Tomtom Carminat Live: Editing installation files on Windows

Sun Jan 22, 2012 6:10 am

I collected all available info on the current Carminat Live problem in this thread : :link:
In the first posting you will find infos on how to access and modify the Carminat Live installation files - the same procedure can be used to access NC10 installation files.

I want to use the above thread for everything that is related to to the patching and activation problem.

This thread here is only for problems related to working with the installation files on a Windows PC, so please use the right thread and don't cross post.

Spoiler: Show

Here are the same instructions :]
It took me a very long time to work out how a user with a plain Windows system can not just see the files inside the ttsystem.ib but also how to actually modify them.
I really hope this info will help to get more users with some programming skills to work with it and maybe to help find us a working solution.
Things you might need:
[Please Register or Login to download file] to open and extract files from Linux partitions - you won't have write access!
A good Hex Editor, since there is enough available and you should already have one if you are skilled I don't post links.
[Please Register or Login to download file] allows you to mount the ttsystem.ib as a virtual drive with write access! You nee to rename the file to ttsystem.ib.img in order to mount it.
[Please Register or Login to download file] is able to read the .gz and .tar formats used on Linux and is able to actually write that format correctly unlike Winrar which can only open and extract. Only downside: if you don't have an actually ext3 drive working with Linux drivers for Win the edited file will have "fat" instead of "unix" as the filesource, but I neither know if that is a problem nor how to change it without Linux.
Since I know basically nothing about Linux I collected the info one might need but could not find anywhere on the net except he is willing to work with Linux.
Here's a very basic step by step on how to modify a file inside the ttsystem.ib:
Do everything with backups and not with your originals!
1. install the above programs
2. rename the ttsystem.ib to ttsystem.ib.img
3. mount that image using Gizmo as a new drive
4. copy all files you need to a location of your choice - if you only want to edit just go further without the copying
5. open the files you want to check with the (hex)editor of your choice - be aware that for textfiles you need a Unix capable editor like Notepad++.
6. If you want to work with the .gz archives:
Use 7zip to open the file
Change the settings so that a suitable editor is used instead of Notepad - you might have to do that according to the file type you want to edit/modify.
Don't unpack a file to your PC for the changes as I don't know if 7zip creates the right checksums if external sources are used to get the file back into the archive.
If you change the settings so that your Hex editor is used you will be asked if the file inside the archive should be updated - confirm that.
Close 7zip and the modified file will be stored on the virtual drive.
7. After you are finnished with all modifications unmout the image in Gizmo and the ttsystem.ib.img will have the modified content!
8. Rename the ttsystem.ib.img to ttsystem.ib and you are free to use it.

Keep in mind that you need the complete content of the original Cab (or my modified version/the version with your changes) on the SD, otherwise nothing at all will happen for the installation.

Tue Feb 19, 2013 10:18 am

hello,
when I Use Explore2Fs to look inside a lookdir\loopback.ex3 file I see only very few information. When I Export the whole directory contents then the saved information is about 6kB while the loopback.ex3 file has a size of 15.360kB. Is this normal or should there be more information to find inside loopback file.
I find:
<map-folder>
deletedPOI.local 1kb
mapsettings.cfg 3 kb
mapuserpatch.dat 1 kb
ITN (an empty folder)
lost+found (an empty folder)
statdata (an empty folder)
and 3 files in the root:
currentmap.dat 1 kb
ttgo.bif 3 kb
userpatch.dat 1 kb

I use explore2fs to find out when and in what file CARMINAT LIVE stores information about the date a map was first used in the device.

Tue Feb 19, 2013 11:37 am

The one I got for my tests is about 15mb.
But you can not judge by that size as it is a "drive image".
So the 15mb is the size of the drive and not of the combined content.

Tue Feb 19, 2013 11:45 am

One observation on drive image files. In windows their file modification date is not (or not always) changed when their contents is changed. So although in windows no files have a changed timestamp, they still could have been changed.

A second observation:
The CARMINATE LIVE unit WRITES/CHANGES a loopback.ex3 file on the SD even if that SD is hardware wise locked (using the little tag at the side of the card).