Problem with 8GB Micro SD HC Card

Hi

I purchased recently a Sandisk 8GB Micro SD HC card and reader, but my laptop won't recognise it as an 8GB card, it says it's unformatted and won't format to higher then 512MB.

The card appears to work fine in my BlackBerry Curve 8310 though.

I'm using XP SP3.

Can anyone offer some advice on what to do about this?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

Did u try the reader and card on another system, try the reader with another card on another system and the card with another reader. it seems to be a prob with the reader

 

Nope, I don't have another laptop/pc I can try it on at the moment.

I have tried it in Vista on the same laptop however and Vista recognises the card, without telling me it's unformatted and it's showing as an 8GB card, actually a little under but that's normal.

So I think it's an XP problem, unless I've installed the wrong drivers, but if I had installed the wrong drivers it wouldn't recognise my 128MB and 1GB cards right?

 

Sounds like the XP drivers cannot switch into HC mode with the card reader. This would mean you are limited to below 4GB cards unless you can find newer XP drivers that are the same as the Vista ones.

 

Yeah but I'm using the Vista drivers. They're exactly the same. I installed them from the Asus drivers disk and there isn't an XP version of the drivers on there.

I've seen a hotfix but that was apparently bundled with SP3 which I've already got installed so installing that hotfix won't work either.

 

I have XP SP3 and use my 8 GB microSD card with a card reader quite often for file transfers and it sees it accordingly.
So it must be the driver...

 

Ok so where would I get drivers that work in XP with an 8GB Micro SD HC card? I've tried Asus and they don't have XP drivers specifically for the M70Vm.

In device manager it's telling me the reader is a Ricoh SD/MMC Disk Device. And the Vista drivers disk indicates it's a RICOH_R5C833 reader.

I've tried windows update and that doesn't work, driver genius is no help either...

 

Most _DELL notebooks also use the same RICOH R5C83 reader. Here is Ricoh R5C833_Windows_XP/Vista driver for _DELL notebooks. Try that and see if it works. You’ll have to manually extract the file and update the driver. I don’t have XP, therefore I can’t say fore sure whether it'll work. But I have the same driver on Vista and it detects 8GB cards.

 

Thanks PhoenixFx I googled a few mins ago for Ricoh R5C833 XP drivers and came across the Dell version of the driver, tried it, no joy.

Rather than the driver being the problem could it be that the particular Sandisk card I'm trying to use is just plain incompatible with XP despite it working in Vista?

Because if it's not the driver (and I seem to be finding the latest versions) and it's not an OS problem then that can be the only other explanation I would have thought...

...this is really bugging me now because I use XP more than Vista and I really don't want to have to keep switching to Vista just to use my SDHC card.

 

It has to be a software problem. If it works in _Vista then it is not a problem with hardware (card or the reader). The only other alternative is to buy a cheap SDHC card reader from eBay; they are less than $5.00 with shipping.

 

Try this incase sp3 missed it http://support.microsoft.com/kb/934428

I know theres a ricoh driver for Samsungs that support SDHC, the link is now dead though.

 

Yep tried that, won't let me install it because I have SP3 installed.

 

For the past 18 months there has been a lot of mail in the various help forums suggesting that a purchased data card is not recognised by some computer operating systems.
The reason for this is that storage cards, up to 2 gigabytes, store data in a way that is recognised by most all operating system still in use. In November 2006 a new card with a higher capacity was introduced into the market....in a number of types.
Using secure digital as an example:
Any card to 2 gigabytes will be classified as SD (Secure Digital), but any card with a storage capacity above 2 Gigs will have the notation HC (for high capacity) added to the SD. This applies not only to SD cards but MMC, Micro and Mini cards as well. And the situation is going to get even worse. There is now a 64 gigabyte Micro SD card on the market and also a next generation of cards is here which are classified as SDXC...(the XC indicating extended capacity and these cards have a storage capacity of up to a 2 Terrabyes, although God knows what the cost of them will be.
Some replies in these forums suggest that the card....or the operating system are faulty, but I assure you, neither is the case. There is update software on the internet that will allow your older operating system to handle these cards. The newer Vista operating system has the software included to accept, and read them
The alternative is (remembering that these cards are recognised as "removeable drives") to download the information to your computer from some sort of device that handles these cards....ie moble phone or a media player IRiver or similar, or camera, and utilise the recognition software in these devices ie: use the camera as a computer removable drive.
I am using a 9 years old Compaq Presario with a Windows XP program pentium 4 processor...something of an antique by todays standards but I have absolutely no trouble accessing these higher capacity cards by downlaoding through my media player....an IRiver P7. And....whatever you do, don't forget to format the card before you first use it. This is very important...corrupt cards can be difficult to restore.

I do hope this information is of help to you....good luck

 

So? Have you found a solution ?
I have the same problem...