The phone writes an empty sd memory card. Why the phone does not see the sd memory card or usb flash drive. What to do? Wrong SD format
Support for external memory cards for many Android users is an important criterion when choosing a new device. Fortunately, most of them still support this option. However, failures can also occur here - for example, a message about damage to the SD card. Today you will learn why this error occurs and how to deal with it.
The message "SD card not working" or "Empty SD card: formatting required" may appear in such cases:
Reason 1: Random single failure
Alas, the nature of Android is such that it is impossible to test its operation on absolutely all devices, therefore, errors and failures occur. Perhaps you moved applications to a USB flash drive, for some reason it crashed, and as a result, the OS did not detect external media. In fact, there can be many such reasons, but almost all random failures are fixed by rebooting the device.
Reason 2: Poor contact between slot and memory card
A portable device such as a phone or tablet is subject to stress during operation, even when in a pocket or bag. As a result, movable elements, which include the memory card, can move in their grooves. Therefore, if you encounter an error about a damaged flash drive that cannot be corrected by a reboot, you should remove the card from the device and inspect it; it is also possible that the contacts are contaminated with dust, which in any case penetrates into the device. Contacts, by the way, can be wiped with alcohol wipes.
If the contacts on the memory card itself are visually clean, you can just wait a while and insert it again - perhaps the device or the flash drive itself has simply warmed up. After a while, put the SD card back in and make sure it's fully seated (but don't overdo it!). If the problem was in bad contact, after these manipulations, it will disappear. If the problem persists, read on.
Reason 3: The presence of bad sectors in the map file table
The problem most often faced by fans of connecting the device to a PC and instead of safely removing it, simply pull out the cord. However, no one is immune from this: this can cause an OS crash (for example, shutdowns when the battery is low or an emergency reboot) or even a banal file transfer (copy or Ctrl + X) using the phone itself. The owners of cards with the FAT32 file system are also at risk.
As a rule, a message about an erroneous recognition of an SD card is preceded by other unpleasant symptoms: files from such a flash drive are read with errors, files disappear altogether, or such digital ghosts appear. Naturally, neither a reboot nor an attempt to pull out and insert a USB flash drive will fix the cause of this behavior. In such a situation, you should act like this:
Reason 4: Physical damage to the card
The worst case scenario - the flash drive was damaged mechanically or in contact with water, fire. In this case, we are powerless - most likely, data from such a card cannot be recovered, and you have no choice but to throw away the old SD card and purchase a new one.
The error, accompanied by a message about the damage to the memory card, is one of the most annoying that can happen to users of devices under Android. Fortunately, in most cases this is just a single failure.
From time to time, an error may occur on users' SD cards, in which the camera starts to display messages about what is on it. not left free space , although the photographer certainly knows that it is empty. If you have this exact situation, then you have come to the right place and our article will help you fix the drive problem.
Let's look at a couple of examples from user stories to learn more about the topic.
Case one.
The user deleted some images from the SD card on the laptop and when he installed it back into the Sony Alpha camera, she informed him that the drive could not be used due to being full. However, when you try to view the content, the device does not show images.
Second case.
A user with the same camera had a similar situation, but in reverse order. First, the error appeared on the camera, and only then, when trying to connect the card to the computer, operating system was unable to open the contents of the drive.
If your camera's SD card suddenly encounters a full problem, you might be interested in knowing the possible causes.
- 1) The media has invisible or hidden files, so the SD card appears full, even though there is nothing on it at first glance.
- 2) Formatting error. You may have removed the card at the wrong time, causing a file system crash.
- 3) There is a problem with the camera.
Solution one. Showing and exporting hidden files
Step 1. Export and Restore Hidden Files from SD Card
The first thing to remember in this situation is that you should not panic if you lose access to information stored on the drive. Unfortunately, in the standard list of software Windows software there are no utilities capable of recovering files, so you will have to resort to specialized third-party software.
Starus Photo Recovery will become good choice both for beginners and professional photographers. The application allows the user to forget about the risks of losing important images from weddings and other important events due to a failure on the SD card.
