SD Card Corrupted

Recuva
21

MiniTool Partition Wizard Home Edition 7.6:

Take care while you are installing it to avoid the extras. Watch for this during the install ...

Better still, you do should avoid any extras via

http://www.freewaref...gram_50631.html

An alternative is

http://www.majorgeek...tion_d6175.html

I suggest you avoid the top-most majorgeek link to "Download@Authors Site"

and instead use one of the lower links to "Download@MajorGeeks Site"

My fear is that just possibly the Authors Site may on a bad day get routed to download.com

I never had the extras problem in the past,

but this may have been when Minitool delivered the download from their own servers,

or may have been before download.com started bundling foist ware.

22

That download I linked to is absolutely fine, and I suggest you stick to it help890. It's a normal download and not CNet's "installer".

It's the recently updated version 7.6 which now carries the passenger, as a lot of freeware does. Previous versions didn't contain "extras".

We're muddying the waters here unnecessarily as I'm guessing that "extra" is common to all versions 7.6, and I downloaded and installed 7.6 myself to check it out, which is a practice I always carry out. I never suggest something I haven't first tried myself.

It isn't a problem at all, as there is a clear "opt out" choice as long as one doesn't do an install with eyes closed.

23

Sorry, I have not checked the free version 7.6 because I was given the Professional version as a birthday present.

I assumed the extra you referred to was part of the recent CNET abuse.

Regards

Alan

24

Just for the sake of clarity for others, the FreewareFiles version also contains the "extra".

25

I have downloaded the Mini Tool Partition Wizard.. Heres the screen shot, picking the card up but only saying 30mb

post-63634-0-01207400-1347868054_thumb.jpg

26

Thanks for that, and I wish I'd spotted that capacity anomaly earlier. My bad on that one.

I was expecting the screenshot to show a 30mb partition and the missing capacity as unallocated space, but sadly that's not the case. I'm gonna have to study this one a while, but you could provide some more info for me via other screenshots.

Depending upon which part of your card you click on, there will be a different menu to the left ...

Click and highlight the outside, which is the actual volume (or drive) and you get this ...

Click and highlight the inside, the partition, and this menu is available ...

Can you do two screenshots like this? Thanks.

Up until now, I've seen flash drives and memory cards (my own included) showing the wrong capacity, but the missing space has showed up in a partition manager like MiniTools, but I haven't seen one with the missing space being just that. Completely missing.

This is why we couldn't scan for a lost partition containing your files. There's nothing to scan.

OK, get the screenshots for me, and I'll see what I can find on resurrecting drive space which doesn't show up at all. My thoughts at the moment are to maybe do something with the 30mb of "unallocated space".

It should be easy to create a new partition on that 30mb of space, and that would fix the bootsectors, but would that make the missing gb's show up? I have no idea, but I may be able to find a man who does.

27

Here are the 2 screen shots that you asked for...

post-63634-0-99993600-1348063798_thumb.jpg

post-63634-0-82990700-1348063909_thumb.jpg

28

OK, thanks.

I've found lots of examples of drives, flash drives and cards showing a capacity way below their actual size, but in all cases so far, the missing capacity has been "unallocated space". I haven't found one example of there being no indication at all of the missing space.

I'll keep looking for a while, and in the meantime, have you ever had anything out of the ordinary installed on that card, such as a U3 installation ...

http://kb.sandisk.co...unchpad-on-a-pc

I was hoping to be able to try a search for a lost partition by running the MiniTools "Partition Recovery" option on your card, but it looks like only the 30mb would be searched. Give that a try for me just to see what does happen with MiniTools.

And also can you hit the "Show Disk Properties", and the "Show Partition Properties" buttons and show me what they come up with?

Thanks.

29

Is it possible that this SD Card was fabricated with many RAM chips bonded to a substrate,

and due to thermal or mechanical shock the bonds have failed and / or interconnects have broken,

and there is only one chip still doing its job ?

30

OK, thanks.

I've found lots of examples of drives, flash drives and cards showing a capacity way below their actual size, but in all cases so far, the missing capacity has been "unallocated space". I haven't found one example of there being no indication at all of the missing space.

I'll keep looking for a while, and in the meantime, have you ever had anything out of the ordinary installed on that card, such as a U3 installation ...

http://kb.sandisk.co...unchpad-on-a-pc

I was hoping to be able to try a search for a lost partition by running the MiniTools "Partition Recovery" option on your card, but it looks like only the 30mb would be searched. Give that a try for me just to see what does happen with MiniTools.

