My first Sandisk SD failure

jjbinx said:

Satyaa said:

Did you have a second card in the camera and were you able to get those photos?

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yes but I don’t write simultaneously to both cards. I need the second card to carry on if the first fills.

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I'd buy bigger cards before I gave up redundant saves.

Member said:

Member said:

One suggestion I can give is to use the write-protect tab when inserting card into the PC or card reader. That way you can be sure that the computer won't damage the files. You can unprotect it and format in the camera later.

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I used to always do that but have become lazy

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I do this, almost always. (Except when I'm spacey.) I find that, for me, it's too easy to start editing pictures in the wrong directory, (the card instead of the HDD/SSD). It also provides some protection from software screwups. It's not foolproof however - the position of that tab doesn't physically disable writes to the card, it's up to the OS and/or other software on the computer to read the position of that tab and to respect it. Per https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/117531/is-the-slide-lock-on-an-sd-card-optional

jjbinx said:

Satyaa said:

Did you have a second card in the camera and were you able to get those photos?

Click to expand...

yes but I don’t write simultaneously to both cards. I need the second card to carry on if the first fills.

Member said:

One suggestion I can give is to use the write-protect tab when inserting card into the PC or card reader. That way you can be sure that the computer won't damage the files. You can unprotect it and format in the camera later.

Click to expand...

I used to always do that but have become lazy

Click to expand...

Buy a matched pair of larger cards. Cards are not expensive. I only use Sandisk out of habit, I guess. I thought I needed the fastest ones out there, the 300MB/s v90 Extreme Pro cards. Then when I momentarily couldn't find another card and put in a Sandisk Ultra 80MB/s card in my camera, I realized I couldn't really tell the difference with my stills photography workflow.

A couple of the 64GB V30 Extreme Pro cards, double the capacity of what you are using now, should be fine.

I'm sorry hear that you lost so much data & effort due to a SD card failure.

I had this happen with a 64G SanDisk card many years ago.

I had partial success with Disk Drill regarding recovery.

Since then I never put the SD card into any computer without moving the 'Write Protect'
switch to the 'On' position.

I then transfer the selected images to a drive on the computer.

For the mircoSD's I use the larger SD adapter which has the write protect switch.

It might sound a bit like closing the stable door after the horse has bolted - but utilising the write protect switch is now part of my workflow when it comes to processing images.

Most antivirus programs will still read a protected disc & say what is wrong but cannot automatically go ahead & start correcting an infected area & then most likely causing a request for initialisation.

It gives one some choice in the matter on how to proceed.

All the best with future night sky projects.

Martin

bobnn said:

bobnn said:

...the position of that tab doesn't physically disable writes to the card, it's up to the OS and/or other software on the computer to read the position of that tab and to respect it. Per https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/117531/is-the-slide-lock-on-an-sd-card-optional

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Wow. That's a surprise to me. I always assumed it is protected like a physical lock.

Good to know.

I have changed the Card use settings in my C4 (Astrophotography) configuration.

Now, raw files will write to both cards and I will keep a pair of 64G cards dedicated to Astro work.

I'm going to keep the suspect card as the SD1 card in my camera when shooting Astro and I'll give it a good workout in coming months (weather permitting)

jj

This is the first one to fail, that i have heard of.

Quailane said:

jjbinx said:

Satyaa said:

Did you have a second card in the camera and were you able to get those photos?

Click to expand...

yes but I don’t write simultaneously to both cards. I need the second card to carry on if the first fills.

Quailane said:

One suggestion I can give is to use the write-protect tab when inserting card into the PC or card reader. That way you can be sure that the computer won't damage the files. You can unprotect it and format in the camera later.

Click to expand...

I used to always do that but have become lazy

Click to expand...

Buy a matched pair of larger cards. Cards are not expensive. I only use Sandisk out of habit, I guess. I thought I needed the fastest ones out there, the 300MB/s v90 Extreme Pro cards. Then when I momentarily couldn't find another card and put in a Sandisk Ultra 80MB/s card in my camera, I realized I couldn't really tell the difference with my stills photography workflow.

A couple of the 64GB V30 Extreme Pro cards, double the capacity of what you are using now, should be fine.

Click to expand...

Slot 1 on the E-M1 III is UHS-2 compatible; slot 2 is UHS-1 only. Using UHS-2 in slot 2 is a needless expense. Using UHS-1 in slot 1 is suboptimal. Using the same model card in both slots is either a waste of money or a loss of speed.

