SD/SDHC card problems? Click here.

[andrewthecoder]

In theory, all SD and SDHC cards should work perfectly when using Rockbox on the Cowon D2/D2+.

However in practice this does not seem to be true, as people have reported problems with certain cards not working and at least one card has been certified to not work.

The aim of this thread is to catalogue (if possible) cards which do and do not work.
If you own an SD/SDHC card (or several), I would appreciate it if you could PM me with the details in this format:

1) Brand name (SanDisk, Kingston, A-DATA, PNY etc.)
2) Model name / Product line ("ultra II", "premium series" etc.)
3) Capacity (512MB, 4GB, 16GB, 32GB etc.)
4) Image (entirely optional but if you could take a photo/scan of the card it would aid identification as there may be several slight variations of the same spec card from the same manufacturer)
5) Supplier (ebay.com, amazon.com etc.)
6) Functional with Rockbox? Yes/No/Partially (give details)


Whenever I receive a PM, i'll confirm it has the info required and update this post.

To anybody who bothers to do this, thankyou very much :)
Hopefully we can help advise people who wish to buy a card which will work, and perhaps help figure out why some cards don't work.

-Andrew


Responses:

1) A-Data
2) Turbo Secure Digital SDHC CL6 Memory Card
3) 32GB
4) Image (http://imgur.com/YHqO3.jpg)
5) memoryc.com (http://www.memoryc.com/products/description/32GB_A_Data_Turbo_Secure_Digital_SDHC_CL6_Memory_C ard/index.html)
6) Working perfectly


P.S - here is the contents of this post before I edited it and changed the aim of this thread, for reference and to dispel confusion;

I created this thread so anybody who has trouble with Rockbox regarding SD/SDHC support could post here instead of making a new thread.
Also, anybody who finds it works perfectly may

I'll start ;)

I don't seem to be able to get it working properly on any of my cards, SD or SDHC.
Following my own instructions does not work - precisely, the following happens:

Rockbox bootloader revision 21979 loads Rockbox successfully.
The first thing once the bootloader hands over control to the Rockbox binary is two errors; "No .rockbox directory" then "Installation Incomplete".
The menu then shows up, but white text on black background with no graphics.
Trying to play a song gives me the above errors again, then a few errors about not being able to load codecs, and fails to play.

Movingthe .rockbox directory from the SD card to the internal memory allows Rockbox to boot normally into the usual usable-but-readonly system. (as long as the SD card is not inserted - if it is, the bootloader fails to find the rockbox binary. Perhaps a fallback should be implemented if rockbox is not found on the SD card?)

The Rockbox build I am using is 21884, since that is what I get from http://build.rockbox.org/dist/build-cowond2/rockbox.zip

The bootloader I am using, as mentioned above is 21979 (patched into the firmware files for the how to guide)

The same happens on all four cards I own - two 32GB, one 16GB, one 256MB.

I would be very grateful if anybody who has Rockbox working perfectly from an SD card could tell me what they did exactly, and/or if anybody has any advice for me.

Thanks,
Andrew

P.S - well done shotofadds, awesome achievement despite my problems. I'd call this a pretty big milestone for the D2 port, no?

[shotofadds]

I'd call this a pretty big milestone for the D2 port, no?
It would be if it worked!

The good news is that, since you tried 4 cards and none of them worked (and I haven't seen a single other report of cards not working), there's a good chance that you're just doing something wrong... ;)

When you get the "No .rockbox directory" error, does the File browser show any files at all? Are they files from the SD, NAND, or none at all? Make sure "General Settings" -> "File View" -> "Show Files" is set to "All" or you might not see any files except music...

All I did was:

1. Build bootloader from r21976
2. Patch it into a Cowon firmware using mktccboot (I used 4.02+ , but that won't make any difference)
3. Flash it to the D2
4. Unzip rockbox.zip r21976 to the root of your SD card.

Alternatively, you could try using an old bootloader, and just unzip rockbox.zip r21976 to the root of the internal memory. You should still be able to see files on the SD card in the File browser...

EDIT: If it boots as far as a "No .rockbox folder" error, it means it successfully powered up the card and mounted the FAT filesystem, but the expected files were not present. The only two possibilities are that 1) the files really aren't on the card or 2) for some reason the card became un-mounted during bootup. I don't know what would cause that.

EDIT2: Also, what font was the error displayed in?

