PI won't read that SD card

[LittleNooby]

Hi,

I've got a set of two identical SD cards, I've bought them both in the same package. One can be used to boot PI, the other can't. The one that can't could in the past.
How can I make the second to boot the PI again?
How can I know what prevent Pi to read the card?

[Optional] I didn't use my PI for 2 years, I tried and failed to boot it since yesterday until a few minutes ago. Thanks to this forum, I found the answer, trying a different SD card. I knew the SD card was the problem because the ACT led wouldn't blink (it was as there was no SD card at all in the slot). But I don't understand, that SD card seems to work fine. I can browse the files without any problem. I'm currently using it with my camera.

I'd really like to know because I don't want the problem to occur again.

Thanks for the help.

[drgeoff]

Maybe you were not in the habit of shutting down properly. If you don't but merely remove power, the file system on the card can be corrupted and fail to boot.

You should be able to use the card again by installing an OS or NOOBS from scratch.

[FTrevorGowen]

Maybe you were not in the habit of shutting down properly. If you don't but merely remove power, the file system on the card can be corrupted and fail to boot.
You should be able to use the card again by installing an OS or NOOBS from scratch.

+1
@LittleNooby OOC and "just for completeness" what model of Pi do you have?
Trev.

[LittleNooby]

Hi, I did install NOOBS from scratch (on both of them actually), I have the model B Rev2.

I may have the habit to remove the power... I thought it was like that as it doesn't have a power button T_T.

[kusti8]

Hi, I did install NOOBS from scratch (on both of them actually), I have the model B Rev2.

I may have the habit to remove the power... I thought it was like that as it doesn't have a power button T_T.

It is probably corrupted. You need to start fresh.

I've never had any corruption mainly because I always shutdown normally. The Pi is like any other computer in that if you remove the power, it may be in the middle of something and you may corrupt the SD card. The best way is to shut it down right. In the GUI, there should be a shutdown option in the menu, or in the terminal you just need to do:

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sudo halt

Once its done, then you can remove the power. It is also a good idea to make regular backups if you have important files.

[BMS Doug]

If you put the SD card down on a flat surface does it seem a little bent?

The older models of PI have no card support at the back of the SD card reader and the card can bend over time so that it doesn't meet all of the contact points. when placed in a card reader that supports the back the card reads OK but when in a Pi it bends out and doesn't read.

There are many solutions, including using a clothes pegs (pushing the card into contact), gluing a bit of old credit card to the back, using an SD to micro SD adapter, replacing the card reader.

[stefanw1337]

I'm having a similar problem. I've got this 8gb card that had pre-installed NOOBS. Both Micro SDHC, but the one that's not working is a 16gb, only difference as I can see. Now I took and made a .img file from the pre-installed one with the Win32DiskImager program, I swapped out and did write instead of read, and it's still not working. I've also tried going Rasbian directly, but the lights on my Rasberry Pi 2 Model B is still just glowing red/green no matter what I do. I've also tried formatting it with the SDFormatter(it actually doesn't support "Full format(erase)".

Some help please?

[LittleNooby]

I'm sorry I didn't reply for such a long time but I took for granted my SD Card was corrupted because of my habit to remove the power cord. I should have been more explicit, sorry.

Today my second SD card ended up corrupted after I removed the power cord... For my defense, the screen freezed for an hour and it didn't answer to TCP handshake.

So, is it possible to get a corrupted SD card back to work? I'm not speaking of repairing but doing a fresh install. Because I did try to start fresh with a dd command + backup.img, gparted + noobs and Xbian installer; None of them made a readable SD card. I assume formatting doesn't repair the damage.

I will try some testdisk tools but I'm not exactly an expert at this.


Again, thanks for the help.

I did try

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root@adrienLT:/home/adrien/btrfs-progs#./btrfs check --super 1 /dev/mmcblk0p2
using SB copy 1, bytenr 67108864
couldn't open because of unsupported option features (10).
Couldn't open file system

You could use that I guess

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root@adrienLT:/home/adrien/btrfs-progs#uname -a
Linux adrienLT 3.19.0-31-generic #36-Ubuntu SMP Wed Oct 7 15:04:02 UTC 2015 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux
root@adrienLT:/home/adrien/btrfs-progs#./btrfs --version
btrfs-progs v4.2.3
root@adrienLT:/home/adrien/btrfs-progs#./btrfs fi show
Label: 'xbian'  uuid: b7d9263d-1687-4f5b-9a4d-c74ed4e28b8c
	Total devices 1 FS bytes used 1.69GiB
	devid    1 size 7.10GiB used 3.19GiB path /dev/mmcblk0p2

btrfs-progs v4.2.3
root@adrienLT:/home/adrien/btrfs-progs#./btrfs fi df /dev/mmcblk0p2
ERROR: can't access '/dev/mmcblk0p2'

[drgeoff]

Try formatting the cards in your camera.

[LittleNooby]

Formatting with the camera didn't give better results sadly.

[BMS Doug]

I'm sorry I didn't reply for such a long time but I took for granted my SD Card was corrupted because of my habit to remove the power cord. I should have been more explicit, sorry.

Today my second SD card ended up corrupted after I removed the power cord... For my defense, the screen freezed for an hour and it didn't answer to TCP handshake.

Examine your assumption: "I corrupted the SD Card by removing the power".

The SD card now isn't recoverable by any known means?

I would instead posit the supposition that the SD card catastrophically failed, causing the lockup that you experienced.

Replace the card with a new one, they aren't very expensive and are widely available.

So, is it possible to get a corrupted SD card back to work? I'm not speaking of repairing but doing a fresh install.

Normally they are, but it seems that you have tried all the standard methods, bin it and start with a new one.