Nuvi 8xx series - no more full NA map, no more cloning?

I had used the clone method to get all of North America and added the Large JCV file for a few years with my nuvi 855. But starting a year or more ago, I realized the 855 is my backup to a backup to a backup to a .... device and that I'd likely never use it again, so I settled for just Lower 48 (49?) states and the default tiny JCV file. I do map updates on it since I'd hate to come up to the "2-yr without updates" loss of ability to update.

No Voice Recognition is a game changer for me. With the "Hands-Free" laws it's hard to use a GPS without voice recognition. I thought the voice recognition on the 855 was far superior to the voice recognition on the 3597. With the 855 you could navigate to any page and zoom in or zoom out the display, all with voice commands. The 3597 seems to recognize only a small number of phrases.
Mark

Only 2 days ago did I use the cloning method on my backup, backup 855 and had no problems to install the full 2022.20 map file to a SD card. Though I do not use the large JCV file, but if I did it would be on the SD car in any case.

That's good information Melaqueman. Maybe I am giving up too easily. Thanks for posting your successful results. I have changed the cautionary note in the cloning FAQ and acknowledged your successful results for cloning CN NA 2022.20 on a nuvi 855.

Maybe some other 8xx users who use cloning will chime in. I will try again in the next couple of days doing a more thorough cleaning of old files on my 855 and using a new SD card.

Just for whatever it's worth I reuse =GarminDevice.=xml this file over and over. I just rename it by adding the = symbols so the file cannot be read and when I want to use the SD card for cloning I just delete the = symbols.

Thanks for the follow-up Melaqueman. I am not sure what I did wrong with my 855. Since you have been successful, I am sure it is me making some stupid error and not a flaw in the process or the 855. I haven't had a chance to work on it again, but I am going to give it another try, starting from scratch as soon as I find the time.

alandb I know you're more experienced than I am but one time I forgot to rename the 3 files from "gmap" to "supp" and it took me a while to realize what I forgot to do.

I thought I renamed them, but I can't be sure with my "old-timers" mind, or more likely, I typo'ed one or more of the 3 files when renaming. I did try 3 times before giving up, but that is no assurance that I didn't make the same mistake every time. I can't know for sure now because I deleted the files that didn't work and installed the standard lower 49 using Garmin Express. The cloning did work on my old nuvi 755, which I used to get the large JCV file. I will let you know after I have had a chance to start over from scratch on the 855, hopefully in the next couple of days.

Another thing I wonder about is that I was using Garmin Express 7.6.0.0 when I had the failure, although that version of Express worked fine on all my other devices. 7.7 came out after I had given up on the 855.

Well, I finally found the time to retry the cloning on my nuvi 855 with the 2022.20 CN NA map. I started by removing all the installed map files, ASR and SRX voice recognition files and JCV junction view files. I also did a fresh format of my micro SD card. I then carefully followed the cloning procedure using Garmin Expess 7.7.0.0. When complete, I put the micro SD card back in the 855, booted up and verified that the 2022.20 map was installed and displaying correctly. I then removed the small JCV file that came with the map update and added the the large JCV file from my nuvi 755 update into the internal storage of the 855. As a final step, I moved the new .ASR and .SRX voice recognition files off of the micro SD card and back to the internal storage of the 855.

Booted back up, tested a couple of routes in simulation mode to make sure Junction Views were working properly and everything seems to be working as it should. So Melaqueman is correct that cloning a nuvi 8xx is still a viable procedure. I don't have a good explanation as to why my initial attempts failed. I probably made an error in the map renaming as Melaqueman suggested. Lesson learned ... don't jump to conclusions until other POI Factory members have validated (or invalidated) your results!