I have used 2 (Two) 32GB Sandisk Memory cards with my Samsung Galaxy S3 in the space of 5 months, both dying out on me suddenly, taking away with them valuable data. The last happened just last week.
I was very worried and even considered the possibility that the cards were fakes. However, common sense told me the cards were most likely the real deal because they were bought from BestBuy. Idid a quick search on the internet, on the off chance that some whiz kid with some oracle may have found a solution i could benefit from. What i found was very revealing.
They were tales of woes of how Samsung flagship phones and tablets, including the Samsung Galaxy S3 (perhaps the S4 too?) and Galaxy note, have ruined their microSD cards. If you were lucky, you would get some warning signs – your card acting up for a while, starting and stopping intermittently before failing permanently. It will stop being recognized by any computer or phone.
However, most do not get this warning.
Rumour even has it that the issue is not limited to Sandisk MicroSD brands alone. Apparently, something in the phone is destroying these cards. CNET even published an article on this issue in March 2013.
Unfortunately, no solution has been proffered by Sandisk or any other microSD manufacturer. For now, we can only hope and wait.
7 comments
spacyzuma
I backup up the memory card yesterday.
About 30 mins ago, my Note10 tablet could no longer detect the card. I put it in a card adapter and was able to see it in my laptop, and do normal file operations on it.
I put in another Sandisk 8Gb card in the tablet, and it was detected and accepted. It still couldn’t see the 32GB card.
I ran “chkdsk H: /r” command on the 32GB card on the laptop. It took about 15 mins. Then I turned off the tablet, put in the sdcard, and turned it on.
It now recognizes the card. 🙂
Wale Falade
Would try your tip but i would not rely on such a card again, could fail anytime.
Harry Echemco
Maybe this could be the cause of what I suffered sometime in December last year. My phone is LG though, and the microSD card was less than 4 months old then. I never got any warnings, but my phone had been rebooting randomly after rooting the phone, and I somehow blamed it on rooting and hav refrained from rooting since then.
Wale Falade
A lot of factors could be involved, reason why i was not suspicious at first. Most importantly is the menace of imitation cards that has flooded the Nigerian market.
Deoladoctor
Aha….. ,
At last I see why my Transcend 32Gb memory card died on me with less than 5months of use on my Galaxy Note.
Someone has to do something about this and fast otherwise everyone will be scared of using these splendid cards on these premium phones.
spacyzuma
YES!! I have observed the same thing!
I use the Galaxy note 101 tablet with a 32GB microsd Class 4 card, since last September.
Until February, I never removed the cad from the tablet. Then I started observing that whenever I unlocked the tablet, it would show a message like “Searching for memory card” or “memory card is being checked” for about 10-30 seconds.
I have removed the card and used it on my laptop with no problems. I thought it was an issue of stock Samsung firmware. I flashed CyanogenMod10.1 and used it for 3 days, and didn’t get any error messages. But when I flashed it with another custom ROM (Collective Edition v6) that’s very similar to the stock Samsung ROM, the messages began again.
My main concern is the app data that’s stored in the card. I don’t mind losing the video/music/picture data. Does this mean I have to start doing a memory card backup to my laptop regularly? 🙁
Wale Falade
I strongly suggest you do a back up of your card. It fails without warning.