And also can you hit the "Show Disk Properties", and the "Show Partition Properties" buttons and show me what they come up with?

Thanks.

No, I have only ever had photos/videos on the card. Never had any unusual files on it.

Here are the screen shots for ''Show Disk Properties'' and ''Show Partition Properties''

post-63634-0-76512200-1348223398_thumb.jpg

post-63634-0-09133500-1348223478_thumb.jpg

31

I haven't forgotten about you help890.

Had a busy weekend but managed to do some research into your problem, and I think it's gonna be more a case now of trying to get your 4gb card back to it's proper capacity and hopefully your images may be recoverable somewhere along the way.

You could use Minitools to create a new partition on the recognised 30mb, but I don't think that will make the missing capacity visible, although it wouldn't do any harm to have that 30mb recognized by windows.

I'll get back to you.

EDIT: Thanks for the pics. They confirm that it's 30mb whichever way you look at that card.

32

Is it possible that this SD Card was fabricated with many RAM chips bonded to a substrate,

and due to thermal or mechanical shock the bonds have failed and / or interconnects have broken,

and there is only one chip still doing its job ?

I'm thinking that it's either physical damage Alan or a chip/controller problem, which is stuff I haven't encountered before, but I'm looking at the moment at software which, if it's not physical damage, may be able to do something with this.

You sound like you know more about this stuff than I do, so any suggestions welcome.

33

My career started in electronic equipment design.and construction involving "glow-in-the-dark" valves and transistors.

Then came integrated circuits with perhaps 8 transistors.

After 10 years there were 8 bit processors and I built my own computer hardware and software,

planting 32 off integrated circuits on a printed circuit board to create a 4 Kilo Byte memory card :rolleyes:

Eventually I focused on software and hardware design, and others did the construction.

For over 40 years I worked in factories that have used state of the art production equipment for mounting components on printed circuit boards,

I have been aware of techniques by which integrated circuits have included several dies on a substrate.

I have been retired and out of that environment for the last 6 years - I do not know what the current state of art might be.

I now have a 60 GB SSD from OCZ and understand that my particular model has several different builds.

It could use any one of several suppliers of 0.5 GB or perhaps 1 GB Flash chip,

as determined by the best prices at the time of building..

I do not know how OCZ put the parts together in the package - but it works.

I guess that SanDisk use related techniques for their SSD and SD Card product lines,

hence my suggestion that perhaps only one out of many Flash Chips is still connected/working.

I am sorry, but if it is such a physical problem, I have no feasible solution.

To be honest - whatever the problem I have no solution :(

If the card was cooked at the "right" time and temperature then solder might re-flow and re-bond the chips,

but I doubt the charges in the Flash Chip cells would retain the user data they were holding.

I think the only realistic hope for this situation is if this is a non-physical defect for which you can find a software solution

34

I personally think that the exact cause of failure should be determined before attempting repair & recovery procedures. Then the correct tool can be applied and recovery effected. If this cannot be determined then it should be left to an established professional to do the work. Of course you may get lucky and achieve a full recovery without scrambling "stuff" further.

There have been times when I've recommended to people that they put the device in question into a baggie for safekeeping till they could afford a pro-service. And some months later I got a nice thank-you letter from somebody who did just that.

On the other hand there are folks who, of course, know more than I do about this sort of thing. So in that case I say, Have at it!

35

hi, i'm not sure how to create a new partition on it? i know you said this would probably not work but thought i'd give it a try!

36

I've got something else for you try first, and again it's something I've ran on my own memory card with no issues. I've been deleting the partition from my 1GB SD card to test my suggestions with "unallocated space".

Just to confirm, I wouldn't ask you to try anything that I haven't first ran on my own stuff without issue. And I've just realised that the bookmarks for this utility are on my laptop, and I'm on my desktop at the moment.

I'll get back to you.

37

and i've just realised that the bookmarks for this utility are on my laptop, and i'm on my desktop at the moment.

xmarks would solve that problem.

38

i've got something else for you try first, and again it's something i've ran on my own memory card with no issues. i've been deleting the partition from my 1gb sd card to test my suggestions with "unallocated space".

just to confirm, i wouldn't ask you to try anything that i haven't first ran on my own stuff without issue. and i've just realised that the bookmarks for this utility are on my laptop, and i'm on my desktop at the moment.

i'll get back to you.

ok thanks :)

39

I'll mention first that you do have, and have always had, the option of going down the road mentioned by Keatah in post #34 above ...

http://forum.pirifor...ndpost&p=221376

You may have already considered that option.