[shotofadds]

Just a thought, it's possible that this change broke it:

http://svn.rockbox.org/viewvc.cgi?view=rev;revision=21981

I haven't tested this change yet since I was at work when he committed it. I'll check and see...

EDIT: Yes, confirmed here too. Until it's fixed, make sure you use a version between r21976-r21980.

[andrewthecoder]

there's a good chance that you're just doing something wrong
I hope so ;-)



When you get the "No .rockbox directory" error, does the File browser show any files at all? Are they files from the SD, NAND, or none at all?
Good point - NAND only.

What *I* did was:

1. Build bootloader from r21979
2. Patch it into a Cowon firmware using mktccboot (I use firmware 1.11)
3. Flash it to the D2
4. Unzip rockbox.zip r21884 from the build service to the root of my SD card.

EDIT2: Also, what font was the error displayed in?I don't know - browsing Settings->Theme->Font does nothing... other than make the battery icon flash in the corner (!).
It is a fixed-width, roughly 6px font? (the same as the revision text on the bottom of the bootloader screen)


Just a thought, it's possible that this change broke it:

http://svn.rockbox.org/viewvc.cgi?view=rev;revision=21981

I haven't tested this change yet since I was at work when he committed it. I'll check and see...

EDIT: Yes, confirmed here too. Until it's fixed, make sure you use a version between r21976-r21980.

Uhhh, not sure how that could have affected it, since I haven't used any revision later than 21979?

[shotofadds]

Except you said in your first post:

The Rockbox build I am using is 21884, since that is what I get from http://build.rockbox.org/dist/build-cowond2/rockbox.zip (http://build.rockbox.org/dist/build-cowond2/rockbox.zip)

Unfortunately, I don't know how to fix it so you'll have to use an older version for now (eg. do "svn up -r21976" before building and you should be ok).

EDIT: You'll get 21984 from that link, not 21884.

[kulhous]

For me it's 100% stable and functional. I used this procedure
1. copied .rockbox (recent release) to SD root (and deleted the one I had on the internal memory. I read it should be either on IM or on SD)
2. flashed to 2.11
3. used recently uploaded patched 2.11 fw (from "how to" topic)
4. booted RB as usual
For me it's really milestone of D2 RB:). I appriciate constant enthusiasm of our developers[thumbsup]

NB: when I switch on D2 and boot RB, display shows first splashscreen of RB "boot version 21979" and than changes to second with "version 21977" both with today's date. Is that normal? (I assume that first splash is from bootloader and second from RB itself)

[andrewthecoder]

Unfortunately, I don't know how to fix it so you'll have to use an older version for now (eg. do "svn up r21976" before building and you should be ok).

EDIT: You'll get 21984 from that link, not 21884.

Nope, I definitely get 21884 from that link.

Which tells me two things;
1) I am an idiot for not realizing that was an old revision in the first place
Obviously that revision is too old (no SD support, hence my problems - the bootloader loaded the binary but rockbox was looking for files on the internal memory)

2) The link I was using is not providing the latest, but revision 21884 - http://build.rockbox.org/dist/build-cowond2/rockbox.zip
Not sure why that is, but the current link (from the dev page) is http://build.rockbox.org/data/rockbox-cowond2.zip and seems to work fine.
I wonder why it was changed...?

Anyway, having copied my own build to my SD card, all works perfectly =)
Thankyou very very much - as I use 32GB SD cards, this now means I can switch fully to Rockbox on my player!

Just to clarify, I did;

linux-pzb8:~/rockbox # svn update
linux-pzb8:~/rockbox # cd devel-d2-build
linux-pzb8:~/rockbox/devel-d2-build # make
linux-pzb8:~/rockbox/devel-d2-build # make zip
linux-pzb8:~/rockbox/devel-d2-build # unzip rockbox.zip -d /media/32GB_SDHC_2
linux-pzb8:~/rockbox/devel-d2-build # umount /dev/sdc1
Also, I'm not sure how you "confirmed" that gevearts' r21981 broke something, but 21984 is working perfectly right now for me on my SD card.

[Biaxident]

I had the same expirience as andrewthecoder first post and I followed his guide.
tried on kingston 16GB.
I only see folders from internal memory when in "file"
says 21979 build when loading firmware, but says 21884 in system/rockbox info

any other info I can provide that should help?