1. Connect the card to the computer. Launch the Starus Photo Recovery file recovery program and select the drive you want to scan from the list provided.
2. Select the type of analysis according to your needs. Quick scan allows you to conduct a lightning-fast assessment of the drive, finding all the latest files on it. Complete Analysis will help you perform a deep scan of the SD card and find even the oldest files that you may have already forgotten about.
3. Optionally, you can specify additional search parameters, thereby excluding unwanted or unnecessary files from the list.
4. Wait for the scanning process to complete and carefully examine the results. In the presented list of files, you can find the images you need to restore with the ability to preview in the window on the right. In addition to the photo itself, Starus Photo Recovery provides the user with the ability to see the date the file was created, the format and its resolution in pixels.
5. Once you have decided on the images you want to restore, select the ones you need and click Further(by default, all found files are selected). Choose the most convenient method from the four suggested and complete the data export process.
Step 2. Show hidden files on the SD card.
1. Open up start menu and enter in the dialog box Control Panel or open it in the right menu.
2. switch parameter View into mode Category and open the menu Decoration and personalization.
3. Open up Folders settings.
4. In the window that appears, open the tab View, scroll down the list of options and select active Show hidden files, folders and drives.
5. Click on Apply and OK to save your changes.
Solution two. Format the SD card correctly
1. Connect your SD card to your computer.
2. Open My Computer and find the damaged drive in the list on the left.
3. Click on the name right click mouse and select Format.
4. Select the NTFS file system and start the formatting process.
We recommend checking out all possible ways recovering SD cards and flash drives in the article How to repair a damaged flash drive or SD card
Reading time: 3 minutes
What to do if Android does not see the microSD flash drive? This question often worries owners of smartphones and other gadgets, regardless of manufacturer and cost. The problems of obtaining data from the DVR, installing software on a tablet or smartphone can be solved independently if you know the main causes of the malfunction and how to solve them.
How the problem manifests itself
The malfunction manifests itself as follows: after replacing the micro-SD card, after rebooting, flashing or simply turning on the device, the gadget does not see the flash drive or its contents. As a result, data or installed software is lost, the camera and programs begin to write information to internal memory devices. The latter quickly clogs up, there is no place left for recording service information of the OS, and the gadget loses performance and starts to freeze.
As a result, if the internal memory is low, it becomes impossible to work without a memory card.
To fix the problem, you need to establish the causes of the breakdown. Very often it turns out to eliminate the defect with one's own hand, without going to the workshop.
The phone does not see the flash drive due to formatting problems
The partition table can be damaged in any file system (NTFS, ExFat, Fat32). As a result, Android cannot read files written to SD. Most often this happens when the user tries to format the memory card himself and performs incorrect actions. Another option is a card with a different file system is inserted, for example, from a camera. You can restore the card's performance by formatting it again. This can be done either by the phone itself or by another Android device, or by using a computer with a card reader.
The menu of some phones allows you to format the SD card by selecting the appropriate item in the settings. If it is not there, you can reboot the phone, enter the “Recovery” mode and format the file system of the card by selecting the “Wipe cache partition” item.
Important: errors when working with the device in the “Recovery” mode can lead to the loss of all data and even the inoperability of the OS. Therefore, inexperienced users should not adopt this method.
It is easier and safer to format flash drives on a computer. To do this, you need a card reader and a formatting program (standard, built into the OS, or any other). It is necessary to remove the flash drive from the device, insert it into the card reader and format it in exFAT or FAT32 format. After formatting, Android should start to “see” the flash drive. If this does not happen, the problem is more serious.
Memory card is out of order
Flash memory has a limited number of read-write cycles. In addition, the device may be damaged due to microcracks in the board or under the influence of static voltage. In this case, after installation in the card reader, the computer does not detect the flash drive. It is also unreadable on other devices.
It is impossible to recover a damaged memory card or the data on it. This cannot be done either from the Android device itself, or by connecting it to a computer as a USB flash drive, or from a computer via a card reader. It remains only to purchase a new flash card that is compatible with your device.