----------------------------

I think this is possibly my last shot at this help890, as I'm just about out of fresh ideas (fresh out of ideas as well), although I do have a a little hope with this one.

Before I link to the software, a program called "RMPrepUSB", a little explanation of the testing I've done before posting it for you, and all done as before with my SD card plugged directly into the card reader, to mirror your situation. As opposed to using my USB adapter, which I always use for accessing and transferring files from my SD cards.

Preparation:

I took my 1GB SD card and erased all the contents with "Eraser 5.7".

With CCleaner I also carried out a "Drive Wipe" with a one pass secure delete.

I then carried out a full format of the card.

And finally deleted the partition and created a new one with Windows Disk Management.

This was to try and ensure that the card was devoid of any other files to recover before doing my tests.

Testing:

The purpose of this test was to ascertain as to whether deleting a partition containing files, thus creating "unallocated space", and then creating a new partition with RMPrepUSB would wipe all traces of the files possibly remaining in the "unallocated space".

I did this to replicate the 30mb of unallocated space showing on your card, just in case the photographs you want are by chance on that section of your drive.

1st: Copied 37 jpgs onto the card, and verified their integrity.

2nd: Used Mintools Partition Wizard 7.5 to delete the partition, leaving me with a "raw" drive containing "unallocated space". (again, as per your 30mb)

3rd: Created a new partition with RMPrepUSB

4th: Used Windows Disk management to assign a drive letter.

5th: Scanned the card with "PhotoRec".

Result:

All 37 jpgs were recovered intact by PhotoRec. I tested all of them.

Creating a new partition with RMPrepUSB does not delete any jpg files still residing in the "unallocated space" after the partition and file system has been lost.

So following my suggestions below will not lose any jpg files which may still be on that recognized 30mb section of your drive.

-------------------------------------

Download "RMPrepUSB Portable" from here ...

http://www.rmprepusb...nts/release-2-0 (Scroll halfway down the page and select the 3rd of the first 3 download options)

Extract from the zip to a folder because the zip contains multiple files.

To run it double click the "RMPREPUSB.exe" file, and set it up as shown here ...

The reason I'm using this tool is because there isn't anything I've seen or tried which will do anything other than create a partition on the recognized 30mb of your card.

With the different options available here, there's an outside chance that the full size of your drive may be picked up, and if that doesn't happen with the "Max" size option set, there's the alternative option of setting a larger number in that box to more reflect the size of your card.

That may do absolutely nothing other than recognize the 30mb, but as I've nothing to test that with, I have no idea.

At least I know that the first time you use this, it will create a partition which doesn't delete any files which may be residing within the "unallocated space", which you can then scan with PhotoRec. I tried Recuva and other recovery tools, but only PhotoRec found them.

Run it as shown, and if it just creates a partition on the 30mb, then scan that new partition for files.

Here's some screenshots of my recovery with PhotoRec, which I'll show for the benefit of others ...

Select Drive and Proceed:

Search:

Choose File System (Other - Fat etc):

Press "c" without changes to save in TestDisk "Program Files" folder (This is where PhotoRec resides and is less complicated than changing the "save" directory.)

Recovery process:

Any files will be in a directory called "recup_dir.1" in the TestDisk "Program Files" folder

----------------------------------------

Short of finding another software which will find or restore your missing space the only option left that I know of is to re-program the controller chip of your card providing it isn't damaged.

This will involve using a utility called "ChipGenius", which will scan your card and list what's called the "VID" and "PID" numbers along with the "Chip Part-Number" ...

You would then need to find the programming software dedicated to that "part-number".

Just in case you want to go down that road, the info is here ...

http://www.rmprepusb...usb-flash-drive

If it was my card, and was now a useless 30mb, I would have a look at this option, carefully, but would probably sling the card and call it a day. The option exists which is why I mention it.

Some folk out there may enjoy experimenting.

Good luck, and just ask if you need any info or clarification and I'll help if I can.

40

Thanks for all this info! Really glad to have some help with this!

I am just trying to use the RMPrepUSB Portable tool... I have selected everything that you have shown but I get the following error. Do I need to try again, selecting FAT16 instead? Even though the actual card is 4GB?

post-63634-0-34384600-1349338576_thumb.jpg