[andrewthecoder]

@Biaxident: Please re-do step 5, I have updated the link =)

[shotofadds]

Right, there's a whole load of issues here.

1) The Rockbox build system changed a few days ago, and you're quite right, that link no longer works (how stupid of me, I was confused by the version number!). I need to change all the references to this now. [sad]

2) When I updated to r21981 my D2 did not boot properly from the SD card I was using. It hangs for at least 10 seconds, and then boots from the internal memory only.

3) This seems to because my 16Gb SDHC is destroyed. It doesn't work in a PC card reader either. Other cards work fine in the D2. Not happy at all. [cursing] [cursing] [cursing]

Moral of the story:

BE EXTREMELY CAREFUL WHICH CARDS YOU USE. EXPECT THINGS TO GO WRONG. YOU RUN THE RISK OF DESTROYING YOUR CARDS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

Please don't use any valuable cards with Rockbox until this driver has seen plenty more testing and we have more confidence in it.

[andrewthecoder]

1) Ah, ok, well they probably ought to stop the old link from working, or at least redirect. (else there could be a *lot* of confusion)

2/3) Uh oh, that's not too good. That said, I really can't see how the driver could totally screw a card like that - short of applying too high/low voltages, the controller inside the SD card itself should not be affected by anything the computer sends to it.

I have two spare 16GB cards which work, but don't have the plastic case, if that would help you at all? I don't have any plastic cases to put them in so can't use them (they work in my usb card reader if I hold them in the right position)

Well, I've updated my guide to have a big warning at the top - I would have removed the mention of SD cards completely and reverted to read-only internal instructions, but I figured the SD driver isn't going to see much more testing unless other brave/nonchalant/ignorant people try it and report any problems that may occur, right?
(besides, I've been playing music from my 32GB SDHC in Rockbox for the past hour with no problems)

P.S - I have an unrelated irk which I am wondering if you have ever experienced; on the WPS, there is a straight-ish, 2 pixel-ish, multicoloured pixelated line across the screen, from far left to far right, just above the progress bar. It is not affected by the SD card. It is very strange, I would expect a quirk like that to at least be straight, but this seems to be slightly wavy (by a few pixels either direction in places)
I'll take a photo of it and try out a few revisions to try and narrow it down.

[Biaxident]

@Biaxident: Please re-do step 5, I have updated the link =)

works fine now!
it reads files form internal and external.
the screen sometimes flashes, not sure it this is a known problem.
thank you two so much :)

[andrewthecoder]

Please make sure you read the text in BID RED LETTERS at the top of the guide ;)

[bkd11]

First of all I want to thank you for all your hard work. I sure picked a bad day to forget my d2. I've been waiting for this day since the Rockbox "hello world" was first booted on the d2. I will definitly be testing this tonight when I get home. [thumbsup]

This seems to because my 16Gb SDHC is destroyed.
Sorry to hear about your card. If you set up a PayPal donation link i'm sure people (myself included) would be willing to help you replace it.
Just wondering if you tried the Panasonic formatting tool (http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/sd/download/sd_formatter.html) to see if that could recognize your card.

[Biaxident]

Please make sure you read the text in BID RED LETTERS at the top of the guide ;)

yeah, didn't bother to read at first because I was hyped, I'll wait for more testing form others before I'll switch rockbox again.
worked for me for that little while though.

sorry to hear about your card shotofadds, I'll be glad to help it the way bkd11 suggested.

[kulhous]

...Sorry to hear about your card. If you set up a PayPal donation link i'm sure people (myself included) would be willing to help you replace it...
I had same idea, when I read it...

[shotofadds]

2/3) Uh oh, that's not too good. That said, I really can't see how the driver could totally screw a card like that - short of applying too high/low voltages, the controller inside the SD card itself should not be affected by anything the computer sends to it.
Yeah, I really don't understand what could have caused this. It's possible I yanked the card while it was being accessed or something, but I just don't know. We'll just have to see if there are other reports of this, and if so make the warnings even bigger and redder... [blink]

I have two spare 16GB cards which work, but don't have the plastic case, if that would help you at all? I don't have any plastic cases to put them in so can't use them (they work in my usb card reader if I hold them in the right position)
Well, they're not going to be much use unless there's a way to get them back inside the plastic casing. I didn't even know it was possible to open an SD card without destroying it...