Important: sometimes, due to a malfunction of the board, phones and tablets can “burn” memory cards. Therefore, if after a short time after replacing the flash drive it fails again, it is necessary to diagnose the android device.
Memory card and android devices are incompatible
A smartphone or tablet may not see a flash card if it is simply not designed to work with modern storage media. When there is a suspicion that the card does not correspond to a tablet or phone, then it is worth trying to read it on a computer with a memory card adapter. If the gadget does not see the card, but the computer sees it, the reason is incompatibility.
All gadgets have limitations on the maximum memory card size: 16 GB, 32 GB, 64 GB, 128 GB. This happens if, for example, you bought a 64 GB card, and the limitations of a smartphone (tablet) are 32 GB.
Another option is that the flash drive is made according to a technical specification unknown to your device. In this case, the gadget does not recognize it. Therefore, before buying a memory card, you need to study the documentation of your tablet or phone in order to buy an SD card of the appropriate size and type.
In addition to incompatibility, the device may be damaged or software failure. In this case, the computer will also see the flash card, but the phone (tablet) will not.
Software error
In this case, the gadget either does not see the memory card at all, or certain programs do not see it. If you know that the card is empty, although it shows that the place is occupied, the problem is in the settings or performance of the OS and software of the phone (tablet). If the android does not see the SD card in applications, but sees it in recovery, try looking at the settings first. Perhaps for applications, the save path is set not to the card, but to the internal memory. Fix it.
Another solution when only one application does not see the map is to reinstall or update it, and also check it own settings.
Important: often the phone's OS starts to see the inserted card only after a reboot. If the flash card is not visible without a reboot, and then it works fine, nothing else should be done.
When the above does not help, it is worth trying to update the tablet (phone) firmware. Often after flashing the OS for more new version the device starts working correctly with the SD card.
Damaged SD card slot
If the smartphone does not see a flash drive installed from another smartphone, while it meets the technical requirements of the device, the problem is in the smartphone itself. In this case, you can try to insert the card so that the contacts in the phone fit snugly into its tracks. To do this, you should try to clean and bend them a little. If it's not about contacts, but about damage to the controller or card slot, it remains to send the gadget for repair or replace it with a new one.
For example, the HTC srochnyi-remont.ru workshop repairs all models of this manufacturer, as well as other brands. Search in your city service center for your phone.
Good day everyone!
Today, the popularity of SD flash drives, I think, is not inferior to USB flash drives. Judge for yourself: phones, tablets, cameras, cameras - SD flash drives (sometimes called SD cards) are used everywhere!
In general, I must admit that SD cards are quite "capricious" devices, and it is not uncommon that the computer does not recognize or see it. In these cases, usually, we immediately remember that there are important photos, files, data on the flash drive - which simply need to be 100% returned and restored! ☝
In this article, I will give the most common reasons for the invisibility of an SD card by a computer (laptop), as well as recommendations for their elimination. I hope my humble advice will be useful to someone.
Many users confuse one point (although it is not a key one, it will help in solving the problem). I will show it on the example of one user question.
I took the card from my phone (microSD) and inserted it into my new device, but he offered to format it.
Then I brought it back to old phone, but he also wanted to format it. My laptop also does not see this card and offers to format it. What to do? Help to recover data from a flash drive.
Illustrative case. The laptop sees your flash drive, and even offers to format it - i.e. he does not understand that there is data on it, cannot recognize your flash drive, cannot read the file system (in this case file system marked as RAW).
This often happens due to:
- file system failure on a flash drive;
- Windows cannot read an unfamiliar file system (for example, it often happens with disks connected to a TV - it can reformat them into its own file system, and then Windows does not see it).
by the way, many people make one mistake when connecting the microSD to the computer: when inserting the card into the adapter, they do not push it all the way (see photo-1 below). As a result, the PC simply does not see anything when the SD adapter is connected.
