Ghost in the SD Card?

[Geoaddict]

Yesterday, I had my Android tablet hooked up to my computer. When I looked at my SD card directory on my tablet, I saw two copies of every file and folder on the card. When I look at the SD card properties it shows that I am using 4.45 GB. However, when I select all the folders and files showing in the directory, right click, and select properties, it shows 8.83 GB.

If I delete a one folder using my computer and leave the duplicate folder, the folder no longer show ups when I use the File Manager on my tablet. It still shows up using File Explorer on my computer.

I have had a problem with duplicate thumbnails of all my photos on the tablet and I think this must be related. Can anyone shed light on why see duplicate files and folders even though the SD card seems only to have one copy (4.45 GB) of the the files and folder? Is there a setting that might correct this?

 

[Rukbat]

I've seen this happen on hard drives, but never on an SD card. A folder at the root level gets corrupted so all that's in it is root, duplicating the entire drive. Deleting "either" file deletes both. On a hard drive, the fix is simple - use a disk editor to remove the entry for that folder in the root directory, then clean up.

I'd advise you to not try it on the SD card, as deleting one file could delete everything. (There's a whole computer inside that little card - it's not just a memory chip.)

My solution would be to back up everything to a hard drive (the duplicate files will be "Real" files, so you can delete duplicates), format the SD card (in the phone, so the structure is correct) and copy everything (duplicates removed) back to the SD card.

Someone who's done internal design of SD cards may have an easier solution. I know magnetic storage a lot better than I know SD cards.

 

[John Bean]

Need more information:

Which Android device (and version of Android)?
OS in use on the PC
USB connection mode (mass storage, MTP, whatever)
Size and format of the SD card (FAT, FAT32, whatever)

I have my suspicions about the cause but I'd rather not offer any guesses until I have more information