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Root [Sprint/Cricket] SD Card Destroyed??

ndh777

ndh777

Android Expert
I picked up my phone looking to download a new ROM to it but then found that my ES File Explorer (given root permissions) was not able to view my external SD card via the mnt folder. At the same time, I was trying to back up my apps and such via Titanium Backup but it said that it couldn't backup anything because my card was full (it's default save location is my external card). It just said "Empty". I went to check my Settings to see if my card was somehow unmounted, but nope, it said it was still there. Even said that I had 11.27 GBs left out of 29 GB or whatever and gave me the usual options to Unmount and such. I pulled off my battery cover and the card was still there, so I assumed that the Android system might just need to sit for a while and cool off while off. Then I turned it back on to find that ES was still not able to view the contents of externalSDcard. So I went to my Root Browser and it too said that no files were there. I then went into my Settings and now it just says "Insert SD card".

I've had this happen before on other Android phones so I did what I normally do and hook it to my PC and reformat it. Windows found the device when I attached it via a SD card reader (the big fat kind like in your standard camera), it didn't want to format it. Windows brought up the prompt and said that it only could format 1GB so I knew Windows wouldn't be able to recognize it. I even tried formatting it via Command Prompt and typing "Format G:" and it too said there was only 1024MB to be formatted then went through trying to format and then said it failed.

I then tried pulling up Ubuntu's Disk Utility to format it. At first, Ubuntu wouldn't even correctly identify the device! Then I got the Disk Utility to recognize it and it couldn't even recognize how many GB/MB were originally on the card! Trying to format just brought up a message telling me that it couldn't do anything.

I had this happen a few times with my HTC Evo 4G OG but was able to format the card and put it back into my phone and have it work. Of course, the last time with my old 16GB card ended with it being destroyed much like this.

Please tell me that I can do something to fix this. Anything?!?! I love this 32GB Class 10 card :(

It was working just fine earlier today.
 
Damn man! You've done all the stuff I would suggested already... if it were me, I'd ask ocn or rxpert in the evo og forum and see if they have any advice other than the standard stuff you already did.
 
youdoofus said:
Damn man! You've done all the stuff I would suggested already... if it were me, I'd ask ocn or rxpert in the evo og forum and see if they have any advice other than the standard stuff you already did.
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Thanks. I guess I'll head over there and see if they've got any answers.
 
Yeah, I mean there's always the "have you tried another computer/os? Have you tried another card reader or trying to format it while its in a different phone" etc etc etc, but I assumed you already knew that stuff since you're a Linux user.
 
youdoofus said:
Yeah, I mean there's always the "have you tried another computer/os? Have you tried another card reader or trying to format it while its in a different phone" etc etc etc, but I assumed you already knew that stuff since you're a Linux user.
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Haha yeah. I tried my co-worker's phone, another Android device, the Motorola Cliq. It recognized the card, said it needed to be formatted, etc. etc. but when we tried to do that, it didn't do it.

I went back to Amazon, where I originally bought the card back in February 2012, and they said that the card has a 5 year warranty. So I called customer support who then said that I could request a replacement. I'm also going to take back this Galaxy phone and see about getting another in case this one is defective and to possibly send a message that I'm not too thrilled with Android OS randomly deleting my memory every so often. Who knows, maybe Sprint will even get me a brand new card. Highly doubtful lol

But thanks for your help :) That really ruined my night when I found that out.
 
It happened to me not too terribly long ago on the og evo. Except for the contents of my card were all renamed as file names that were like 47 characters long and the file extensions were about 13 characters and were those weird ones you only find by holding alt and hitting some random 3 digit # in windows... it was really messed up man.
 
youdoofus said:
It happened to me not too terribly long ago on the og evo. Except for the contents of my card were all renamed as file names that were like 47 characters long and the file extensions were about 13 characters and were those weird ones you only find by holding alt and hitting some random 3 digit # in windows... it was really messed up man.
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lol what? What a weird malfunction. At least your contents were all still there. That's the strangest thing that I've ever heard.
 
it wouldnt let me open them because of the weird file extensions and wouldnt let me rename them to a diff extension because the ones they were changed to were too long... yeah, i lost everything... yeah, i totally stumped everyone in the og evo forum with one lol
 
I'm starting to believe that there's a bug with the GS3. Both my wife and I had issues with bad SD cards and now I've been getting an auto unmount/remount every once in a while with my second SD card. Although the SD card issue doesn't seem to affect everyone, it's prevalent enough to consider that there might be a bug/defect or something. :confused:
 
I'm not sure about that. I'm using the same SD card in my gs3 that I had the issue with in my evo and its totally fine :)
 
This is really sad news. I think it's the actual Android firmware as this has happened to many users across various Android devices. It couldn't be manufacturers' versions of the OS because it has happened to all of them so it has to be within the actual Android OS itself.

I've had this happen on Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread, and ICS. I've also heard about others having the issues on other handsets on different OS versions.

But I am going to be reqesting my replacement through insurance so that Samsung or Sprint or whoever can get to the bottom of this. I thought this malfunction would've been fixed in ICS. Hopefully in Jelly Bean it's fixed or it'll be fixed in the next release because I am seriously debating on switching to a different version. I lost all of my photos and other information that I will never be able to get back.
 
I had to do a followup on this.

So I contacted Patriot (the manufacturer of this SD card) and their customer service was great and followed through with their 5 year warranty. They asked me to ship back the corrupted card and they'd send a replacement shortly. The new one wasn't supposed to get here until next week but it came this morning. I popped it in my phone and it's working just as before.

I'll be taking back this phone and asking that I get a replacement from Sprint/Asurion or whoever just so they can keep track of this. If this happens to anyone else, I'd advise you to do the same. A few phones getting taken back will cause the manufacturers to get down to the bottom of the issue and fix whatever is causing this.
 
My gs3 destroyed my 32gb card. Had the mount unmount thing and then died. No device would recognise it. Bought my s3 from eglobaldigitalcameras.com.au - international version sent from hong kong. I have put a spare 1gb card in and have had no problems for a month or so. Hmmm..
 
The intn'l version is quite different from ours. I dont know if it has a cdma radio in it (actually pretty sure it doesnt due to the heat and space issues caused by the quad core) but when did you get the sd card? How many other devices did you put your card in?
 
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