Not that my setup is perfect for all but I have a 128G fast UHS-2 in slot 1 collecting raws (I don't do video so 32G or 64G is all I really need). Slot 2 has a 256G SanDisk Extreme Pro collecting JPEGs (same as the card in the OP).

jjbinx said:

I have changed the Card use settings in my C4 (Astrophotography) configuration.

Now, raw files will write to both cards and I will keep a pair of 64G cards dedicated to Astro work.

I'm going to keep the suspect card as the SD1 card in my camera when shooting Astro and I'll give it a good workout in coming months (weather permitting)

jj

Click to expand...

I hope you manage to recover the data. Anyway, when you get to the point of wanting to start over with the card, here is downloadable software from the SD Association to reformat your card deeply. Hopefully it will correct problems and restore your card to pristine condition or at least tell you if it's bricked: SD Memory Card Formatter for Windows/Mac - SD Association

Following that, you should, of course, run the quick in-camera format as well, as you would normally before you shoot.

Over the last 15 years I’ve had a several card failures. One fell apart in my hand; I was able to reassemble it long enough to get the images off. I got a “card full” error while shooting the total solar eclipse (the card wasn’t full). I had another problem which I can’t recall the details of.

Unless you’re shooting video or 30 fps sports, it’s hard to fill a 64GB card with images in a single session.

In any event, the only sane response is to trash the card. Taking a chance on it failing again, and this time when it’s a non-repeatable event, is too great for me.

SGA said:

Over the last 15 years I’ve had a several card failures. One fell apart in my hand; I was able to reassemble it long enough to get the images off. I got a “card full” error while shooting the total solar eclipse (the card wasn’t full). I had another problem which I can’t recall the details of.

Click to expand...

I had such a Sandisc card about 6 years ago. It was a fake. The memory chip inside was much smaller (and slower) than specified when I checked with a test software. It did let you take as many pics as you wanted, never showing a "card full" error. It was cleverly programmed to simply overwrite older pictures when full.

The fakers did that to extend for as long as possible the time it takes the buyer to realize he has been duped. A few days is all the seller of fakes needs to sell a sizeable number of fakes, cash his money, disappear from our earth, and set-up a new seller account to flush and repeat.

A more detailed explanation from the net:

Fake storage devices are often low capacity storage but their on-chip interface is configured to report a larger size. SD cards and pendrives normally have raw storage space that is a power of 2 in size. A small percentage of the raw space is used internally, and also to provide a small number spare sectors to be used if a block of storage is marginal in manufacture or becomes suspect after heavy us of the storage.

If a smaller chip is disguised, then normally it means that one or more address bits will be ignored. For example, a 16 GiB chip might pretend to be a 64 GiB chip.

16 GiB = 17,179,869,184 bytes

Two extra address bits can mean a reported size of

64 GiB = 68,719,476,736 bytes

Without the extra address lines actually existing, the same 16 GiB of space is being addressed as four separate spaces. Once more than 16 GiB of data is written, further writes will start overwriting earlier writes. This not only means that earlier files may be overwritten or corrupted, but also means that the actual structures of file systems may be damaged, which means files may be lost or fragmented.

If you stay entirely within the real raw space, then you can have a workable 16 GiB drive. This will normally require a partition to be defined that limits the usable space not to go beyond the real raw capacity.

SGA said:

Unless you’re shooting video or 30 fps sports, it’s hard to fill a 64GB card with images in a single session.

In any event, the only sane response is to trash the card. Taking a chance on it failing again, and this time when it’s a non-repeatable event, is too great for me.

Click to expand...

cba_melbourne said:

SGA said:

Over the last 15 years I’ve had a several card failures. One fell apart in my hand; I was able to reassemble it long enough to get the images off. I got a “card full” error while shooting the total solar eclipse (the card wasn’t full). I had another problem which I can’t recall the details of.

Click to expand...

I had such a Sandisc card about 6 years ago. It was a fake. The memory chip inside was much smaller (and slower) than specified when I checked with a test software. It did let you take as many pics as you wanted, never showing a "card full" error. It was cleverly programmed to simply overwrite older pictures when full.

The fakers did that to extend for as long as possible the time it takes the buyer to realize he has been duped. A few days is all the seller of fakes needs to sell a sizeable number of fakes, cash his money, disappear from our earth, and set-up a new seller account to flush and repeat.

A more detailed explanation from the net:

Fake storage devices are often low capacity storage but their on-chip interface is configured to report a larger size. SD cards and pendrives normally have raw storage space that is a power of 2 in size. A small percentage of the raw space is used internally, and also to provide a small number spare sectors to be used if a block of storage is marginal in manufacture or becomes suspect after heavy us of the storage.

