Problems with San Disk Compact Flash Card

[Darth Vader]

Hi,

first apologies if this subject has already been raised but a after a quick search of all the forums I didn't find this particular problem.

I have a Casio QV-3500EX and have been using a San Disk 128MB Compact Flash Card without any problem until now. :)

Cutting a long story short the camera will not fire up with the CF card installed :eek: . I have inserted the CF card into my iPAQ pocket PC and it can be read without problem. I have also backed up the the CF card to my PC using active sync and all the shots are there and displayable :D .

To check the camera I also have an IBM 4GB micro drive. When this micro drive is put into the camera it fires up and tells me that I have a new unformatted CF card which is exactly correct.

So I am of the opinion that either a) there is some minor corruption on the CF card not noticable on the PCs but which screws up the Casio or b) there may be a strange fault with the camera.

I don't want to format the micro drive as it is needed else where in my laptop and iPAQ to backup important files whilst I am on the move and I don't want to take the risk of losing data.

Has anyone else had this sort of problem and if so did they manage to resolve it ie. get the card working again in the camera. I know I could just go out and buy a new CF card but I am uneasy that this might happen again and would feel happier knowing what was causing this and how to resolve this problem.

Many thanks in advance for your help.

DV

May the sauce be on all your chips (fries)............

[Manstein]

In what device did your 128 card have its last format?

[Darth Vader]

Hi,

the SanDisk card has only ever been formatted once and that was within the camera.

I have since routed out the original 8MB card that came with the camera and this still works. So the problem seems to be with the SanDisk.

I am aware of the pitfalls with writing to FAT file systems as the 'standard' is far from 'standard'. Most Pocket PCs and cameras are based on the simpler DOS FAT whereas OS like Windoze 2000 think they know better and 'improve' your FAT. So what was once FAT16 becomes FAT16+!

Also don't even 'view' a flash card on a read/writer as even a simple rotate might get the card rewritten!

It has to be something quite minor on the card as the Pocket PC 2003 can read it O.K. but causes the Casio to hang during power up :eek: .

Cheers,

DV

[Darth Vader]

Poatscript;- Death-of-a-CF-Card

My SanDisk card had only reached 51% capacity when it finally died.

I downloaded 'storage tools' which I have seen recommended on some of theses sites. It too failed at just half way through the card when either scanning or in repair mode. Storage Tools could not recover the errors posted as a lost cluster and invalid file so after several attempts I decided to format the CF card. Good 'ol storage tools then crashes at half way rendering the card useless. Before I could still add and delete files up to the magic 51% but now the card won't even format!

One thing for sure I will never buy SanDisk again and become another marter to the cause.

Cheers,

DV

[Manstein]

I rather think your card is defunct in the mechanical sense as well as from a software point of view. I use a lot of Sandisk cards with no problems the only ones to die on me have been a couple of 'Integral' brand.