Garmin English-language voice versions and dates

 

Note: if you're just interested in the results without details, check the faq:

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/42708

Elsewhere in the Factory's fourms, jfossy posted that there's a new Garmin nuvi "Jill," version 3.20, which offers "Improved road name pronunciations." In searching, I think that Karen, Samantha and probably Jack were also updated at about the same time with the same improvement.

I can never keep my voice versions straight so I now have a Post-It note with my English-language TTS findings. Here's what I found. Since Jack is the name used for both the high and low quality voice files, I have both listed--they are NOT interchangeable--WebUpdater or Garmin Express will offer you the one you can use. If you find updates or corrections to my list, please advise.

Please note that the nuvi model you have will dictate the TTS voices you can use--if your nuvi uses the low-quality voice engine, you need the small files and if your nuvi uses the high-quality voice engine, it uses the large files and the newest nuvis now use the TTS3 files.

Name, Current_version, Garmin's_webpage_date(m/d/y)

Large filesize, higher-quality
Jill, 3.40, 6/21/13
Jack, 2.20, 12/13/13
Karen, 2.20, 6/13/13
Lee, 1.90, 8/11/09
Emily, 2.50, 6/18/13
Daniel, 2.20, 6/18/13
Sangeeta, 1.00, 3/18/00

Note: the devices that use the above large filesize TTS voices also have the following non-TTS voices:

American Michelle, 2.00, 1/24/14
Australian Matilda, 1.00, possibly 12/7/11
British James, 2.10, possibly 11/29/11
British Kate, 2.10, possibly 11/30/11)

Small filesize, lower-quality
Samantha, 2.00, 6/12/13 (See my post of 6/1/14)
Jack, 2.00, 6/12/13 (See my post of 6/1/14)
Karen, 1.20, 6/18/13
Lee, 1.20, 6/18/13
Daniel, 1.30, 6/18/13
Serena, 1.30, 6/18/13
Sangeeta, 1.10, 7/20/11

Large file size, higher-quality TTS3
Serena, 2.20, 5/10/18 (also offers Real Voice)
Samantha, 2.70, 10/2/18 (also offers Real Voice)
Daniel, 2.20, 5/10/18
Jack, 2.70, 10/2/18
Lee, 2.30, 5/10/18
Karen,2.20, 5/10/18
Sangeeta, 2.20, 5/10/18

I also was pleasantly surprised to see that my nuvi 2460 shows the voice version being used in the Tools/Settings/System/About page. I think that most older nuvis (e.g., my 750 and 855) require delving into hidden developer screens to find voice versions. But my yellow Post-It is really all I need now if I keep it updated.

These voice change logs can be hard to find. I find the best way is to do an internet search for (minus the quotes) "garmin voice version karen" and substituting the name desired in place of Karen when doing the search--or for the newest nuvis, search for (minus the quotes) "garmin voice version serena tts3" for current updates with similar substitutions of your desired name in place of Serena. In general for now, look for internet search hits that are something like:

(for the hi-quality voices)
Voice, Australian English-Karen (TTS) software version

(for the low-quality voices--note the (v) after the (TTS))
Voice, Australian English-Karen (TTS)(v) software version

(for the TTS3 voices)
Voice, British-English, Serena (TTS3) software version

[Update 6/24/13] Thanks to MikeG1 and joegambino for quickly finding newer voice updates. Also noted is that there are now appearing some Garmin voices that are TTS3 which may for the new nuvi xxx7 series (or maybe just the nuvi 3597) devices that use new Real Voice files. I also have seen some Garmin TTS2 files but haven't found which devices use(d) them.

[Update 6/26/13] Thanks to charlesd45 for confirming that another of the xxx7 series beyond the 3597 uses Real Voice files and for further confusing me wink with the new nuvi 2597 model and probably many other of the new 2013 nuvi xxx7 models: I'm not quite sure where to place this so I'll offer it here for now. The new nuvi 2597, in addition to using the new large Real Voice files like TTS3 Samantha, also offers smaller voice files and yet another name: American English Michelle 2.00. And thanks for pointing out the GMapTool site.

[Update 4/18/14]
Thanks to dferron for leading me to find the new non-TTS voices for the GPS models that use the large filesize voice engine as well as the TTS Sangeeta voice.

[Update 6/1/14]
Thanks to raycock for leading me to several new updates.

[Update 6/4/14]
A link to the faq was added

[Update 6/11/14]
Thanks to raycock for posting a new Samantha v2.00 that actually works.

[Update 10/2/14]
Thanks to alandb for posting the news of seven new English language TTS3 voices

[Update 1/7/16]
Two new TTS3 updates offering "Pronunciation improvements for major brands"

[Update 5/12/18]
Revised TTS3 voices

[Update 10/5/18]
Revised TTS3 voices

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Thanks

gordonwd wrote:
CraigW wrote:

You may be the first Drive owner to check for voices so I hope you try to install them all and test them out. What voices come with the Drive 60 out of the box? We'd also like to hear how much memory and free memory your Drive has. You will be installing a lot of voices so the download may be quite large.