Well, I've updated my guide to have a big warning at the top - I would have removed the mention of SD cards completely and reverted to read-only internal instructions, but I figured the SD driver isn't going to see much more testing unless other brave/nonchalant/ignorant people try it and report any problems that may occur, right?

I think that's the best thing right now, yes.

(besides, I've been playing music from my 32GB SDHC in Rockbox for the past hour with no problems)
Well, until now this 16Gb card was working for all of last week, and I managed to do a solid 18hr battery_bench test from another 512Mb card. I'm not sure what to make of it.


P.S - I have an unrelated irk which I am wondering if you have ever experienced; on the WPS, there is a straight-ish, 2 pixel-ish, multicoloured pixelated line across the screen, from far left to far right, just above the progress bar. It is not affected by the SD card. It is very strange, I would expect a quirk like that to at least be straight, but this seems to be slightly wavy (by a few pixels either direction in places)

Yeah, that's an unrelated bug introduced in r21978. Should be fixed now.

[shotofadds]

To those of you who wanted to make a small donation, thank you for your generosity. If you use <link removed>, I will take it down again if/when it raises enough to replace my 16Gb Transcend card. I hope none of you suffer similar problems.

[kulhous]

To those of you who wanted to make a small donation, thank you for your generosity. If you use this link (https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=6925521), I will take it down again if/when it raises enough to replace my 16Gb Transcend card. I hope none of you suffer similar problems.
3 pounds from me (i am student without work:( ) are on way:)

[bkd11]

And 5 more from me.:)

[shotofadds]

Thanks everyone, it's really appreciated. I will take the link down now as I've got almost enough to replace the card, and I don't want to be seen as doing this for money. I just hope not to make the same mistake in future...

[Biaxident]

and 5 from me.
:)

edit: wow, that was fast.

[andrewthecoder]

Yeah, I really don't understand what could have caused this. It's possible I yanked the card while it was being accessed or something, but I just don't know.
Does if you connect the reader with the card in it to a linux system, does dmesg show anything?
I would like to try and narrow this down a little, since I'm actually pretty sure there isn't any way Rockbox could have caused your card to die.
How old is the card? I mean, how much usage has it had? I've had an SD card die in a similar way - I began to see bad blocks first, so I figured the flash memory was coming to the end of it's life, after about four years of heavy usage. Turns out I was right - it is now a rectangular bit of plastic with the corner cut off, and nothing more.


Well, they're not going to be much use unless there's a way to get them back inside the plastic casing. I didn't even know it was possible to open an SD card without destroying it...
Yeah, it certainly is - a sharp knife to slice along one edge, and the insanely-thin PCB comes out. in 32GB cards, it is double-sided, two chips per side, on 16GB ones it depends how expensive they were, and on all lesser it is single sided.
There doesn't seem to be anywhere easy-to-find documenting it on the web, but I have repaired at least 15 "crushed" SD cards by simply removing the PCB and putting it inside an equal-thickness plastic case, with a tiny dab of superglue to hold it together.
The PCBs are actually incredibly robust - I've had a few send to me as "damaged" which have clearly been stood on with a hard heel, or some other hard, heavy object, as the plastic case is crushed beyond recognition, or hanging off. The memory still works fine though.
I've even put one of my 32GB ones through a wash/dry sequence in a pair of jeans and it works fine!

For the two 16GB ones I have right now, I have two second hand 128MB SD cards in the mail, when they arrive I'll do them up and probably sell the cards on.


Well, until now this 16Gb card was working for all of last week, and I managed to do a solid 18hr battery_bench test from another 512Mb card. I'm not sure what to make of it.

If the card is useless to you now, would you be willing to post it to me? I would happily swap the case over and send you back a working 16GB card.


Yeah, that's an unrelated bug introduced in r21978. Should be fixed now.
Awesome. Thanks =)

[bkd11]

Well so far so good. Works great with my 16GB A-Data sdhc! (Crossing my fingers). Hopefully shotofadds' card going out was just a fluke. I guess we will find out in the next few days if it happens to anyone else.

I gotta say though now that we have read/write capability, I think rockbox will now be a complete replacement to the official firmware for me. :D With the exception of video, which I don't use too often.

