Upgrading Garmin 496 from Europe to Pacific

[acoulson]

Hi all,
I've been asked a question on eBay regarding whether my Garmin 496 can be changed from a European database to a Pacific (Indonesia) database. Has anyone done this ?

Many thanks,
Andy

[172driver]

I have done exactly that (Europe > Asia) with a 96. This can be a rather involved process, needing to install the DB several times until it works, but then again that sometimes happens during updates also.

A word of warning - last year while attempting to change Europe > Americas my unit hung itself. Permanently. Garmin support (US) were very good about this and replaced the entire unit as no form of reset would bring it back to life.

YMMV

[jez d]

The three, interchangeable Jeppesen aviation databases available for Garmin handhelds are the Atlantic International (Europe and Africa), Americas, and Pacific region, so the short answer is yes.

However, the underlying geographical database is concentrated for the area that the unit was originally purchased, i.e. if you bought it in the UK then it will display greater geographic detail for Europe than it will for the rest of the world. This cannot be altered.

I now stand to be corrected.

Regards, jez

[acoulson]

Thanks, appreciate the advice.
Andy