SD cards are the most popularly used storage devices. Digital cameras, camcorders, and other portable devices use SD cards for their portability and ease of use.
If you are having trouble accessing your favorite videos or photos stored on an SD card, it is probably due to corruption. SD card corruption can also make it RAW or unreadable. If you are wondering, how do you know if your SD card is corrupted? In the article’s next section, you will understand the indications of the corrupt SD card and how they stop you from accessing your data.
Quick Navigation:
- How do I know my SD card is corrupt?
- Recover data from the corrupt SD card
- Fix a corrupt SD card without formatting
- Repair a corrupt SD card by formatting
- How to fix a corrupt SD card on a Mac?
- Frequently Asked Questions
Indications of a Corrupt SD Card
Here are some of the signs that indicate your SD card may be corrupt or damaged. If you ever encounter any of the following indications, back up your data before you try to fix the SD card
A black screen appears along with an error message SD card is not accessible. The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable. The error indicates that the drive has a bad sector, leading to the file system damage.
Error messages appear like – The read or Write error on the SD card when the SD card is corrupted. This error indicates that you will no longer be able to read any data from the SD card or write any data on it.
SD card cannot be recognized on the device. The error is displayed when your device fails to read the SD card. Fix your corrupt SD card immediately when such errors occur to avoid data loss.
SD card turns RAW or unreadable is the error that occurs when the drive has a problem in its file system. It could be a sign that no file system or a damaged/corrupt file system was found.
If you continuously encounter any of the above-mentioned error messages, stop using the SD card immediately. I recommend you first recover data from the corrupted SD card and later on follow the below-mentioned methods to repair a corrupt SD card.
Recover Data from the Corrupt SD card showing RAW Disk
You might not be able to fix the corrupt SD card using CHKDSK due to an error CHKDSK is not available for RAW drives. This happens when your SD card has turned RAW. When you encounter such an error, formatting/reformatting the SD card is the way to repair the corrupt SD card. Unless you fix this error, you will be unable to access the drive and recover files from the SD card.
However, reformatting or formatting involves data loss scenarios. If your SD card holds any important data files, we recommend that you back them up. Suppose your card is severely corrupt; you might not be able to create a backup. If you are wondering how to recover data from a corrupt SD card, here is the way out.
With the help of an automated SD card recovery tool, you can recover your important data without losing any of it. The SFWare SD card recovery tool helps you retrieve your file from severely corrupt or damaged drives. The tool helps you recover data from any kind of SD card, including compact flash drives, microSD cards, digital SD cards, SDHC, SDXC, and Extreme Digital Picture cards.
Now that you have safely recovered your data from your corrupt or damaged SD card, and saved it in a safe location. It’s time to move on and start repairing the problematic SD card.
How to Fix a Corrupt or Damaged SD Card Without Formatting?
Before trying the repairing methods, try reading it with a different card adapter or card reader. Also, try using the SD card on another device to verify if your computer or the SD card causes the trouble you are experiencing. Here are a few ways to fix corruption on an SD card without losing your valuable data.
6 Methods to Repair Corrupt SD Card without Losing Data
- Change the drive letter
- Reinstall the SD card drivers
- Update the SD card drive
- Fix corrupted SD card using CMD or CHKDSK
- Repair the SD card using the Disk part Command
- Fix SD Card Using Windows Repair Tool
Method 1: Change the Drive Letter to Fix Inaccessible SD card
When your computer fails to assign a drive letter to the storage device, the SD card becomes inaccessible. To solve the problem, you need to assign a new drive letter to the SD card.
1: Right-click on the start button, Open Disk Management
2: Find your SD card and right-click on it
3: Choose Change Drive Letter and Paths… from the list
4: Click Change… and select a letter from the list.
You can check if the SD card is readable now. If the issue is still not fixed, try reinstalling the driver using the steps in the next section to fix the corrupt SD card problem.
Method 2: Reinstall the Drive to fix the SD card undetected
If your computer does not detect your SD card, uninstall the drive and try reinstalling. Follow the below-given instructions:
1: Right-click on the start button and click on Device Manager.
2: Expand Disk Drives, right-click on the name of your removable drive and click Uninstall.
3: Click OK. Disconnect the SD card from your computer.
4: Restart your computer and then connect the SD card to your computer again and check if it is being detected.
Windows will install the latest driver automatically and make the SD card detectable. If reinstalling the driver doesn’t fix the problem on the SD card, you can try updating the driver to fix the issue on the SD card.
Method 3: Update the Driver if the SD Card is Unrecognized
To update the drive, follow the until the second step in Method 2. Select update driver. Once the driver is updated, the computer should automatically be able to detect the SD card.
If the issue is still not fixed, try repairing the corrupt SD card using the Diskpart command.