If a smaller chip is disguised, then normally it means that one or more address bits will be ignored. For example, a 16 GiB chip might pretend to be a 64 GiB chip.

16 GiB = 17,179,869,184 bytes

Two extra address bits can mean a reported size of

64 GiB = 68,719,476,736 bytes

Without the extra address lines actually existing, the same 16 GiB of space is being addressed as four separate spaces. Once more than 16 GiB of data is written, further writes will start overwriting earlier writes. This not only means that earlier files may be overwritten or corrupted, but also means that the actual structures of file systems may be damaged, which means files may be lost or fragmented.

If you stay entirely within the real raw space, then you can have a workable 16 GiB drive. This will normally require a partition to be defined that limits the usable space not to go beyond the real raw capacity.

cba_melbourne said:

Unless you’re shooting video or 30 fps sports, it’s hard to fill a 64GB card with images in a single session.

In any event, the only sane response is to trash the card. Taking a chance on it failing again, and this time when it’s a non-repeatable event, is too great for me.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Thanks for that explanation, CBA!

cba_melbourne said:

If you stay entirely within the real raw space, then you can have a workable 16 GiB drive. This will normally require a partition to be defined that limits the usable space not to go beyond the real raw capacity.

Click to expand...

Maybe you could make that work, but it seems a lot smarter just to get one that was genuinely sold as 16GB in the first place. Almost certainly it would have been cheaper. How could you trust such a jury-rigged device?

Mark Ransom said:

cba_melbourne said:

If you stay entirely within the real raw space, then you can have a workable 16 GiB drive. This will normally require a partition to be defined that limits the usable space not to go beyond the real raw capacity.

Click to expand...

Maybe you could make that work, but it seems a lot smarter just to get one that was genuinely sold as 16GB in the first place. Almost certainly it would have been cheaper. How could you trust such a jury-rigged device?

Click to expand...

I tossed that card and learned my lesson: do not buy fast large expensive SD cards on eBay or Amazon. Up to then, I did not even know that fake SD cards existed. It actually took me a few days to work out what was going on with my missing pictures. Only then searching the net I learned fake SD cards are very common.

There are test programs that report the maker and type of memory and controller chip inside a fake card. It will not only be a smaller memory capacity, but also an inferior and slower type of memory. It's just not worth trying to save it. If you have been duped, just write it off as learning money and toss it.

cba_melbourne said:

Mark Ransom said:

cba_melbourne said:

If you stay entirely within the real raw space, then you can have a workable 16 GiB drive. This will normally require a partition to be defined that limits the usable space not to go beyond the real raw capacity.

Click to expand...

Maybe you could make that work, but it seems a lot smarter just to get one that was genuinely sold as 16GB in the first place. Almost certainly it would have been cheaper. How could you trust such a jury-rigged device?

Click to expand...

I tossed that card and learned my lesson: do not buy fast large expensive SD cards on eBay or Amazon. Up to then, I did not even know that fake SD cards existed. It actually took me a few days to work out what was going on with my missing pictures. Only then searching the net I learned fake SD cards are very common.

There are test programs that report the maker and type of memory and controller chip inside a fake card. It will not only be a smaller memory capacity, but also an inferior and slower type of memory. It's just not worth trying to save it. If you have been duped, just write it off as learning money and toss it.

Click to expand...

Just out of interest, did you run one of these test programs or was there something else that convinced you it was fake?

Bobapingu said:

cba_melbourne said:

Mark Ransom said:

cba_melbourne said:

If you stay entirely within the real raw space, then you can have a workable 16 GiB drive. This will normally require a partition to be defined that limits the usable space not to go beyond the real raw capacity.

Click to expand...

Maybe you could make that work, but it seems a lot smarter just to get one that was genuinely sold as 16GB in the first place. Almost certainly it would have been cheaper. How could you trust such a jury-rigged device?

Click to expand...

I tossed that card and learned my lesson: do not buy fast large expensive SD cards on eBay or Amazon. Up to then, I did not even know that fake SD cards existed. It actually took me a few days to work out what was going on with my missing pictures. Only then searching the net I learned fake SD cards are very common.

There are test programs that report the maker and type of memory and controller chip inside a fake card. It will not only be a smaller memory capacity, but also an inferior and slower type of memory. It's just not worth trying to save it. If you have been duped, just write it off as learning money and toss it.

Click to expand...

Just out of interest, did you run one of these test programs or was there something else that convinced you it was fake?

Click to expand...

