"on the route" v. "anytime I'm within X distance" alerts

Welcome to The Factory.

Part of the problem is that in many cases, there are several ways to accomplish a task and the choice of which to use varies with various owners; e.g., do you Categorize Custom POIs or not? Another issue is that many forum threads and faqs were started years ago and address issues different than what newer models have so you need to read through the whole thread to find what's applicable to you.

If you use mp3 audio, your nuvi 760 does not need sox.exe. If you choose to use wav audio files, you do need the correct version of sox loaded in the proper computer folder with a PC although I believe sox.exe is not needed for Mac users. If you ever buy a new nuvi, it will not play mp3 files, so you'll be committed to using wav files with sox.

Regarding "You're within X miles of a Flying-J", etc., yes, it can be done. As you've indicated, you'll need the Flying-J POI file (csv or gpx), renamed with the addition of TourGuide in the file name, a Flying-J bmp icon (identically named except for the extension) and a wav or mp3 file you created saying "You're within X miles of a Flying-J" also identically named--then loaded to your 760 with POI Loader in Manual mode with an alert set for the distance in feet equivalent to your "X miles." I'm pretty sure that for TourGuides to work, there must be an audio file associated with the POI file.

Special editors and fancy tricks can be used but are not needed for what you want to do. The best advice is "Start Simple." There are snags that happen and when they do, ask for advice here giving detailed instructions to us as to what you've tried already, what's not working, etc. You are already well ahead of many new folks here since you have successfully loaded and used Custom POIs with alerts.

You probably know this and don't want to hear it said, but it's always best to start with the faqs:

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/6656

especially the Beginners Education faqs:

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/6654

Craig provides you with some sound advice. There are a couple changes I would make regarding your requirements. The Wal-Mart file has about 6,000 locations in North America and many places have more than one store. Consider carefully which stores you would like an alert on and which you wouldn't want to know about.

One of the things I do with that file is a little scrubbing in that I extract all the locations with fuel into a second file while leaving the location in the main file as well. I then create a TourGuide for those locations having fuel and those locations only. I can search for and through all Wal-Marts but I'm only alerted for those that have fuel. This way I have two Wal-Mart files, WalMart and WalMart Fuel TourGuide.

One final point. TourGuide files REQUIRE an audio file.

Outstanding suggestions by CraigW and Box Car.

I'd like to add my 2 cents.
Although your Nuvi 760 can use MP3 sounds, it will also play.wav sounds using POI loader with sox.exe in the POI folder. If you use this method you can use that created POI file on any Nuvi including the newest. The 760 will not last forever so whatever you replace it with the files will still work.

Since you want a custom sound for distance you can create your own .wav file at the link below and save it with the same name as the .csv file, and .bmp file. Experiment with the various voices to see wich one appeals to you.
http://www2.research.att.com/~ttsweb/tts/demo.php

When you create the file and you want it to say
"You're within one mile of a Wal-Mart",you must use that distance when creating the POI file. Use POI Loader in the "MANUAL MODE" and for distance type in 5280 feet (1 Mile). If you want the alert to be for two miles, type in 10,560 feet. This way the sound will correspond with the distance you require.

Also many of the alert sounds available at the Factory are in MP3 format. You can easily convert them with a free online converter to .wav without installing any software.
Find it here: http://media.io/

I hope this will simplify things a bit.

CraigW... and Box Car... Thanks much for the quick replies/suggestions! Before I go off to spend some time reading the FAQs, some quick responses of my own:

Re: categorizing customer POIs. No, I don't do it yet (with just a single set in-use so far), but I may end up doing so.

Re: my 760 and mp3 audio files. I gleaned, from the reading I'd done, that the mp3 format WAS supported with this unit, so I DID in fact 1st generate a WMA file with my own "announcement", then created an mp3 file from that (using a trial version of SWITCH). BTW, I'm working on a Win 7 box.

Re: TourGuides as a solution. I downloaded the latest Wal-Mart POI file (cvs format) from the Factory site. I too thought that a bezillion Wal-Mart's were a bit much for my needs, so I trimmed the # down (used MS Excel) to just the supercenters (one of our favorite 1-nite stops for parking, shopping, haircuts, etc). There's prolly more parsing/trimming I could do, later. I ended up with three (3) files in a folder:
1) Wal-Mart_SUPERCTR_ONLY Unites States & Canada TourGuide (an Excel comma separated values file),
2) Wal-Mart_SUPERCTR_ONLY United States & Canada TourGuide.BMP (a simple Wal-Mart icon), and
3) Wal-Mart_SUPERCTR_ONLY United States & Canada TourGuide.mp3 (the mpi3 format audio file I'd created). I launched POI Loader and first removed all custom POIs, then re-launched and pointed to my folder with these three (3) files, chose manual mode, reloaded all of my "low clearances" POIs, indicated there was a proximity alert involved when I got to the point when POI Loader started processing my Wal-Mart stuff, gave it a distance of 26400 feet... and it reported it had successfully loaded some 4000 POI's. I verified that my own, previous POIs were still functional... alerting me 13200 feet in advance WHEN DRIVING ON THE ROUTE CONTAINING that low clearance bridge (I have one conveniently-close to my home). I then drove to my nearest Wal-Mart Supercenter (it DOES have a correct entry in the cvs format POI file!). At 6 miles, nada. At 5 miles, nada... at the entrance to the Wal-Mart, nada. Hmmm... I seem to have made a mistrake somewhere. When I got home I reconnected the nuvi to my laptop and took a look at the folders/files on the nuvi itself. Seems I found a gpi file with what appeared to be Wal-Mart info it it, but ... I'm totally unfamiliar with what I may have been looking at on the device.

