Create your own content for NB1

[canderson]

@Andy
Too strange. If the system is split between internal memory and SD card, and the ttsystem file is located in internal memory, how the heck would one update the firmware on one of these? Know anyone back at TT or elsewhere that knows better about these automotive units? They're a lot more common in Europe than they are here in North America.

 

[canderson]

OK - starting from scratch. We now know that this beast is some sort of Nav2/Nav3 hybrid. Looks like a Nav3 on the face, but uses a Nav2 formatted SD card. So how about we see what Home makes of this? I think (would have to page backwards) that we tried to get Sally to directly copy items to places on the SD card that seemed logical, but the unit didn't find things in the expected places. Assuming that Home has to do the work for us to get added custom items where the unit can find them, I'd be curious to know what happens if we let Home try.

@Sally
Insert your SD card into the card reader on your PC and let Home start up automatically (it should -- if not, stop here and get back to us!).

Home should provide some sort of a menu interface to your SD card. I would expect one of the options to say something like "Manage my 'whatever". For other units, it would say "Manage my GO" or "Manage my XL", but I have no idea what it will say for your device since it's technically neither of these.

I have no idea how Home will interact with your card, but what I'm describing is how Home deals with a more typical device. If you can find that "Manage my xxxxx" option, let us know and we'll gently work from there. We'll make sure your splash screen and perhaps a car icon or three is located on your PC where Home can find it, and then try to get Home to put it onto your SD card. If it claims success, we'll peek at your SD card to see where it put it, and from there, we should have a better understanding of how the NB1 file system works.

 

[Sally_C]

There are two areas that might be of interest.
1) Manage My Mazda Navigation System NB1.
2) Add Traffic, Voices and Other Services.

I've attached pics of what I see with both those selections.

I don't know if you can tell by the pictures, but some of the options in the Add menus are greyed out so I can't really do them, like Routes or Fuel Prices.

After selecting Manage and then the Install Items from computer tab, you'd think I could navigate and add a ov2 file I created, but no. To install custom POIs, I have to open up the SD card in Explorer and then put it in the USA_Canada folder outside of Home. However, once I reinsert the card, it sees my ov2 file and it now shows up under Items on this Device. And if I remove the POI file, it gets stored in a folder called FromDevice and those items are what I see when I click on the Install Items from computer tab.

Likewise, when I made a custom car avatar, I had to use Explorer and put it in the SD card's art\cars folder. But now it shows up in Home when I go to Manage, Items on this Device, and click the plus sign by car symbols.

Hope that's clear and helpful to you.

I think I've pretty much figured out how to do what I want to (except maybe change the splash screen which isn't a big deal.) It's just a little convoluted sometimes.

 

[canderson]

Yes! It looks like Home has some strategy for dealing with your card. Let's let Home do its work and see if we can make this happen.

It's largely a matter of getting the items you want to fiddle where Home can find them properly. On Page 5, "Items on my computer", are you able to navigate to anywhere you like .. perhaps to a copy of that splash screen you wanted to use?

 

[Sally_C]

No, that screen only allows me to navigate to things I've removed using Home, as far as I can tell.

But I did find the splash screen using Windows file Explorer (splash.bmp in photos directory). I renamed it and added one with the same dimensions, bit depth, etc. but it still doesn't show. However, the one that is there doesn't show either so i think it must be using something I don't have access to.

Oh well. It doesn't show on the screen for long anyways. The car and custom poi files is what I really cared about - and that I figured out how to do.

 

[Andy_P]

As I mentioned above, I reckon that any "user content" that goes into a folder will be OK (such as POIs in the "Europe" map folder, car cursors in the "art" folder, voices in the "voices" folder).

But the splashscreen has always gone in the system's root directory so can't be accessed here

 

[Arno]

But I did find the splash screen using Windows file Explorer (splash.bmp in photos directory). I renamed it and added one with the same dimensions, bit depth, etc. but it still doesn't show. However, the one that is there doesn't show either so i think it must be using something I don't have access to.

But the splashscreen has always gone in the system's root directory so can't be accessed here

If it cannot be accessed, why was Sally able to rename it and why does neither the new nor the old one show?

@ Sally,

Have you tried to add your splashw.bmp right onto the SD card so it will show just above your tthome.bif, per your post #5?

 

[Sally_C]

@ Sally,

Have you tried to add your splashw.bmp right onto the SD card so it will show just above your tthome.bif, per your post #5?

Yes. I think it must be accessing something internally, because no matter what I do, the splash screen is the same.

 

[Andy_P]

If it cannot be accessed, why was Sally able to rename it and why does neither the new nor the old one show?

Because TT left the default Splashscreen in the "photos" folder. Sally renamed it from there and put it in the root of the SD card like you would normally do.

Also don't forget on NAV3 models there is a way in the menus to do that too... you can opt to change the startup pictures and itdoes exactly that - it looks at any pics you've added and copies one of them and renames it to splashw.for you.

But in this case there's no way to access the root directory of the "hidden black box" that is the real TomTom here, so nothing changes.

 

[TomTomy]

Glad I've found this thread... I've been trying to do the same thing, but with no luck either. Hard to believe that this can be so difficult.