Hi there.

Forgive me if I'm posting something that's been asked before, but I cannot find anything about the specific device I've got in question. I'm taking delivery of an ancient Garmin GVN 53 soon, to install in an old Bentley (old style RCA video/audio connectors for the nav screen, so I'm severely limited on choice if I wish to retain the original display that originally was driven by a DVD Alpine Unit).

I understand that these units only accept NT maps via SD card, but according to Garmin these need to be 'purchased as-is' rather than updating them at home. In any event, the European maps have been discontinued in that format, owing to the change to unicode NTU format. After a good while in your wonderfully informative forum, I've seen that NT maps are still around, even if segregated in Europe. My question is, given that Garmin are adamant that only pre-loaded SD cards (which are no longer available) would be suitable, is there a way of loading Western Europe maps to an SD card (or even UK only) to such a unit?

The Garmin website directs one to purchase a pre-loaded SD Card with City Navigator NT on it. In the good ol' US of A, this is still a thing, but NTU is now the only option officially for Europe. Is it possible to formulate an SD Card with the locked or unlocked maps circulating on this forum that might be compatible? I've seen the general SD card structure in terms of folder structure and .img files that may need to be renamed for such an older device. I just feel like this is a slightly more niche product than has been previously covered.

Many thanks,
Andrew

Welcome to the forum, once you have the device ,use a tool like [Please Register or Login to download file] to share how the current SD card files are laid out with the existing maps.
Garmin shows that it can use 8GB, that's good
GVN 52 and GVN 53 8 GB microSD Class 2 to 10
[Please Register or Login to download file]

So I finally took delivery of the GVN 53. Upon connection to power and a display it had City Navigator North America 2009 installed with no SD card present for any updated maps.

I took a punt and after updating the firmware (documented on Garmin website), I've managed to install both the Unlocked IMG UK & Ireland Maps onto an SD Card (4GB Class 2) as well as Western Europe (in the same format) to the directory Garmin/gmapsupp.img on a FAT32 card.

Thought this may be useful in the very rare event someone else purchases this now defunct unit for a specific purpose such as mine. It's capable, but clunky given its age. A nice hybrid between looking OEM in a 23 year old car, but still having current maps.