Unlock Your Mio Moov 500 GPS With VisualGPS
I bought a Mio Moov 500 GPS a few days ago. Here’s how it looks:
Mio Moov 500
Pretty nice, huh ?
The bad thing is that it came only with the navigation software ( MioMap ). No video player, picture viewer or mp3 player. After a little bit of google-ing I found out that Dalibor Dalik made the Mio Moov Unlock Shell.
The Unlock Shell simply kills your original GPS application and starts Visual Shell. You can download the Visual Shell from www.lanik.org. I wanted to upload the current version to my website but it wouldn’t be useful as it isn’t final and future versions will appear. Let me share a small tutorial on how to install the Unlock Shell on a Mio Moov 500.
Note: If you have another GPS model read the full instructions. This is the easy way to install on a Mio Moov 500. I’m writing this so you don’t have to read the whole ReadMe file.
Installation Instructions
- Download Visual GPS
- Extract it to your hard drive
- Connect your Mio Moov 500 to your computer with the USB cable
- Copy the following 3 folders to your GPS to the parent directory (just open Mio Device – appears on your desktop when it has connected with your PC): Visual, Visual.auto and Visual.ins.
- Open Program Files/MioMap/appstartupsec.ini in a text editor and change the line:
ProcessFile=Program Files/MioMap/MioMap.exe to
ProcessFile=\\..\\My Flash Disk\\Visual.auto\\auto.exe - Safely remove your GPS, remove the USB cable and turn it on.
You will see that VisualGPS is starting. I won’t tell you how to use VisualGPS. It will be nicer to find out what it can do yourself. All I’m telling you is that you can now play a video, listen to music and use other GPS software (iGo, TomTom, Route66 etc.) on your Mio Moov 500.
Screenshots
Mio Moov 500 Unlocked - GPS Applications
As you can see I have MioMap and iGo8. They both work flawlessly.
Mio Moov 500 Unlocked - Multimedia Applications
I use Core Player to view videos (top left corner) and Nitrogen ( 3rd icon on top row )to play mp3 files.
Mio Moov 500 Unlocked - Games
Solitaire is the best thing ever for the times when you’re stuck in traffic
Mio Moov 500 Unlocked - Settings Screen
Total Commander is really useful
. From this screen you can change the wallpaper, open USB mode, close processes and modify some settings.
And there you have it: your unlocked Mio Moov 500. Remember that you can always read more about the VisualGPS Mio Unlock Shell.
Categories: GPS
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16 Responses
to “Unlock Your Mio Moov 500 GPS With VisualGPS”
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Very nice tutorial indeed. It costs some money to unlock these gadgets. It’s nice to know that we can do it for free in house. Thanks
[...] I just unlocked another GPS: the Mio Moov S505 using Dalibor Lanik’s Visual GPS. It was as easy as unlocking the Mio Moov 500. [...]
On my MIO MOOV 500 there is in Program Files/MioMap/appstartupsec.ini no line that says
ProcessFile=Program Files/MioMap/MioMap.exe that I can change ?!
Ton, paste the contents of your appstartupsec.ini here so I can take a look at it
Sava,
it reads as follows:
[Process1]
RelativePath=TRUE
ProcessFile=SmartST_CE.exe
ProcessCmdLine=
ProcessDbgFile=SmartST_CEDbg.exe
ProcessDbgCmdLine=
MaxRestarts=3
Major=TRUE
WindowName=SmartST_CE
MaxCloseMessages=10
Then you should take a look at : http://savasplace.com/2010/01/visualgps-on-mio-moov-s505/
or just change
RelativePath=TRUE
ProcessFile=SmartST_CE.exe
to
RelativePath=FALSE
ProcessFile=\\..\\My Flash Disk\\Visual.auto\\auto.exe
Make sure you enter the right path to auto.exe just in case you didn’t copy the Visual.auto folder to the root of your GPS
Thanks for that Sava, I will give it a try.
Just another question here: actually I just want to run iGO 8.3.4 with Gurjon skin 6.15 om my MIO MOOV 500, just like it does so well on m MIO 268+.
