit to unit) based on the HW platform. Try writing a 1.5GB file to the 2GB SD card and write the same file to a Class 10 SDHC card (>2GB; 4,8,16,or 32GB card size) and you will see the difference.

I'm using a 16 GB SDHC card from the MicroCenter on my Nuvi 350 for the past several years. Works fine. Lot's of storage. Haven't updated any software on it for more than a year.

Fred

Yes, there is a big difference between a class 10 and a class 2 card's speed. But only if your device can supply data to the card faster than a class 2's 2GB/sec. If your device's max write speed is 2 GB/sec, then there will be no difference in write speed. The same holds true for the read speed. If your device can't take advantage of speeds over 2 GB/sec then there is no advantage to using a class 10 card.