Thanks! I had already figured it out and selected Karen, so my wife and I have our traveling "threesome" back in business, although I haven't had time yet to try it out with the new voice...

That's great. My guess is that the majority of Garmin 'On The Road' device buyers know nothing about adding extra Real Directions English language voices and settle for Samantha or Sanjeeta. Those voices do the job but it's always nice to have extra choices.

Thanks for confirming the stock voices included with a North America Drive 60.

Thanks, too, for reporting your internal memory. I've reported your results to the thread of memory offered and expect it'll be added to the Garmin FAQ soon. Yours is the first of the Drive models to have reported the storage capacity.

Asian languages in Drive 60LM

Forgot to mention that there were several Asian languages in the base set, but I had no way of telling what they were. I would assume Japanese, Chinese, and Korean?

TTS2

I was hacking my in-car GPS (2015 Dodge Journey), since it seems that all FCA (Fiat Chrysler Automobiles) models imported into Australia do not have TTS with street names installed. The internal GPS inside my car is using a Garmin mini-PCB and it looks like a cut-down version of Nuvi 3750 or something very similar. However, it was cut down considerably.

Anyway, long story short, the only version of the voice files this beast accepts is TTS2 (I'm quite happy with Karen's TTS2 Australian voice smile ). It seems that the board is not powerful enough to process TTS3 voice DLLs, hence TTS2 is a compromise OEM are using in the in-car installs.

Voice updates

New updates TTS3

Our friend Karen along with several others have recently been updated for those interested:

https://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=6487

http://www.gmaptool.eu/en/content/recent-updates

--
Nüvi 255WT with nüMaps Lifetime North America born on 602117815 / Nüvi 3597LMTHD born on 805972514 / I love Friday’s except when I’m on holidays ~ canuk

How exciting!

canuk wrote:

Our friend Karen along with several others have recently been updated for those interested:

https://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=6487

http://www.gmaptool.eu/en/content/recent-updates

Thanks, canuk!

How exciting! OK, I'm easily amused. I'll update today and revise the FAQ if all works well. Golly, of all seven of the TTS3 voices, the five 2014 updates are improved now leaving only the two American voices from 2016 unchanged.

Voices

Well other than the voices I normally hear in my head, I'm quite happy with the standard Garmin voice.

In the past I've tried the English voice, the Australian voice, I'd even tried German and Spanish.

I just find using anything other than the regular USA voice I have to listen more extensively to what's being announced. Too distracting for me I find. In the USA English it just flows into my head.

--
Nuvi 2797LMT, DriveSmart 50 LMT-HD, Using Windows 10. DashCam A108C with GPS.

Please share your updates

canuk wrote:

Our friend Karen along with several others have recently been updated for those interested:

https://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=6487

http://www.gmaptool.eu/en/content/recent-updates

I had some issues updating the five voice from their old version to the new ones.

What I found is that Garmin Express will only offer one of the five new updates, and even then, only if that voice is selected as the active voice. It make me think that to update all five of these new voices using Garmin Express, you will need to select each new voice (Serena, Lee, Sangeeta, Karen and Daniel) as the active voice and run Garmin Express five times with each selected voice to obtain its voice update.

One workaround is to instead to go Garmin Express' Optional Voice Updates and choose English but I found that GE states I have insufficient space even when I have 2-3 GB of space in the nuvi and oodles more on the PC running GE. Odd. I'd like to know your results if updating these five new TTS3 voices to your device. Did you have a problem? Did you succeed updating all and how did you do it?

Voice updates

CraigW wrote:

One workaround is to instead to go Garmin Express' Optional Voice Updates and choose English but I found than GE states I have insufficient space even when I have 2-3 GB of space in the nuvi and oodles more on the PC running GE. Odd. I'd like to know your results if updating these five new TTS3 voices to your device. Did you have a problem? Did you succeed updating all and how did you do it?

I was able to use this method to download the 5 new voices on a clone of the DriveLuxe 50. The clone had about 5 GB of free space and GE did not give an insufficient space error.

I also applied the updates directly on my 3597 (not cloned) and also did not get the insufficient space message. That device only has about 250 MB of free space.

One thing I noticed is that the voice files on the DriveLuxe are named differently than on the 3597. For example, on the DriveLuxe Karen is named English_Australian_Karen_D4451-00_0210.vpm, while on the 3597 it is named English_Australian_Karen.vpm. The files are identical in size so I would guess they are the exact same file.

--
Alan - Android Auto, DriveLuxe 51LMT-S, DriveLuxe 50LMTHD, Nuvi 3597LMTHD, Oregon 550T, Nuvi 855, Nuvi 755T, Lowrance Endura Sierra, Bosch Nyon

Let me further befuddle you, alandb

alandb wrote:
CraigW wrote:

One workaround is to instead to go Garmin Express' Optional Voice Updates and choose English but I found than GE states I have insufficient space even when I have 2-3 GB of space in the nuvi and oodles more on the PC running GE. Odd. I'd like to know your results if updating these five new TTS3 voices to your device. Did you have a problem? Did you succeed updating all and how did you do it?

