MicroSD - cannot access or format

eezarthegreat

Hey all,

I have a 16GB MicroSD and after some tinkering around, I've mucked it up. I haven't encountered this error in a while (I\O error), so I'm wondering if someone can help.

When I connect it, it appears listed as the "G" drive, but I can't access/format it. Whenever I try access it, it says "please insert (etc)", and when I try to format it, it says "Windows cannot format (etc)".

When I enter the disk management, it's listed, but grey and caps the drive as a "unallocated".

Here's what I've tried:

1. Windows formatting (won't work)
2. Checkdisk/format through CMD (won't work)
3. HDformatUSB (won't work)
4. SDFMT3 (won't work)
5. Safe mode format (won't work)
6. Renaming drive and format (won''t work)
7. Format via portable tablet (won't work)

Any suggestions or help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
e

yoyo

It could be the Memory card has gone faulty, is it a branded one? Where did you get it? Fake poor quality memory cards are doing the rounds on auction sites quite a bit the last few years, if you got this error message after starting to receive i/o errors then I would imagine the Flash memory on the device is gone faulty, although not really an expert with these things

Nick

Skerries

similar to you where I bought a 32gb off Amazon for my tablet for xmas and it stopped working yesterday and wanted to be formatted but it wouldn't so tried CMD and gparted and in several other pc's but no joy
Had to send it back to them today

eezarthegreat

yoyo wrote: »

It could be the Memory card has gone faulty, is it a branded one? Where did you get it? Fake poor quality memory cards are doing the rounds on auction sites quite a bit the last few years, if you got this error message after starting to receive i/o errors then I would imagine the Flash memory on the device is gone faulty, although not really an expert with these things

Nick

Hi Nick, it's an official Sandisk, but thanks for the input

eezarthegreat

Skerries wrote: »

similar to you where I bought a 32gb off Amazon for my tablet for xmas and it stopped working yesterday and wanted to be formatted but it wouldn't so tried CMD and gparted and in several other pc's but no joy
Had to send it back to them today

Hmmm, that could be an option. I've had this card about 2 months now though. Ideally I'd love to sort it without sending it back

yoyo

eezarthegreat wrote: »

Hmmm, that could be an option. I've had this card about 2 months now though. Ideally I'd love to sort it without sending it back

Where did you buy it? Lots of fake Sandisk memory doing the rounds. If it was on an auction site it could be a fake memory card, see here for more info, fake memory can look exactly like the original.

Nick

Skerries

mine was a Sandisk as well but I did buy it off Amazon direct and has been working for a week

yoyo

Skerries wrote: »

mine was a Sandisk as well but I did buy it off Amazon direct and has been working for a week

Was it off Amazon or a seller on Amazon? It could well be a fake if it was baught from Amazon Marketplace, of course it could have also just been a dud. Would recommend getting Flash memory from the likes of memoryc.ie, mymemory.co.uk, 7dayshop etc. personally. Just too much of a gamble otherwise, and then there is the data loss dodgy flash can cause

Nick

areyawell

Right click the MicroSD and click explore. I know this sounds stupid but same thing happened me and could access it that way for some reason and no other way. It was a windows problem. Try it on another computer as well before sending it back.

If the above fails Download a program called Easeus Partition Master Home Edition and see if you can access and format the microSD that way.

If not its fe****!

eezarthegreat

yoyo wrote: »

Where did you buy it? Lots of fake Sandisk memory doing the rounds. If it was on an auction site it could be a fake memory card, see here for more info, fake memory can look exactly like the original.

Nick

Bought it on play!

eezarthegreat

areyawell wrote: »

Right click the MicroSD and click explore. I know this sounds stupid but same thing happened me and could access it that way for some reason and no other way. It was a windows problem. Try it on another computer as well before sending it back.

If the above fails Download a program called Easeus Partition Master Home Edition and see if you can access and format the microSD that way.

If not its fe****!

Explore doesn't show as the device doesn't appear to be "registered" if you get me? Even though the light pops on the microsd reader and all.

Might try that program, thanks for that

riclad

http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec try this,or gparted live cd,
http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php
if gparted cant, see it its probably not working,or acessible,
try it in another pc,try using a sdcard reader plugs into usb, 2euro deallz shop near arnotts, henry street dublin 1.
try putting a 1gig sdcard into your pc, its possible a virus on your pc can delete files ,stop you acessing sdcard slot.
The light flashes just means its detected ,a card.does it work in your phone.?
i have a 16gig card,it worked fine, now i just get do you wish to format this card when i put it in.

whizbang

I'll bet your running Win7.

Try it on an XP machine, but chances are it needs formatting after Win7 got its claws into it.

eezarthegreat

riclad wrote: »

http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec try this,or gparted live cd,
http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php
if gparted cant, see it its probably not working,or acessible,
try it in another pc,try using a sdcard reader plugs into usb, 2euro deallz shop near arnotts, henry street dublin 1.
try putting a 1gig sdcard into your pc, its possible a virus on your pc can delete files ,stop you acessing sdcard slot.
The light flashes just means its detected ,a card.does it work in your phone.?
i have a 16gig card,it worked fine, now i just get do you wish to format this card when i put it in.

Will try gparted - thanks for that

eezarthegreat

whizbang wrote: »

I'll bet your running Win7.

Try it on an XP machine, but chances are it needs formatting after Win7 got its claws into it.

Yep, W7 - it's ridiculous really

eezarthegreat

Update:

I'm using EaseUS partition tool and it seems to be able to read the device. It's running a surface scan and there's errors in there. I'll see how this goes.

Thanks again for the replies

yoyo

Windows 7 shouldn't have any issues with flash memory, if the disk is showing errors then it is faulty, it has been reported play.com have inadvertently sold fake flash cards before (here) so it could possibly still be a fake

Nick