dacs.doc electric

Awhile ago, I was doing digital photography for some eBay auctions and moved the SmartMedia card from my camera (an Olympus) to a USB reader attached to my server (Windows 2003 Small Business Server). The files moved across to where I wanted them on the server, and I then erased the contents of the memory card using Windows Explorer, as I usually do. I then put the SmartMedia card back into the camera, and it immediately displayed “Card Error!” on the camera’s LCD panel.
I put the card back in the PC, and things looked just fine—The DCIM folder was there, and I was able to move files to the SmartMedia card and then copy them off onto another computer. But when the card was put into the camera, the camera complained. Other SM cards worked in the camera, so it didn’t look like there was a problem with the camera. (Thank goodness!)

A search on the internet revealed that a SmartMedia card can go into this mode (become corrupted) most often if it is written to by a camera that has weak batteries. But my camera was on an external power supply. It also said that some devices will format the card differently—for example MP3 players don’t use the same format as a digital camera. Oh? Lastly, the search revealed that the underlying low-level format may be different between devices.

That didn’t help me much, but I figured that I might as well try reformatting the card. First I tried to format it in the camera, using the camera’s utility menu. It rejected it. I then tried it in my son’s camera (a different brand). Still no good. I then tried to format it via the PC—using several different PCs— Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows 2003 Small Business Server. In each case, I tried both standard format and ‘quick’ format. In each case, the PC format utility didn’t complain, I could use the card to read/write files to/from PCs and between PCs, but it wouldn’t be accepted by the camera. Digging deeper revealed that cameras typically use the FAT12 file system rather than the more common FAT16 or FAT32 as found in Windows. And of course, Windows doesn’t do FAT12 formatting.

I went back to the web and Google and did more searching. There I found that some readers come with a utility program that can do the format, but the reader must have a specific chip in it. I didn’t have any readers with that brand of chip. (Finding out which chip is in which reader is another story.) I also found a service—$15 set up (no matter how many cards) plus $5 per card to ‘repair’ cards—put them back to factory low-level format. Lastly, I found a vendor CompuApps who sells a bundle—a USB Reader/Writer device that handles SmartMedia, Compact Flash, MMC, SD, Memory Stick devices and is bundled with software “OnBelay” that can recover damaged/corrupted files, do backups, do recoveries, and most important, do low-level formatting. I ordered it, installed it in about 2 minutes, and within 10 minutes (low-level formatting is a comparatively slow process) had recovered a working 64MB SmartMedia card that my camera now accepts. If I recover one more SmartMedia card, I’ve paid for the cost of the bundle.

I don’t know how the original card got damaged—perhaps it was removed from the camera or PC reader when a write or erase wasn’t finished, but should the problem return, I’m ready.

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