Checking a flash drive: fixing file system errors
In this case, you can try to restore the flash drive and all the files on it using the error checking and repair utility - chkdsk (built into Windows).
To do this, do not agree with the Windows suggestion to format the media (screenshot above), but simply 👉 (Easiest way: press Win+R, then type CMD and press Enter, see screenshot below).
Check disk / flash drive
An example of recovery is shown in the screenshot above. After such a simple procedure, the flash drive returned to its working state and functions normally to this day. 👌
When the check succeeds, usually command line reports something like: "Windows checked the file system and found no problems. Next steps not required".
As a rule, if there was a small file system failure, then chkdsk it will be eliminated and the flash drive will become readable (after this procedure, it will be able to read both the phone and the laptop).
Now what if chkdsk did not help, but you need to restore files from a flash drive... 👇
Restoring files from a flash drive
If after trying to fix Windows errors still intends to format it (i.e. the OS sees it, but does not recognize it) - then first of all, I will recommend that you restore files from it (unless, of course, you need them).
After you format the USB flash drive, it will be more difficult to recover data from it (and if you write new files, it will be impossible at all!).
There is a data recovery special programs. Some free and popular ones, I will give in the table below.
3 free programs for data recovery
| Recuva On the official site |
R.saver On the official site
|
Pandora Recovery On the official site |
Advantages:
|
Advantages:
|
Advantages:
|
In principle, you can use any of the recovery utilities. More simple for beginners is Recuva, which has a wizard in its arsenal that walks the entire procedure step by step from A to Z.
The screenshot below shows my scanned HDD v Recuva in order to search for old deleted pictures, photos. Many of the deleted files were found and restored (the green circle next to the file is good sign, then the program highly appreciates the possibility of recovery).
An important point: when restoring files - restore them to another medium! ☝ I.e. if you want to recover a file from a flash drive, save it to your hard drive (if you save to the same flash drive that was scanned in the program, then the recovered file will overwrite other unrecovered data). Such is the tautology...
In general, the recovery procedure requires another rather voluminous article (to dot all the 👀).
Formatting a flash drive
Option number 1
If you don’t need data on flash drives or you have already restored them, and Windows still continues to ask you to format the media (that is, a microSD card) - just agree ...
Option number 2
You can also format the flash drive by going to "My computer" / "This computer" (screen above) :
- First click on SD card right mouse button and in context menu select " Format";
- Next, select a file system (I recommend starting from what file system is supported by the device in which it worked / will work. As a rule: FAT 32, exFat);
- Click the button "To begin"(Windows will ask you if you really want to format the media - agree...) ;
- If everything went smoothly, you will see a message that formatting is complete. (each step is shown in the screenshot below).
Option number 3
If in " " your flash drive is not visible, or Windows cannot format the media - you must use special. utilities for working with such flash drives.
How to format SD card in HDD Low Level Format Tool:
Letter conflict: drive letter change
In general, when you connect a drive (including a flash drive), Windows automatically assigns a letter to this drive (for example, F :).
But there is such a "glitch" that the letter is assigned incorrectly: for example, the one that is already in the system - as a result: a conflict occurs and your flash drive is invisible! 👀
Therefore, in case of invisibility of the flash drive, the first thing I recommend to do is go to " ": look up the drive letter, change it (it is possible to format the media).
1) To do this, first press the buttons Win+R , to a line "Open" enter the command diskmgmt.msc and press Enter.
2) Next, find in the list that disk (microSD card) that is not displayed (not visible) for you. Right click on it (sign-1 on the screen below) and from the context menu select "Change Drive Letter or Drive Path" .
1) If the required flash drive is not in the list in "Disk Management", go to the next subsection of this article.
2) If the file system is marked as RAW, the flash drive must be formatted (more on this at the beginning of this article).
Change drive letter
3) In the next step, press the button "Change"(number-1 on the screen below), then set the slider to "Assign drive letter (A-Z)" and choose some unique letter (the one that is not in the system).
Agree with the changes made. Sometimes, you may need to restart your computer (laptop).