Is it possible just to ignore MioMap2008 completely and direct the MIO MOOV 500 straight to iGO.exe on the SD Card as it starts up by changing the two lines in appstartupsec.ini as follows ?
RelativePath=FALSE
ProcessFile=\\..\\SD CARD\IGO8\\iGO8.exe
I understand that by doing so, I can not switch between MioMap2008 and iGO, but to be honest I don’t mind because I’m not very enthousiastic about MioMap2008.
I wouldn’t recommend that. In case your iGo installation fails your GPS will try to start a broken application. It happened to me as well … I wanted to start iGo on my Moov 500 and it got jammed. I had to drain the whole battery ( played with the on/off/reset switch for about 2 hours ) and only after I was able to connect it to my computer with the USB cable and change the startup application from appstartupsec.ini
OK, I’ll just unlock first then. It’s just that I don’t need all the features that come with it and just gonna use it to start iGO.
You wouldn’t know another way to get that done, by using a sys.txt somewhere or something like that ?
You can set iGo as your default GPS application and then set VisualGPS to start the default GPS application when it starts up. Check out http://projects.lanik.org/GPSProject_00.htm and search for Autorun Default App and Folder icon lets you specify
Yes, I’ll go for that, thanks. It just seems such a complicated U-turn to accomplish what I’m looking for and I’m surprisede there is not an easier way to get it done.
as I said … the easiest way would be to edit appstartupsec.ini and put iGo as the default started application without unlocking … but it’s not safe.
I installed the IGO8 as the default application in my MIO MOOV 500 the IGO work fine but since this install The USB and my SD are not accessiable. (I.e I can’t access the flash memory from my PC nor be able to use the SD card, Just run the existing IGO8). I sent the GPS to the lab and was told that the board is damaged by the installation of the IGO8. And the have to replace the main board with a cost of about 85% of the original price!. I refiused and now I have the GPS working fine with my IGO8 but without the ability to update or change anything. I am looking for a way to perform a hard reset or at least to be able to use my usb and access the GPS from my pc. Thanks in advance for any help with the above.
You have to play with the On/Off switch until you drain it’s battery. Do this until the screen doesn’t light up when you switch it on. After that connect the USB cable to it and it should be able to connect.
Read this comment as well: http://savasplace.com/2010/01/unlock-your-mio-moov-500-gps-with-visualgps/comment-page-1/#comment-611
Like Ton said, inmy MIO MOOV 500 there is in Program Files/MioMap/appstartupsec.ini –> processmgr.ini see detail below
[GEN]
config1 = 0,3000,1267,
callsetting = \My Flash Disk\Program Files\Settings\Settings.exe,1,
restorereg = -SetSetting,
apcall00 = \My Flash Disk\Program Files\MainShell\MainShell.exe,,1,0,0,2000,
mioid = \My Flash Disk\Program Files\MainShell\MioID.dll,
[WM_MESSAGE]
msg00 = 0,1046,0,0,\Windows\USBScreen.exe,,0:3317::,196900,
msg01 = 0,1058,0,0,,500,0:3309::,512,
msg02 = 0,1048,0,0,,500,,20,
[BATTERY]
lowbatt = 3,20,1,\My Flash Disk\Program Files\System\BatteryMsg.exe,,BatteryMsg,6,3312,0,,
criticalbatt = 0,3,1,\My Flash Disk\Program Files\System\BatteryMsg.exe,,BatteryMsg,6,3312,1,,
then I change apcall00 = \My Flash Disk\Program Files\MainShell\MainShell.exe,,1,0,0,2000, –> \\My Flash Disk\\Visual.auto\\auto.exe
Then restart –> start to install Visual GPS shell….after a few second ——–preparing to start — creating screen —then HALT/ STOP no response…..Pls advised
I’m used MIO MOov S500 (Korean version)
Pls advise me, thx
slava, it is working fine but for some reason i can’t make the IGO8 work with it. in what folder should i put the files?