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Two 16GB CF Cards Went Bad Today?!

Jordan Livingston

Jordan Livingston

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Dear Friends,

I have always been a HUGE fan of the RED 16GBCF cards. They have never failed me yet. Today, however, something strange happened that I have NEVER seen before:

Out of four 16GB CF cards on the shoot, two inexplicably went bad midway through the day. We had already shot on them, downloaded from them, re-formatted them, and shot on them some more... But all of a sudden when I went to re-format the cards (in the camera), they refused to mount!

I then tried to format them on the computer using R3D Data Manager, but they refused to mount to the computer too! This happened to two cards out of four, back to back, and after we had already shot and successfully transferred the footage. Could the CF module on the RED have temporarily gone bad?

To make matters more complicated, if I gently jiggled the cards, the RED would see them momentarily, and give me the error message that they were not RED-certified cards (they were!). Attempts to format after that message would still fail, and the cards would again refuse to mount to either the camera or the computer.

Has this ever happened to you? If anybody knows how to solve this, please let me know asap! Thanks in advance...

- Jordan
 
Bad reader/writer card. They can send you out a new one. It is an easy fix.

Stephen
 
Hi Stephen,

Thanks for your quick response! So is this a common problem? Still doesn't explain why it would work perfectly all day with 2 cards and suddenly not work with 2 others? Also, why would the cards suddenly not work in the computer as well? Should I worry about the CF module doing damage to cards? What about during shooting?

- Jordan

- Jordan
 
Yep, most likely a bad reader -- contact RED if you have not already.

It is possible for a faulty reader to damage the cards. I would do a full repartition and format, zeroing out the data, on the cards. Scan them for any errors after doing that. Then all should be well with a new CF module.

I would pop the CF module cover off the camera and inspect the module and cable connections, connection pins for the card. You may see something, but you may not.

It is also possible for the faulty reader to be at the computer too and it could be damaging cards. But I'm doubting that as you mention wiggling the cards in the camera showed issues. Which is also the reason I would think to pop the hood and take a look. Seems as if something has come loose.
 
Jeff Kilgroe said:
I would do a full repartition and format, zeroing out the data, on the cards. Scan them for any errors after doing that. Then all should be well with a new CF module.
Click to expand...

I'd love to do that, Jeff. But the cards do not mount to either the RED or to the computer (MacBook Pro). If I can't mount them, I can't repartition / re-format them. :-(

I would pop the CF module cover off the camera and inspect the module and cable connections, connection pins for the card. You may see something, but you may not.
Click to expand...

This I have not yet tried... will definitely do so. Although the module continues to work just fine with 2 / 4 cards.

- Jordan
 
I would not say for sure it is the CF module, I've had the same problem, and so have a few others I know of. I've swapped the modules back and forth, to no avail, and in the end it appears to me like it were bad cards. I've researched this issue for weeks; tested many cards in many different MX'es, in the end it were some card issues, which I will send back to Red for evaluation. There is no clear answer, also not from Red who were very much on the case. One thing I noticed; once a camera does not recognize a card, more cards will not recognize it, since it is in the middle of a very slow mounting proces, and it is halfway the first card, so it will not read another. Rebooting is the only option then. Also reformat the cards in disk utility worked for us a bit.
 
Bent pins could damage a card if two pins were forced into one slot/hole.
Or if the reader is damaged and is somehow frying cards.
 
Having the same problem. Never problems with the 16GB cards and suddenly some are getting difficult to mount or format in the camera.

Reader in the camera looks fine, no bent pins. Could this have anything to do with build 30 or MX sensor? That's when it started but I don't know how it is for other people.
 
We had the same problem the other day. This never happen before but with the MX sensor this started to happen. So far only one card down. Hopefully it can be recovered.
 
Those were my 2 cards in the initial thread. Red would not issue a repair ticket because the cards are out of warranty. I would like to know if there is a defective batch or if the new M-X cameras or B30 had anything to do with it. Mick, Thomas, did you hear anything back about yours?
 
Same thing happened to our 8gb CF last Friday. Now it's working fine again. We have never had this before, so I'm starting to think it maybe is a build 30 thing also.
 
I only sent in my cards last week, from a new batch of 10 one is starting to behave badly as well. No news from Red so far, but I also start to suspect that it has to do with build 30....
 
A 'we are looking into the issue' statement from RED would be nice. There's just too many reports of 16GB cards suddenly dying.
 
Thanks Mick. Please let me know what they say. I think it's a bad batch because the two other cards being used the day mine went bad were fine and were being used with the same camera and same reader/tech. Jordan definitely knows his stuff and is consistent through the whole download process. This leads me to believe that my cards, which were purchased at the same time, might be part of a faulty batch. Obviously, other cards from the same batch would have to be failing as well for this hypothesis to work. I ordered my 16gig cards as soon as they were available.
 
I've had my 16GB cards for a year and have not experienced the corrupt frame problem until build 30.5.0.
 
Unfortunately SAME problem here. These 4 cards have worked flawlessly. 2 Started to record errors last week. What's even WEIRDER? only the RAW files are corrupted. The proxies were fine and we were able to salvage the shots using proxies.

We also reformatted the cards with OUR camera, and they work fine again. The M-X camera that the cards failed on, was a rental camera recently upgraded.

SO how does RAW not record properly but all the proxies are fine? Is this still a CARD problem?
Very strange indeed. We also did not file a support ticket, because they are out of warranty.

That said, I cant wait for the 64GB cards!

EDIT: Im on a shoot tonight with the camera, and marked the cards and am going to try them again as we have lots of footage tonight. Will advise
 
This is worrying... I understand that you guys are the minority otherwise this thread would be 50 pages of frantic posts already, but I have 16GB cards that are fine at the minute but I'm not looking forward to shooting and suddenly halfway through the day having to say to the Director, DP and rest of the crew;

DIT - "Sorry guys and gals can we do those takes again as my CF card has just crapped out!".

Director - "WTF? Why? What happened?"

DIT - "I'm really sorry but I don't know!! I've checked everything but it might be the double twister overhead crank two way bus driver that failed!!! :lol: "

Director - "Well what's the solution?

DIT - "I'll try another CF card, fingers crossed it doesn't happen again!"

Director - "..."

I understand that kit goes out of warranty but this is RED media - footage - we're talking about. RED doesn't need to fix the card - just look at it or troubleshoot and tell you what the likely causes or what has happened - Bent pins? Dodgy batch of CFs? Build 30? Stupidity? CFs reaching EOL? Media not ejected properly? Dodgy reader? Dodgy CF module? Scrambled or Fried? I do feel for the Tech support team at RED - there are so many variables! :banghead:

I hope you guys find out what caused the problems, do let us know when you do - as this is what makes REDuser such an invaluable resource for its users. :thumbsup:

All the best,

Tom
 
Some people are posting that footage is corrupted or messed up on their cards. My cards themselves are corrupted, won't mount on a computer or in camera. This might be a different issue than corrupt video files. Then again, they could be related. I don't know.
 
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