[mremt11]

Hello all,
Just joined as a member and making my first post, unfortunelty it's about a problem already! Hopefully you guys are able to help me as I've seen you have done for others.

Well, I've had my D200 for about a month now and it has had no problems what so ever. Within the last 2 weeks I have been shooting for my company to update some website pictures. I've shot about 250-300 pics both in RAW and JPEG. My company gave me a 2gb Transcend Compact flash 80x to use and for the majority of the time it was fine. Yesterday, I took out the battery, charged it and placed it back in the camera. Afterwards I went to view the images on the camera and the back screen says in big red letters: Card not formated, Format card. Okay, it was fine before I charged it and now it it says reformat. Well obviously if I do it will erase all my pictures. I haven't got a chance to import onto a computer yet though. I tried using the firewire card reader I have and the disk won't even mount on my mac desktop, I just got a message saying this card is not readable by this computer. The card reader hasn't had any problems before this either. Any ideas why I can't see my images anymore. What happened? Can I recover my images? How can I prevent this? Thanks in advance. You guys are great!

[orangepeel]

There's a ton of recovery apps out there - this one is from the makers of the one I use (RescuePro).
PHOTORECOVERY for Digital Media

might even be some free ones.

[Steve]

There is a link to a free one in our downloads section.

maybe someone else will be able to advise you for sure, but my understanding of a format is that it doesn't actually remove the images or overwrite them, what it does do is remove the indexes that tell the camera, pc where the pictures actually are on the card and its only if you then start using it again do you actually risk overwriting and losing the images.

It may be necessary to format the card to get your reader to 'see it' and then use one of the rescue applications to recover your pictures.

Please wait until someone else confirms this for you though, I am 99% certain but I accept no responsibility should you try it and find it doesn't work.

Best of luck to you and let us know how you get on.

[inventory]

I had the same problem a couple of weeks ago and found a novel solution completely by accident, which I've detailed on my blog:

Inventory-photo insights: Corrupted memory card? Fear not!

[orangepeel]

Originally Posted by Steve

maybe someone else will be able to advise you for sure, but my understanding of a format is that it doesn't actually remove the images or overwrite them, what it does do is remove the indexes that tell the camera, pc where the pictures actually are on the card and its only if you then start using it again do you actually risk overwriting and losing the images.

certainly in the world of hdd's formatting doesn't delete the actual data. Only floppy disk low level formats do that.

I never format my cards, just delete the files but hold on a sec and I'll test: -

confirmed. Formatted a card full of mp3's. Took 4 test shots. formatted the card again. Recovered the 4 test shots - oddly the mp3's where not there. May be an issue with the software I'm using. It's not generic recovery software but rather designed for photogs - yep confirmed again. It recovered the mp3 album art (covers) but not the mp3s.

[VikingPhotography]

I had a near-miss in this regard the other day; accidentally formatted the wrong CF card before I had transferred the images on it to my PC.

Fortunately I have RescuePRO 3 as packaged with one of my Sandisk CF cards; I set it to run and it recovered 214 RAW files from my card - the ones I needed and many more, some going right back to a wedding I shot on 18th June 2006

You can download a demo version of Rescue PRO here and you can pop over to LC Tech's website here to purchase a license for $40

I can't speak for how effective other apps are since I haven't used any but there's no reason for you not to try the free one's first and, if they don't work, I can highly recommend RescuePRO

[Steve]

Originally Posted by orangepeel

certainly in the world of hdd's formatting doesn't delete the actual data. Only floppy disk low level formats do that.

I never format my cards, just delete the files but hold on a sec and I'll test: -

confirmed. Formatted a card full of mp3's. Took 4 test shots. formatted the card again. Recovered the 4 test shots - oddly the mp3's where not there. May be an issue with the software I'm using. It's not generic recovery software but rather designed for photogs - yep confirmed again. It recovered the mp3 album art (covers) but not the mp3s.

Thanks for doing the test but you are taking it a step futher...if you take a load of shots, format the card and then try to recover the shots without taking any more shots or adding any files to the card...hopefully you should be able to recover the files?

The only reason I suggested a format was to allow the card reader to see the card (which is what the original poster also said was an issue). Obviously formating the card will remove the indexes but it should not effect the images as long as the card does not have any new files written to it.

[inventory]

Originally Posted by Steve

The only reason I suggested a format was to allow the card reader to see the card (which is what the original poster also said was an issue). Obviously formating the card will remove the indexes but it should not effect the images as long as the card does not have any new files written to it.

Rebooting the computer with the card in a reader should start up the Windows CHKDisk utility. If this finds any problems with the file system which are making it unreadable in camera or on computer, this should sort them. Well, it works for me anyway

[orangepeel]

Originally Posted by Steve

hopefully you should be able to recover the files?

yes that's correct.

Any shots you take after the format overwrite individual images from the card but it's an effective lottery regarding which get overwritten. But if you don't write anything to the card after the format then recovery should be a doddle.

All this assumes, of course, the card isn't faulty


There is no format in windows these days that lets you low level format - wipe data. The only difference between quick and "normal" is the normal one does a disk check. Both of them simply rebuild the FAT/MFT - for NTFS drives*

Originally Posted by inventory

Rebooting the computer with the card in a reader should start up the Windows CHKDisk utility. If this finds any problems with the file system which are making it unreadable in camera or on computer, this should sort them. Well, it works for me anyway

You shouldn't need to reboot. Stop the card reader then unplug it. Wait, plug it back in. Right click the memory card drive in explorer, select properties. Go to the tools tab and click the error check button. Tick both the boxes and start.

You only need to reboot when windows can't get exclusive access to the "drive" - I had to unplug as that closes any open file access on the drive.



* With NTFS small files are stored in the MFT so these would be lost in a format.

[Steve]

Originally Posted by orangepeel

All this assumes, of course, the card isn't faulty

Absolutely.

[silver]

Originally Posted by inventory

I had the same problem a couple of weeks ago and found a novel solution completely by accident, which I've detailed on my blog:

Inventory-photo insights: Corrupted memory card? Fear not!

great images on your website - v cool

Sil

[inventory]

Thankyou! I do try my best

You only need to reboot when windows can't get exclusive access to the "drive" - I had to unplug as that closes any open file access on the drive.

Ah, that's good to know for the future. Cheers.

[mremt11]

Wow, great responses everyone. I am going to work on these things today. I'll let you all know how it goes!