So I'm still at a loss. But I'll do some reading as you've suggested.

I'll be back! Thanks again!

The most common problem with POI alerts not working is a double extension. Microsoft, in its infinite wisdom decided a user didn't need to know the extension on a whole slew of file types so they built into the OS an instruction to hide common file extensions. You need to go into the system parameters and uncheck Hide File Extensions and then check the files again. The instructions for displaying the OS options are in several FAQs and have been mentioned many times in these threads. Do a search on file extensions and you'll see.

Here are a few thoughts. Look at your Custom POIs as if you were going to create a route to one. You should see your nearest 50 Low Clearance locations when you choose that POI. Are the Wal-Marts there as available Custom POIs? Can you route to one? What happens when you arrive (either real-time or in a simulation)? ...Audio and visual alert or not?

If the Wal-Marts aren't there, then there's an issue loading the file; if the Wal-Marts are there and can be routed to, but aren't giving alerts at your desired radius, then either your file naming isn't making them a TourGuide (such as Wal-Mart_TourGuide.csv, Wal-Mart_TourGuide.bmp, and Wal-Mart_TourGuide.mp3), or there's an issue setting it up with POI Loader as an alert. I guess one other possibility if the Wal-Mart POIs are seen in Custom POIs is that the coordinates for the store you're going to was incorrectly coded meaning that the nuvi thinks you're not there when in fact you can see the building right out your windshield.

One final thought: I think there's a maximum radius that can be used for TourGuides. Does anyone know what it is and could five miles be too far? Aha, some say the max for a TourGuide radius is 1.25 miles:

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/37174

although you're seeing it work at 13,200 feet (but not at 26,400 feet) so the maximum is probably more than 1.25 miles (6,600 feet). It may be that this is the answer though--26,400 feet may be too large a value. Try a smaller alert distance and see if Wal-Marts suddenly start working for you.

@JerryGPS

Are you following the requirement that TourGuide must have a capital "T" and a capital "G" (with the other characters in the string "TourGuide" being lower case?

Also check the upper/ lower case spelling on the extensions. I don't think it matters but I use all lower case.

Box Car...

THANK YOU!!! I did, indeed, have a filename of "Wal-Mart_SUPERCTR_ONLY United States & Canada TourGuide.BMP" for the bit-mapped icon (file extension is .bmp) and another of "Wal-Mart_SUPERCTR_ONLY United States & Canada TourGuide.mp3" for the MP3 audio file (file extension is .mp3) I'd created announcing a supercenter proximity alert. I renamed both files to NOT have the redundant(?) file extension as part of the name, used POI Loader to delete all of the POIs from my nuvi 760, then again to (re)load everything again. IT WERKZ! At almost exactly 26,400 ft (5 miles) I get 1) a TourGuides alert icon on the screen, with the name of the supercenter, 2) the audio alert I recorded AND 3) a "lips with a microphone" icon on the screen. If I tap this latter icon the device displays the full POI info - name, address, etc, and asks me if I want to "GO". All of this is exactly what I wanted from my device and this POI file. THANKS AGAIN!

CraigW... et al,

Yes, the custom POIs were showing up on my device, and I could route to them, I just wasn't getting the TourGuide functionality... which you alluded to as a possibility and which Box Car correctly diagnosed as a problem with my file names (some redundancies of file ext w/i the file name itself).

On the possible issue of maximum radius being 1 1/4 miles... I think that stems from the use of (if you choose that method) speed as a factor in calculating the proximity alert distance. 36 seconds + max speed of 124 mph xlates => approx 1 1/4 miles. Running POI Loader in manual mode allowed me to specify my 2 1/2 mile (13,200 feet) radius for my low clearances POIs and 5 miles (26,400 feet) for the Supercenters. I do recall seeing a max no. of feet that POI Loader will handle however... seems like it was several 10s of miles, but I'll have to find it again.

I AM(!) now using categories... nesting these one level below the folder in which I keep all of my custom POIs. It DOES(!) have some value. I also discovered that POI Loader has a max limit of 32 POI files per such sublevel folder - category. So, at the moment, all of my many low clearances POIs (ranging from 5' 6" up to 12' 7"; our coach is 12' 6" in height and I want some add'l wiggle room) are not "categorized".

Now... back to the FAQs, and my next lil' project.

Glad you got it working. Double extensions bites about 85% of the people loading POI for the first time.