Method 4: Diskpart Command to fix Corruption on the SD Card
Diskpart command line helps you manage your computer’s drives without system errors.
1: Connect the SD card to your computer and type cmd -> Run as administrator
2: Type diskpart -> press Enter -> Type list disk -> press Enter
3: Type select disk <number of your SD card on the list> and press Enter.
4: Type recover -> Enter. This command will refresh the state of the SD card.
With the help of the Diskpart command, you can easily fix the corruption and recover the data if it is not severely damaged.
Method 5: Windows Repair Tool to Fix SD Card
Windows computers have an inbuilt tool for checking drives for system errors. When you insert a corrupt drive, your computer automatically detects it and invokes the tool to scan for damage. If you skipped the scan, here are the steps to repair an SD card using the Windows repair tool manually.
1: Go to My Computer or This PC.
2: Right-click on your SD card and select Properties.
3: Click Tools -> select the Check option -> Click Scan and Repair drive.
If any warning message states that Windows can’t repair the drive while in use, save your work on the SD card and choose to repair it now.
Method 6: Fix Corrupt/damaged SD Card Using CMD /CHKDSK
CHKDSK can fix any logical errors in the device and verify the integrity of the file system. Follow the steps to fix a corrupt SD card using the CHKDSK command-
1: Connect your corrupted SD card to your computer to repair the corrupt SD card.
2: Type in cmd in the search bar and press Enter.
3: Right-click Command Prompt/ cmd.exe and choose Run as administrator.
4: Type chkdsk G: /f in the command prompt, where G is the drive letter of your SD card.
The /f parameter allows CHKDSK to fix all the bad sectors on your memory card.
After the repair process is complete. Restart your computer and reconnect the SD card. If no error message appears, you have successfully repaired a corrupt SD card.
How to Fix Corrupt SD card by Formatting?
- Fix corrupted RAW SD card by reformatting
- Format the error causing the SD card
Method 7: Fix the Corrupted SD Card by Reformatting the drive
If your SD card has turned RAW, the only way to fix the corrupt SD card is to reformat it with the NTFS/ Fat32 file system.
1: Connect the corrupted SD card to your computer.
2: Right-click on the Start button and select Disk Management.
3: Locate your SD card using the disk information and right-click on it.
4: Select Format, and then you can select the file system to repair the corrupt SD card.
5: Click OK to finish reformatting.
By reformatting, you will assign the corrupted SD card a new file system that your computer can read.
Method 8: Format the Error Causing SD Card to Fix Corruption
Formatting is a quick and effective way to recreate a damaged file system and fix an SD card. All you have to do is go to This PC, right-click on your SD card, and select Format.
Note: Ensure you uncheck the Quick Format box, which only removes the files’ addresses. Unchecking Quick Format will enable the Full Format option, which also checks for bad sectors on the drive.
If you were unable to take a backup or recover data before formatting/ reformatting, don’t worry. With the help of SFWare SD card recovery, you can recover data from formatted SD cards.
How to Fix Corrupt SD card on Mac OS?
Disk Utility on Mac, an inbuilt application by Apple Inc., helps you verify a disk’s integrity, check for logical errors, and repair a damaged disk.
You can open Disk Utility using any one of the following methods:
1: Click Launchpad in the Dock -> type Disk Utility in the search bar -> click the Disk Utility icon.
2: Choose Go -> Utilities in the Finder, then double-click the Disk Utility icon.
3: Open the Disk Utility program from the Utilities menu.
4: Select your SD card and click on the First Aid tab.
5: Select the Repair disk button to initiate the repairing process of a corrupt SD card.
If any of the above-mentioned methods helped you repair the corrupt SD card, please let us know in the comment section below.
Frequently Asked Questions
1: How do I Uncorrupt a Corrupted SD Card?
The best way to uncorrupt or repair an SD card is to use CMD or CHKDSK to fix bad sectors, use Windows Repair Tool to fix any errors, and repair the SD card using the Disk part command
2: How do I fix a Corrupted Micro SD Card on Android?
To repair an SD card on an Android phone, you only need to remove it, connect it to a card reader, and connect it to a computer. Once you connect your SD card to the computer, try the methods explained in the article to fix the corrupt or damaged SD card.
3: What happens if my SD Card gets Corrupt?
When an SD card becomes corrupted, you cannot access any data from it. The PC will not read or recognize the card. Also, you may see the indication of an SD card showing a RAW file system. However, if you encounter these indications, you must recover data from the corrupt SD card and fix the drive.
4: Why is my SD Card Corrupt?
SD cards can get corrupt due to multiple reasons. The most common reasons are bad sectors on the drive, virus intrusion, and using the same SD card on multiple devices, which may cause damage to the files.