Yes I did run several of the test programs available at the time (2018). It was a clear confirmation for a fake, the memory chip inside was only 8G and a strange maker name I never heard of before. The Sandisk label on the SD card said 32G. Despite spending hours, I was not able to recover most of the pics, even those tat should have fitted into the 8G space. Just the last dozen pics I took, I got off that card. The rest were corrupted and did not open in PP software.

The blister package the card came in was a perfect copy, absolutely indistinguishable from the original. Also the card itself looked perfect, it had however a yellow lock tab on the side, at the time the only exterior warning sign for a fake (as I only found out later). The genuine Sandisk Extreme Pro of the period apparently should all have had a light grey lock tab. The price was only slightly cheaper than from any other seller.

Apparently also reputable dealers did sometime sell fakes at the time, without knowing it. The difference is, reputable dealers will take fakes back and refund. Online sellers just disappear. I think today eBay would cover you in such case, but it's still a lot of hassles to prove it's a fake, often just not worth your time (and sanity).

Bobapingu said:

jjbinx said:

I have changed the Card use settings in my C4 (Astrophotography) configuration.

Now, raw files will write to both cards and I will keep a pair of 64G cards dedicated to Astro work.

I'm going to keep the suspect card as the SD1 card in my camera when shooting Astro and I'll give it a good workout in coming months (weather permitting)

jj

Click to expand...

I hope you manage to recover the data. Anyway,

Click to expand...

I gave up on the data straight away.
Time was I would have tried everything I could to recover it, but now my life is less complicated and I find it easier to let material things go.

Bobapingu said:

when you get to the point of wanting to start over with the card, here is downloadable software from the SD Association to reformat your card deeply. Hopefully it will correct problems and restore your card to pristine condition or at least tell you if it's bricked: SD Memory Card Formatter for Windows/Mac - SD Association

Click to expand...

I’ve had that utility for years but stopped using it.

I reformed the card again but this time using the utility - seemed normal

Bobapingu said:

Following that, you should, of course, run the quick in-camera format as well, as you would normally before you shoot.

Click to expand...

And again did an in-camera format

I’ve marked the card with a red X

jj

cba_melbourne said:

I tossed that card and learned my lesson: do not buy fast large expensive SD cards on eBay or Amazon. Up to then, I did not even know that fake SD cards existed. It actually took me a few days to work out what was going on with my missing pictures. Only then searching the net I learned fake SD cards are very common.

Click to expand...

It should be obvious that buying from eBay comes with some risk, but the dangers with Amazon are more subtle. They're big enough to have a direct connection with the manufacturer, so you'd think they could avoid the fakes. The problem is the third party seller program. Even if you don't buy from a third party, Amazon ships everything from their warehouse. When Joe Sleazy sends his inventory to be fulfilled by Amazon, they're not going to carve out a spot in the warehouse just for him; they'll mix it with the "same" parts that they already have. So even if you didn't order from Joe, you might get his parts.

(Apologies if your name is Joe and you're offended, I just needed an example. And if your name is Sleazy, you should consider getting it changed.)

jjbinx said:

I’ve marked the card with a red X

Click to expand...

Why bother with the X? Just insert the card - straight into the trash can.

Mark Ransom said:

jjbinx said:

I’ve marked the card with a red X

Click to expand...

Why bother with the X? Just insert the card - straight into the trash can.

Click to expand...

Short answer = Because I’m not you.

Longer answer = I’m curious to see if/when the issue recurs and if it does I’ll do a deeper look to see if I can find what’s happening. In the meantime it will have a live backup SD in the second slot

jj

Mark Ransom said:

cba_melbourne said:

I tossed that card and learned my lesson: do not buy fast large expensive SD cards on eBay or Amazon. Up to then, I did not even know that fake SD cards existed. It actually took me a few days to work out what was going on with my missing pictures. Only then searching the net I learned fake SD cards are very common.

Click to expand...

It should be obvious that buying from eBay comes with some risk, but the dangers with Amazon are more subtle. They're big enough to have a direct connection with the manufacturer, so you'd think they could avoid the fakes. The problem is the third party seller program. Even if you don't buy from a third party, Amazon ships everything from their warehouse. When Joe Sleazy sends his inventory to be fulfilled by Amazon, they're not going to carve out a spot in the warehouse just for him; they'll mix it with the "same" parts that they already have. So even if you didn't order from Joe, you might get his parts.

(Apologies if your name is Joe and you're offended, I just needed an example. And if your name is Sleazy, you should consider getting it changed.)

Click to expand...

And how can I be sure the cards I buy over the physical counter at my local camera store are legitimate?

Can I buy direct from Sandisk . . . their website directs me to resellers, one of which is Amazon

jj