Oregon 550 losing waypoints

[+Chief301]

This has happened to me twice now and it's getting annoying...I use the Waypoint Averaging feature to start getting coordinates for a cache placement. I go back later to get additional readings to average into the same waypoint, and tha waypoint is gone. I did not (on purpose) delete it. The only thing I can figure is that when I went in and deleted GPX files of old caches to load a new PQ, somehow I also deleted the waypoint. But I thought the GPX "Geocache" data and waypoints that I add myself are handled as two completely different animals, and stored in different folders. What did I do wrong?

[+Hemorrhage]

When I taking coordinates with my 550 they are stored in the gpx folder along with the gpx files for caches. I don't know why it does it that way though. I can usually tell them apart because the waypoint I took is numbered along with the date I took it for its file name.

[+larryc43230]

This has happened to me twice now and it's getting annoying...I use the Waypoint Averaging feature to start getting coordinates for a cache placement. I go back later to get additional readings to average into the same waypoint, and tha waypoint is gone. I did not (on purpose) delete it. The only thing I can figure is that when I went in and deleted GPX files of old caches to load a new PQ, somehow I also deleted the waypoint. But I thought the GPX "Geocache" data and waypoints that I add myself are handled as two completely different animals, and stored in different folders. What did I do wrong?

When you create a waypoint, using either the Mark Waypoint or Waypoint Averaging function, a new waypoint is created in a GPX file called Waypoints_dd-MMM-yy.gpx. This file is stored in the M:\Garmin\GPX\ directory (M:\ is the internal storage on the 550t on my PC). This is the same directory that holds the GPX file(s) with geocache information.

 

For example, I just used the Waypoint Averaging feature to record a waypoint for my home location. There's now a file named Waypoints_03-APR-13.gpx in that directory on my unit.

 

I then booted the 550t into "normal" mode, went to Waypoint Averaging, found the new waypoint, and recorded a second sample (I got a warning that "For best results, wait 90 minutes between samples", but I ignored that). Everything seemed to work fine.

 

I've never seen the problem you're referring to. Are you sure you didn't accidentally deleted the waypoint file?

 

--Larry

[+Chief301]

I'm sure I accidentally deleted it when deleting old caches...I just need to figure out how my individual waypoints are being tied in with the GPX file of caches I'm deleting.

 

Probably best to just go play with the thing till I figure it out 😉

[Grasscatcher]

Next time save all the GPX files from Garmin\GPX (both from unit and from card) to a separate folder on your PC. Include all the Archive files from Garmin\GPX\Archive as well as the individual gpx files under GPX.

 

Then when you delete them from your unit, you've still got an "insurance" copy. You can go through that folder at your leisure and open each gpx file individually to be sure whether it does or doesn't have any data that you want to retain.

 

If you start to get a large collection of individual gpx files under "unit" \Garmin\GPX, download all of them to your PC, merge all the important data that you want to keep on your unit into one gpx file, and store that one file on your card under "card"\Garmin\GPX. It's out of internal memory, less likely to get corrupted, and loads on startup just fine.

 

I have a "master" merged gpx file of tracks, waypoints, routes,etc. All I have to worry about keeping updated is that one file. I send it to the card on any of my units and replace what's there, and I'm assured of having the latest data with me no matter which unit I'm using.