KMZ to IMG in a Nutshell

**hwdean** · 21st January 2021, 03:58 AM

Hi,

I've been scouring the posts here looking for a simple way to convert kmz files to garmin img. Seems one of the best tools was g-raster but It can no longer be reged. Old stuff

Here is my dilemma....maybe someone knows a better way out. I swapped out my Oregon 600 for a Montana 680 and lo and behold, the Montana does not allow you to enable/disable custom maps individually -- its either all of them or none of them. Thus if I have two custom maps overlapping I can only view the one on top. In the Oregon I was able to toggle them according to the info needed at the time.

The only way out of this that I can think of it to convert them to IMG files and then they will show up as individual maps to enable/disable.

There are a lot of old obsolete posts about conversions and it gets a little confusing trying to digest it all. What's the latest and greatest way to to the conversion?

I have read that a direct conversion isn't that good and its better to embed the kmz in an img file. Comments?

**hwdean** · 23rd January 2021, 06:36 AM

I hope this post will save some people headaches.

After two weeks of diddling around following dead links in old posts and installing mapping tools I didn't need I finally figured out how to convert a KMZ to a Garmin IMG. Here it is in a nutshell:

1) Open KMZ in Global Mapper
2) Export to JNX
3) Convert JNX to IMG using JNX2IMG

Why am I doing this? I swapped out my Oregon 600 for a Montana 680. To my disappointment the Montana did not offer a listing of custom maps like the Oregon did where I can enable/disable the custom maps individually. On the montana it was all custom maps enabled or none at all.

On some of my hikes I use more than one kmz in a single area. On the montana I can only view the one that is on top. Now I get a list of raster maps in my Map Setup/Select Map screen that I can enable/disable as needed. And the look good too!

Hoped that helps someone in the same predicament as me

BTW, I reported this to Garmin and they will be updating their documentation to reflect how the Montana enables/disables custom maps as all or nothing

**Eyelet99** · 23rd January 2021, 07:58 PM

BTW you can also open the KMZ in MAPC2MAPC and write the JNX. Then set the zoom levels with JNXCustomizer and convert to IMG. After conversion to IMGs, multiple IMGs can also be joined using GMapTool as I believe there is a limit of 20 IMGs that can be displayed in the device Map Setup > Configure Maps menu.

**hwdean** · 25th January 2021, 03:05 AM

Ah...ok. I already had a registered copy of global mapper, but not mapc2mapc

I can't seem to get JNXCustomizer installed in win10....needs mdac 2.7. Haven't dug too deep yet on how to get around that...maybe create my own odbc driver config

**Bushwalker8** · 1st February 2021, 08:15 AM

Originally Posted by hwdean

I can't seem to get JNXCustomizer installed in win10

For what it's worth it runs OK on my W10, I didn't need to do anything special

**mast** · 24th January 2021, 08:44 PM

You could convert your KMZ files to JNX, with Global Mapper, see under creating maps. The JnX can be selected as an IMG. Change Montana firmwares with Patched firmwares for JNX files.
The JNX files, to put under, Garmin/BirdsEye (Montana microsd)

**Allin** · 24th January 2021, 09:01 PM

You could convert your KMZ files to JNX with Global Mapper and use jnx2img to convert .jnx to .img

**hwdean** · 25th January 2021, 02:56 AM

Originally Posted by mast

You could convert your KMZ files to JNX, with Global Mapper, see under creating maps. The JnX can be selected as an IMG. Change Montana firmwares with Patched firmwares for JNX files.
The JNX files, to put under, Garmin/BirdsEye (Montana microsd)

Yes, but I believe I will have the same issue: all those jnx files will be enabled/disabled en mass? Maybe if I gave each a unique product ID they each jnx will have its own enable/disable tab? I'll test it out

Originally Posted by Allin

You could convert your KMZ files to JNX with Global Mapper and use jnx2img to convert .jnx to .img

That's exactly what I have done after you helped me with the jnx2img install. It worked well

I posted a roadmap hoping it will save some people time: [Only registered and activated users can see links. ]

**mast** · 25th January 2021, 09:27 PM

Originally Posted by hwdean

Yes, but I believe I will have the same issue: all those jnx files will be enabled/disabled en mass? Maybe if I gave each a unique product ID they each jnx will have its own enable/disable tab?

Yes, by modifying the product id, with global mapper, you could have up to 10 different JNX maps. Each JNX with a different id, will be possible to enabled or disabled in your Montana.

**Bushwalker8** · 1st February 2021, 08:30 AM

Originally Posted by mast

Yes, by modifying the product id, with global mapper, you could have up to 10 different JNX maps.

You can modify many more in JNXcustomiser and also with your own names but you have to first add them to the JNXcustom.ini
The edits/numbering also needs to sequential, it won't tolerate gaps. So it would be a good idea to first invest a little time figuring out your own schema. The behavior of the different devices is all similar and they all typically show each product id or group together so best if your theme has the member images in different geographic area's or appropriate zoom/scales and it all works fine. Some examples for the .ini:
Group1=1/Hema
GroupZooms1=
Group2=2/Gold
GroupZooms2=
Group3=3/Parks
GroupZooms3=
Group4=4/Historical
GroupZooms4=
Group5=5/Topo 25K
GroupZooms5=
Group6=6/Topo
GroupZooms6=
Group7=7/7-Spare

You can also edit the default drop down selection names in the Global Mapper .exe to match your own product ID's if you have a binary editor, makes life a lot easier to do it all in one go. Still limited to 10 though.

Thread: KMZ to IMG in a Nutshell

Thread Tools

Display

Hybrid View

KMZ to IMG - Montana made me do it

Advertissements

KMZ to IMG in a Nutshell

Tags for this Thread

Bookmarks

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions