Anyone knows how to fix the "card error" message?

[Fujipixel23]

Hi all:

After not using my X-T30 for a few months, I picked it up again last Friday and to my surprise I got a persistent screen message "CARD ERROR". I tried again with at least 6 different sd cards, old and new, slow and fast, formatted the cards with ex-fat and fat32 in the PC, also formatted them inside the camera, made sure the security pin on the cards was in the off position, replaced the battery and still the same message. Went out and bought a brand new Kingston sd card. No change. Same "card error" message.

Anyone has any idea why this is happening?. The camera works fine otherwise. It turns on, react to any change of the dials, except for the irritating message that don't go away and don't allow me to use any card on the camera.

Thanks a lot in advance for any help.

 

[KennyXYZ]

I don't have any experience with your stated problem. What I would try doing is to reset the camera to its factory default. I would also try taking pictures with the "card error" message still displayed just to see if the camera is writing to the card. Hope you get it sorted out.

 

[JPEGer]

I also have a "card error" problem with a T20 camera. Won't work with any card except an old 32GB SanDisk.

There's a "card error" thread, which I posted to a couple of months back.

It's intensely irritating. Not sure if Fujifilm has any idea this problem exists or they just ignores it.

 

[Tom Schum]

It is remotely possible that some of these problems are due to oxides or other material interfering with electrical contacts to the SD card.

This happens in laptops too.

I suggest you start with a clean SD card (clean it with an isopropyl dampened swab and let it dry thoroughly). Turn off the camera. Insert and remove the SD card ten or twenty times.

Insert the SD card. Power up. If it was dirt, card error should be gone.

--
Tom Schum
"Beware of taking advice from anonymous wise men." Quote from Anon.

 

[Fujipixel23]

Hi Tom:

Do you mean dirt inside the camera ? I bought a new sd card just to check if it was a card issue and the same message still there with the new card. All the cards I've tried work fine in the other 2 cameras I have (Nikon Coolpix A and an old Sony HX9V). Cheers.

 

[Tom Schum]

Hi Tom:

Do you mean dirt inside the camera ? I bought a new sd card just to check if it was a card issue and the same message still there with the new card. All the cards I've tried work fine in the other 2 cameras I have (Nikon Coolpix A and an old Sony HX9V). Cheers.

This problem is sometimes due to a thin layer of oxide or oil on the electrical contacts, whether they are in the camera, or on the SD card itself.

When you put the SD card into the camera over and over, you rub the contacts together and this might cut through the thin layer of oxide or oil. This layer is invisibly thin; you will not be able to see it without high magnification and sometimes not even then.

Back in the old days you could fix your computer by unplugging all the plugs and circuit boards and plugging them back in, at least twice. The oxides rubbed off from unknown places, and the computer worked like new. Next time the problem came up, you would just do exactly the same thing and it would fix the computer again.

Another problem would come from the spring tension on the socket contacts getting "worn out" or reduced over time. This was much more difficult to fix because you had to re-tension the contacts in the socket, one at a time. But, it worked! Same problem could occur in a SD card socket, I guess, but like I said would be extremely difficult to fix.

PS: When I was visiting my cousin a few weeks ago, his SD card reader in his Mac did not work. We put the SD card in and took it out, and repeated 10 times, and lo and behold the SD card reader started working!

--
Tom Schum
"Beware of taking advice from anonymous wise men." Quote from Anon.

 

[Fujipixel23]

Thanks Tom! I tried your solution but no luck. Also reset the camera to factory settings and even renamed the file naming (didn't believe it may work but somebody mentioned it could in another post). Nothing. Will wait for Fuji to answer my email hopefully tomorrow and post here if there is a solution. Thanks to you and everybody for trying to help.

 

[Tom Schum]

Thanks Tom! I tried your solution but no luck. Also reset the camera to factory settings and even renamed the file naming (didn't believe it may work but somebody mentioned it could in another post). Nothing. Will wait for Fuji to answer my email hopefully tomorrow and post here if there is a solution. Thanks to you and everybody for trying to help.

Please keep us in the loop. It will be interesting to find out what is really wrong here.

 

[bs1946]

Hi all:

After not using my X-T30 for a few months, I picked it up again last Friday and to my surprise I got a persistent screen message "CARD ERROR". I tried again with at least 6 different sd cards, old and new, slow and fast, formatted the cards with ex-fat and fat32 in the PC, also formatted them inside the camera, made sure the security pin on the cards was in the off position, replaced the battery and still the same message. Went out and bought a brand new Kingston sd card. No change. Same "card error" message.

Anyone has any idea why this is happening?. The camera works fine otherwise. It turns on, react to any change of the dials, except for the irritating message that don't go away and don't allow me to use any card on the camera.

Thanks a lot in advance for any help.

One major mistake you made was formatting those cards on your PC. The formatting scheme is entirely different and can easily cause card errors. When if you format a card in your PC or a Mac, there are files the operating system needs put on there that are hidden from view. When the camera formats a card, it puts files and folders on the card it needs to operate properly all of them are visible. Always formatting cards in the camera appears to wipe everything clean and no hidden files left behind. I have used the same San Disk Extreme Pro 32GB SD cards for many years, going between MFT, Fuji, and Leica M; always formatted in the camera that will use the card and never had a problem. You might want to consider getting a new unused and see what happens when you formatted it in camera. But definitely read the old card error thread first.

 

[Patrick Lowe]

I also had such problem during my recent trip when I download them from camera (X-H1) to my phone but not like you, I only have it on Video transfer not on still photos. Otherwise everything is OK. However, I thought it was the card error so I delete it including the video. Now can I restore my video recording. Thanks

 

[robert1955]

Hi all:

After not using my X-T30 for a few months, I picked it up again last Friday and to my surprise I got a persistent screen message "CARD ERROR". I tried again with at least 6 different sd cards, old and new, slow and fast, formatted the cards with ex-fat and fat32 in the PC, also formatted them inside the camera, made sure the security pin on the cards was in the off position, replaced the battery and still the same message. Went out and bought a brand new Kingston sd card. No change. Same "card error" message.

Anyone has any idea why this is happening?. The camera works fine otherwise. It turns on, react to any change of the dials, except for the irritating message that don't go away and don't allow me to use any card on the camera.

Thanks a lot in advance for any help.

One major mistake you made was formatting those cards on your PC. The formatting scheme is entirely different and can easily cause card errors. When if you format a card in your PC or a Mac, there are files the operating system needs put on there that are hidden from view. When the camera formats a card, it puts files and folders on the card it needs to operate properly all of them are visible. Always formatting cards in the camera appears to wipe everything clean and no hidden files left behind. I have used the same San Disk Extreme Pro 32GB SD cards for many years, going between MFT, Fuji, and Leica M; always formatted in the camera that will use the card and never had a problem. You might want to consider getting a new unused and see what happens when you formatted it in camera. But definitely read the old card error thread first.

Sorry but your info is not correct. Anyway the OP said he also tried a brand new card

 

[bs1946]

Hi all:

After not using my X-T30 for a few months, I picked it up again last Friday and to my surprise I got a persistent screen message "CARD ERROR". I tried again with at least 6 different sd cards, old and new, slow and fast, formatted the cards with ex-fat and fat32 in the PC, also formatted them inside the camera, made sure the security pin on the cards was in the off position, replaced the battery and still the same message. Went out and bought a brand new Kingston sd card. No change. Same "card error" message.

Anyone has any idea why this is happening?. The camera works fine otherwise. It turns on, react to any change of the dials, except for the irritating message that don't go away and don't allow me to use any card on the camera.

Thanks a lot in advance for any help.

