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Author Topic: Camera CF card failed  (Read 3762 times)

Offline jcarter

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Camera CF card failed
« on: July 09, 2010, 02:47:55 PM »
Just before we came home, I turned on the Nikon camera to take a few more pix, and got these 3 error messages,

Warning this CF card cannot be read
No images on card,
Card is not formatted.

Now we are at home I put it into the Mac and its corrupted, I got a bunch of nothing.

Is there a company or somebody who can recover these pictures for me from the card? Its a Lexar 256 MB and its about 3 years old, always worked perfectly.
This is really really sad, as the grandkids were with us in Maine and there are some great pictures on that card, well maybe not now.
Thanks in advance,
Jane

Yes, cardrescue dot com, but it costs $40, oh well, its worth it to get those pix back. Im looking at their previews now, they are all there.  Here goes,,,,,,
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Offline jcarter

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #1 on: July 09, 2010, 03:04:48 PM »
Yes, it worked!  Ive got most of the pictures.  But some are truncated. Tried opening them in Photoshop, Preview and more, but some are just plain cut in half and some are sort of like small boxes.
In Cardrescue's info, this does happen and I think its because my card is very old.      Is 3 years considered an old card?  I guess I should buy a new one?
Anyway, I hope this info helps other people who have this problem.
It was worth the 40 bucks to get those vacation pix back.
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Offline Paddy

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #2 on: July 09, 2010, 10:21:13 PM »
Jane, sorry to hear that this happened to you. The age of the card is not the factor - it's the number of times you've used it and erased it that generally matters. From what I've read, most cards are good for at least 1000 uses. You should have a warranty still - if you kept the bill. (Most cards come with at least a 5 year warranty)

Now...a few words of advice. ALWAYS have more than one card. ALWAYS. Cards are cheap these days. Get 2 to 4GB ones - not the big ones that will tempt you to put all your pics on one card (unless you have a 16MP camera or something, in which case the bigger cards become a necessity) On a trip or any other special occasion that cannot be repeated, use at least 2 cards - alternate their use each day or over the course of the day. That lessens the possibility of a complete loss of all photos considerably. And offload your pictures every day to at least two sources if you can; I use my laptop and a portable hard drive/card reader. You could also copy your pics to a DVD.
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Offline kimmer

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #3 on: July 09, 2010, 10:32:54 PM »
Jane, I'm glad you recovered most of your pics. What a sad.gif ending to your trip.

Fear of losing vacation pics was one of the biggest reasons we bought a laptop. We download each day, and we back them up to thumb drives.
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Offline Highmac

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #4 on: July 10, 2010, 03:33:00 AM »
So a happy-ish ending.... smile.gif

A few years ago, during a holiday in Spain, I found an internet cafe, run by Brits, where I could burn pictures from the card to a CD (smaller pictures back then!) ready to bring home. Just bought a blank disk and rented the PC for an hour. But they had to show me how to burn a disk on a PC..... rolleyes.gif

Didn't take long and I was able to log on to TS while it was burning. From memory the whole thing cost me about 1.50 GBP -  less than $2 US back then.
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Offline jcarter

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #5 on: July 10, 2010, 05:43:48 AM »
I think that this card has been erased at least 1000 times, I download it to one of our Macs every time I get a chance, sometimes daily.
Thats most likely the problem, seeing that some of the recovered photos were truncated.

We always take 3 cameras with us, (and the iPhone), so hopefully we divide the trip up amongst many CF cards.

Having a Macbook would be a great thing to have, but the last time I had one, all I used it for was to download pictures, and ended up giving/sending it to Kelly here at TS.

I am going to buy another card, as my old ones are tiny.

Thank you for this advice, as I will buy another card right away!
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Offline Xairbusdriver

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #6 on: July 10, 2010, 04:23:20 PM »
Apparently, this write/erase action is also a potential problem in flash-based SSD memory. Some manufacturers go to the trouble of monitoring the usage of the cells and randomly assigns bytes to cells that have not been used as much. The intent is to level out all cells usages and extend the MTBF of any one cell.
« Last Edit: July 10, 2010, 04:26:37 PM by Xairbusdriver »
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Offline jcarter

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #7 on: July 10, 2010, 04:42:38 PM »
Yes, this is a learning process for me, and it was interesting to notice that several of the truncated pix had a partial 'wipe', like a written page where somebody had stopped writing.
I can post a screen shot of that, but I think that its where the camera stopped 'writing' to the card, or more like where the card stopped accepting the signal.
My terminology is not correct, but it looks like this.
Jane
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Offline Xairbusdriver

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #8 on: July 10, 2010, 05:32:52 PM »
Your terminology sounds perfect to me. The problem was in the card, not the camera. wink.gif And the camera even was telling you that's where the problem was. thumbup.gif Now, a really advanced camera would have ejected the bad card, crimping it slightly to avoid any mistaken use in the future, and grabbed a good one from your camera bag... eek2.gif
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Those that use metric = #1 Measurement system
And the United States = The Banana system
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Offline jcarter

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #9 on: July 10, 2010, 08:47:21 PM »
Soon as we get to town, which we avoid in summer, we will get a new one(my old ones are tiny).
Or to order one on-line.
Though we have many other cameras which use different size ones.

I LOVE the iPhone!  And am astonished at the quality of the photos from it.  (Just learning about FUN apps)
Thanks,
Jane
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Offline Paddy

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #10 on: July 11, 2010, 06:43:42 AM »
Jane, as I said before...order TWO...not one. And get them online - unless one of the big box stores is having a sale, they'll be far cheaper from Amazon etc.

You can get some idea of performance (and weigh that against price) from Rob Galbraith's excellent database:

http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/multi_page.asp?cid=6007

I generally buy cards in the lower half of his lists - I don't have the multiple shot needs that sports photogs have etc.
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Offline jcarter

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #11 on: July 11, 2010, 07:13:00 AM »
Thank you!
This is just the perfect info, I will order them today.
Weve been so busy in this hot weather and using the other cameras, that I forgot.
Glad I did forget, as its better online than our local photo store.
Its an old Nikon, so thanks to your link, I can pick out the proper card for it.
Jane
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Offline jcarter

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #12 on: July 11, 2010, 07:38:57 AM »
This camera is a Nikon Coolpix 4300, my card is an older Lexar 256MB card, 24X speed. Seems the new ones are HUGE, but I download frequently, so I should look for a smaller capacity card, but the speed is nice, as my old card is rather slow. I need to read some more about this, as the card has to be compatible with the old camera I would think.  So many to choose from!  Need to find a compatibility chart, to see what is recommended for this older camera.
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Online jchuzi

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #13 on: July 11, 2010, 08:53:26 AM »
Look at the links in this Google search page. If you can't find the answer there, phone Nikon tech support or email them via Nikon's website. Contact information for phone service can be found here.
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Offline jcarter

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Camera CF card failed
« Reply #14 on: July 11, 2010, 10:33:04 AM »
Thats good!  I saw the 2005 questions about the cards, but also found that the newer ones 'might' work in the older cameras.
I will give Nikon a call.
I have bought things in the past from Abes of Maine, and can call them when their business hours resume too.
Thank you all for this info!
Its a great little camera, though not many mpixels, it does the job, and Im not afraid of taking it to the beach.
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