I was able to use this method to download the 5 new voices on a clone of the DriveLuxe 50. The clone had about 5 GB of free space and GE did not give an insufficient space error.

I also applied the updates directly on my 3597 (not cloned) and also did not get the insufficient space message. That device only has about 250 MB of free space.

One thing I noticed is that the voice files on the DriveLuxe are named differently than on the 3597. For example, on the DriveLuxe Karen is named English_Australian_Karen_D4451-00_0210.vpm, while on the 3597 it is named English_Australian_Karen.vpm. The files are identical in size so I would guess they are the exact same file.

On my 3597, the one that didn't error out on me claiming insufficient storage, I was able to install all English language voices through GE's Optional/LanguageFiles/English selection. When I did this, then checked the various file names, these files contained the ............_Dxxxx-00_210.vpm following the name for TTS3 voices and ............_VCT210.vpm for the non-TTS voices: Jack, Karen, Daniel, Serena, Matilda, James, and Kate

while these named voice files (both TTS and non-TTS) did not have the added characters after the name: Michelle, Samantha, Lee and Sangeeta.

Now that's confusing.

I was able to copy all eleven voices to the other 3597 (that one that did error out due to "insufficient space") and they work well now too so it appears not to be a Garmin model issue since your 3597 has no added characters while my 3597 mostly has the added characters (seven of the 11 files). For what it's worth, on my 3597, you can only see the odd filenames when viewing the folder from a computer. The nuvi itself only displays the text name minus the added characters.

Also, in the past, the old WebUpdater program would update voices. I tried this past week to obtain all the new updates but found that WebUpdater did not offer them. It may be that WebUpdater is finally starting to lose its usefulness.

But...

Melaqueman wrote:

Well other than the voices I normally hear in my head, I'm quite happy with the standard Garmin voice.

In the past I've tried the English voice, the Australian voice, I'd even tried German and Spanish.

I just find using anything other than the regular USA voice I have to listen more extensively to what's being announced. Too distracting for me I find. In the USA English it just flows into my head.

But Melaqueman, what if a Dudley Do-Right or Nell voice became available, eh? twisted

Samantha and Jack updates available.

Garmin Express is now offering v2.60 for Samantha and Jack.

--
Alan - Android Auto, DriveLuxe 51LMT-S, DriveLuxe 50LMTHD, Nuvi 3597LMTHD, Oregon 550T, Nuvi 855, Nuvi 755T, Lowrance Endura Sierra, Bosch Nyon

Well done!

alandb wrote:

Garmin Express is now offering v2.60 for Samantha and Jack.

Well done, alandb. Even the Polish http://www.gmaptool.eu/en/content/voice site doesn't mention either of these yet although if you do click the 2016 Samantha and Jack links, it takes you to the current 2018 updates for both.

What difference a day makes!

I did update my nuvi 3597 to the two new 2.60 voices but I had to run Garmin Express three times to do so.

-In my 1st attempt to get the new voices, my 3597 had Karen as my selected voice, and as I know to be the case and should have considered in advance, GE offered me nothing.
-After changing my selected voice to Samantha and running GE, I was offered the 2.60 Samantha update from its current 2.50 version.
-Then after changing the selected 3597 voice to Jack and re-running GE, I was offered the Jack 2.60 update.

For now I feel that all seven of my TTS3 voices are at their latest update. Whew, what a month it's been! rolleyes

Language Files

While on the subject of voices, if I wanted to free up some space on my Garmin Drive 50, could I delete all the other language files that I don't need such as like Chinese or Russian or whatever? As long as I stay in the USA there shouldn't be any reason my device would malfunction for removing those files, correct?

Thanks!

Yes, that's correct. I only

Yes, that's correct. I only have the two EN US voices on my unit. You can also delete all the text and keyboard files that aren't English, also.

--
Frank DriveSmart55 37.322760, -79.511267

And. ..

The help and EULA files

--
Where there's a will ... there's a way ... DriveSmart51LMT-S, DriveSmart50LMT-D, Nuvi 2508LMT-D, 1490LMT, 1310, Montana 650T, Etrex 20

Samantha and Jack (TTS3) Version 2.70

As of today (10/4/18) Garmin Express is offering the V2.70 update to the TTS3 Samantha and Jack voices. I did not check to see if any of the other voices have updates.

--
Alan - Android Auto, DriveLuxe 51LMT-S, DriveLuxe 50LMTHD, Nuvi 3597LMTHD, Oregon 550T, Nuvi 855, Nuvi 755T, Lowrance Endura Sierra, Bosch Nyon

Voice update

Thanks,Webupdater as usual picked up both of the updates.

--
Charlie. Nuvi 265 WT and Nuvi 2597 LMT. MapFactor Navigator - Offline Maps & GPS.
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