One major mistake you made was formatting those cards on your PC. The formatting scheme is entirely different and can easily cause card errors. When if you format a card in your PC or a Mac, there are files the operating system needs put on there that are hidden from view. When the camera formats a card, it puts files and folders on the card it needs to operate properly all of them are visible. Always formatting cards in the camera appears to wipe everything clean and no hidden files left behind. I have used the same San Disk Extreme Pro 32GB SD cards for many years, going between MFT, Fuji, and Leica M; always formatted in the camera that will use the card and never had a problem. You might want to consider getting a new unused and see what happens when you formatted it in camera. But definitely read the old card error thread first.

Sorry but your info is not correct. Anyway the OP said he also tried a brand new card

What do you think is not correct except that a new unformatted card didn't help?

 

[robert1955]

Hi all:

After not using my X-T30 for a few months, I picked it up again last Friday and to my surprise I got a persistent screen message "CARD ERROR". I tried again with at least 6 different sd cards, old and new, slow and fast, formatted the cards with ex-fat and fat32 in the PC, also formatted them inside the camera, made sure the security pin on the cards was in the off position, replaced the battery and still the same message. Went out and bought a brand new Kingston sd card. No change. Same "card error" message.

Anyone has any idea why this is happening?. The camera works fine otherwise. It turns on, react to any change of the dials, except for the irritating message that don't go away and don't allow me to use any card on the camera.

Thanks a lot in advance for any help.

One major mistake you made was formatting those cards on your PC. The formatting scheme is entirely different and can easily cause card errors. When if you format a card in your PC or a Mac, there are files the operating system needs put on there that are hidden from view. When the camera formats a card, it puts files and folders on the card it needs to operate properly all of them are visible. Always formatting cards in the camera appears to wipe everything clean and no hidden files left behind. I have used the same San Disk Extreme Pro 32GB SD cards for many years, going between MFT, Fuji, and Leica M; always formatted in the camera that will use the card and never had a problem. You might want to consider getting a new unused and see what happens when you formatted it in camera. But definitely read the old card error thread first.

Sorry but your info is not correct. Anyway the OP said he also tried a brand new card

What do you think is not correct except that a new unformatted card didn't help?

That he made a major mistake by formatting in PC. Formatting in PC is usually not deep formatting [which might change 'hidden files', like bad sector maps] but only [superficially] deletes any folders and files [data]. Likewise, the camera's formatting only deletes the data. The DCIM folder structure only gets created if you take a shot

 

[bs1946]

Hi all:

After not using my X-T30 for a few months, I picked it up again last Friday and to my surprise I got a persistent screen message "CARD ERROR". I tried again with at least 6 different sd cards, old and new, slow and fast, formatted the cards with ex-fat and fat32 in the PC, also formatted them inside the camera, made sure the security pin on the cards was in the off position, replaced the battery and still the same message. Went out and bought a brand new Kingston sd card. No change. Same "card error" message.

Anyone has any idea why this is happening?. The camera works fine otherwise. It turns on, react to any change of the dials, except for the irritating message that don't go away and don't allow me to use any card on the camera.

Thanks a lot in advance for any help.

One major mistake you made was formatting those cards on your PC. The formatting scheme is entirely different and can easily cause card errors. When if you format a card in your PC or a Mac, there are files the operating system needs put on there that are hidden from view. When the camera formats a card, it puts files and folders on the card it needs to operate properly all of them are visible. Always formatting cards in the camera appears to wipe everything clean and no hidden files left behind. I have used the same San Disk Extreme Pro 32GB SD cards for many years, going between MFT, Fuji, and Leica M; always formatted in the camera that will use the card and never had a problem. You might want to consider getting a new unused and see what happens when you formatted it in camera. But definitely read the old card error thread first.

Sorry but your info is not correct. Anyway the OP said he also tried a brand new card

What do you think is not correct except that a new unformatted card didn't help?