If the problem was related to an incorrectly specified drive letter, the flash drive will become visible and will work in normal mode...
Classes and formats of SD cards
SD-card SD-card is different - they differ not only in volume and manufacturer, but also in size, class (working speed), generation. All this, of course, can affect the visibility of the SD-stick in the card reader...
SD card sizes
There are three form factors of SD cards: SD, miniSD, MicroSD (differ in size). Cards are used in a variety of portable devices: phones, cameras, camcorders, tablets, etc.
The most widely used microSD cards (due to their compact size, they can even be inserted into a miniature phone or MP3 player).
To connect a microSD card to a laptop or computer, it always comes with a small adapter (see photo below).
Typical information on the SD card
Manufacturer : no comments here. The only point is when you buy an SD card for yourself, I recommend choosing well-known manufacturers: SanDisk, Transcend, Sony, etc.
SD card type
| SD card type | Description |
|---|---|
| Card size: from 128MB to 2GB; Initial file system: FAT16; |
|
SD High Capacity |
SDHC card capacity: 4GB to 32GB; Initial file system: FAT32; Since SDHC operates on a different principle than standard SD cards, the new format does not backward compatibility with SD card readers. Note: Card readers released after 2009. must support the SDHC format. |
SD Extended Capacity |
SDXC capacities from 64 GB to 2 TB (or ~2000 GB); Initial file system: exFAT; Card readers on laptops before 2009 do not support SDXC cards. SDXC cards will work in SDHC compatible (non-SD) readers if the computer's operating system supports exFAT (Windows 7, 8, 10). |
 Ultra High Speed |
UHS is an addition to the original SD specification interfaces. When the card and card reader support UHS - will be achieved maximum speed(up to 50MB/s - UHS-50; 104MB/s - UHS-104). Otherwise, the card reader and card will use the slower, maximum available SD speed. There is no compatibility issue for UHS cards with non-UHS devices. |
Important! Compatibility table for card readers and SD card types
In principle, each card reader (on the package with it) indicates which cards it supports. Naturally, if you insert a newer card, he simply will not see it, and you will not be able to read it. The table below will show you the compatibility of card readers and SD card types.
| Card reader, phone, camera, etc. | Supported memory cards |
|---|---|
| SDXC
|
|
| SDHC | |
| SD |
Card class (speed)
Usually, SD cards do not indicate the speed of work (in MB / s, although sometimes they indicate it), but the class of the card. Using the tables below, you can find out what speed your card will support.
👉 Important
The higher the speed, the more expensive the card. Some devices require a specific card class (for example, to the camera, otherwise the video recording will go with brakes, or not at all)- so be careful with this moment!
Speed class
UHS speed class
| UHS Class | Minimum Speed |
|---|---|
| 1 | 10MB/s |
| 3 | 30MB/s |
Capacity, card size
The bigger, the better. True, try to proceed from real needs: if you need to store a dozen or two photos, then maybe it makes no sense to overpay and take a high-capacity card?
Lack of drivers
It is possible that your flash drive is not displayed due to the fact that the drivers for the card reader are not installed.
In this case, the card reader itself does not work, which means that it will not read the SD card either. Usually, while the flash drive is not visible in "Disk Management" , and in " Device Manager" - there will be a question mark next to the device (means there are no drivers).
There is no driver (that's why the flash drive is not displayed ...) - device manager
How to enter device manager
- Through the control panel (Windows 7, 8, 10);
- Call menu "Run", for this press Win+R and enter devmgmt.msc, press OK.
Look at the tab in Device Manager "USB controllers" it should have something like "Realtek USB 2.0 Card Reader" (see screenshot below 👇). Opposite the device, no question marks or red icons should be lit.
If you do not have a device (card reader) in the lists, and there are unknown devices with question marks (example - ) - most likely you simply do not have a driver.
There are several exits:
PS
A few more tips:
I am finishing the article on this.
Setting up Russian keyboard layout on iphone 5s
What is the screen resolution of the iPhone What is the screen on the iphone 6
How to write to technical support here