That he made a major mistake by formatting in PC. Formatting in PC is usually not deep formatting [which might change 'hidden files', like bad sector maps] but only [superficially] deletes any folders and files [data]. Likewise, the camera's formatting only deletes the data. The DCIM folder structure only gets created if you take a shot

47 years in the computer industry tells me you are wrong about PC formatting and many camera manuals will tell you to only used memory cards formatted in the camera. If in camera only deleted data, which would be the photo or video files, I could not reuse the ones I have in entirely different brands of cameras.

 

[Fujipixel23]

I respectfully disagree with your opinion "One major mistake you made was formatting those cards on your PC".

The same formatted cards work on different cameras without any problem at all. Also I have had several cameras in the past (Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, Pentax, Sigma) and never a case like this where the error is persistent with any sd card.

Browsing the internet I noticed it seems to be a camera issue affecting specifically some X-T20 and X-T30 cameras and has been described on different forums and on Youtube.

I got the answer from my email to Fuji this morning and I am sending them the camera tomorrow for repair. Fingers crossed.

Will post again when the camera comes back. Cheers.

 

[robert1955]

Hi all:

After not using my X-T30 for a few months, I picked it up again last Friday and to my surprise I got a persistent screen message "CARD ERROR". I tried again with at least 6 different sd cards, old and new, slow and fast, formatted the cards with ex-fat and fat32 in the PC, also formatted them inside the camera, made sure the security pin on the cards was in the off position, replaced the battery and still the same message. Went out and bought a brand new Kingston sd card. No change. Same "card error" message.

Anyone has any idea why this is happening?. The camera works fine otherwise. It turns on, react to any change of the dials, except for the irritating message that don't go away and don't allow me to use any card on the camera.

Thanks a lot in advance for any help.

One major mistake you made was formatting those cards on your PC. The formatting scheme is entirely different and can easily cause card errors. When if you format a card in your PC or a Mac, there are files the operating system needs put on there that are hidden from view. When the camera formats a card, it puts files and folders on the card it needs to operate properly all of them are visible. Always formatting cards in the camera appears to wipe everything clean and no hidden files left behind. I have used the same San Disk Extreme Pro 32GB SD cards for many years, going between MFT, Fuji, and Leica M; always formatted in the camera that will use the card and never had a problem. You might want to consider getting a new unused and see what happens when you formatted it in camera. But definitely read the old card error thread first.

Sorry but your info is not correct. Anyway the OP said he also tried a brand new card

What do you think is not correct except that a new unformatted card didn't help?

That he made a major mistake by formatting in PC. Formatting in PC is usually not deep formatting [which might change 'hidden files', like bad sector maps] but only [superficially] deletes any folders and files [data]. Likewise, the camera's formatting only deletes the data. The DCIM folder structure only gets created if you take a shot

47 years in the computer industry tells me you are wrong about PC formatting

Please tell me were I went wrong. As far as I know neither PC [which could if explicitly commanded] nor camera do a low level formatting

and many camera manuals will tell you to only used memory cards formatted in the camera. If in camera only deleted data, which would be the photo or video files, I could not reuse the ones I have in entirely different brands of cameras.

I think the ability to use cards in different cameras shows the opposite: camera makers are adhering to the standard

 

[Bruce Hyman]

formatting *only* in the computer is a bad idea. but formatting in computer *before* formatting in camera is perfectly fine.

 

[robert1955]

formatting *only* in the computer is a bad idea. but formatting in computer *before* formatting in camera is perfectly fine.

why?

 

[Bruce Hyman]

i'd prefer to have the camera do the final formatting, purely in case there is something unique in its preferences. this is more belt and suspenders than something i can document. (but it seems to be a near-universal view..)

i format in computer beforehand if i have any doubt about wonky files. that's about 1% of the time,

 

[Fujipixel23]

OK, the camera is now back from Fuji. It has been fully repaired as stated in the brief report. No explanation of what caused the issue though. So far so good.