[shotofadds]

Does if you connect the reader with the card in it to a linux system, does dmesg show anything?
I didn't actually try (can do later). I did some testing in Rockbox using the low-level SD card commands, and the card just refuses the power up and does not respond to any other commands. I think it's dead. [cry]
How old is the card? I mean, how much usage has it had? I've had an SD card die in a similar way - I began to see bad blocks first, so I figured the flash memory was coming to the end of it's life, after about four years of heavy usage. Turns out I was right - it is now a rectangular bit of plastic with the corner cut off, and nothing more.
It's only about a week old - I guess there's a chance it was just a dud from the start. I should try getting a warranty replacement (note: if this is successful I will use any money donated to buy something else D2-related, eg. line-in, TV-out cables).

The PCBs are actually incredibly robust - I've had a few send to me as "damaged" which have clearly been stood on with a hard heel, or some other hard, heavy object, as the plastic case is crushed beyond recognition, or hanging off. The memory still works fine though.I guess the difficulty is finding replacement cases. No wonder companies manage to flog so many "refurbished" items if it's as easy as this!

If the card is useless to you now, would you be willing to post it to me? I would happily swap the case over and send you back a working 16GB card.I also have another dead card which I can send you. I killed this one right at the start of my SD driver experiments when I managed to send completely the wrong set of driver commands to it. It didn't like that. [no]

[andrewthecoder]

I didn't actually try (can do later).
Definitely worth it - if dmesg shows nothing, then the card is completely screwed.


I guess the difficulty is finding replacement cases. No wonder companies manage to flog so many "refurbished" items if it's as easy as this!

Yeah, definitely - not so much finding cases, but finding cases that belonged to cards of the right thickness - too thin and the circuit won't fit, too thick and it rattles around and doesn't make a proper contact.


I also have another dead card which I can send you. I killed this one right at the start of my SD driver experiments when I managed to send completely the wrong set of driver commands to it. It didn't like that. [no]
Well if you feel like posting them, i'm sure the 30p postage would be worth it for two working 16GB cards =)

I'm now beginning to wonder if I should investigate SD cards better - if you are sure you wrecked that card by sending the wrong commands to it, then my confidence needs to be re-assessed. ;)

[paulr]

I have a bunch of 2gb and a few smaller and larger cards that I can donate some of if it will help rockbox d2 development.

[MoMonster]

It works fine with my 16gb Transcend card.

Thank you sooo much for this update, shotofadds [thumbsup][thumbsup][thumbsup]

If I run into any problems, I'll report back if that's all I can do to help[blush]

[Voluspa]

Nice work Rob,

No problems yet with r21996-090722 on a SanDisk Ultra II 1 gig. Will yell if something crops up, of course. Think I'll try a Transcend 16 gig in a week or so (the damn thing cost me ca 150 euros when new, so has a bit of sentimental value ;-)

[shotofadds]

Best not to use this too much - I've had another report of a damaged card, so I'm no longer the only one with bad luck..

I've disabled the SD driver in current builds until we figure out what the problem is. Sorry guys (and gals)!

[Voluspa]

Best not to use this too much

Yeah, I snuck a peek on the IRC logs. Though I would have used a partition editor instead of trying to access the card with fdisk or doing dd-s. A real low level hammer needed there.

His card wasn't electrically 'dead' like yours. And I definitely would have used a card reader (I know, he didn't have one) instead of going through the D2 for access.

Ah well, I'll try and load stuff on the 1 gig card (both through the D2 and an USB reader), then muck around with database init etc - trying my very best to trigger that kernel panic. Perhaps I'll get lucky/sorry.

[shotofadds]

His card was definitely dead, just in a different way. There's not much a partition editor can do if the card physically refuses to read sectors.

I have a suspicion that these problems only happen when the card is left in the D2 while Rockbox is shut down and restarted. It could be something along the lines of not shutting down the power supply properly, resulting in a spike in voltage which the card can't handle. But that's just speculation, it could be something else entirely.

My reason for thinking this is because I managed to run a whole battery_bench test from the SD card, which involved playing music from the card and writing a log file periodically until the battery ran down. It lasted 17h:45* with no corruption to the card, so just running Rockbox normally certainly isn't the problem.

I will look into it, but I'm not quite sure how to test this theory effectively. In the meantime I would advise inserting the card only once you have booted up, and then remove the card before you shut down Rockbox.

* this isn't a particularly great runtime figure. However my D2 battery is 18 months old and probably isn't at the peak of its life. I also haven't made any attempt to optimize battery life in Rockbox yet. So don't worry about that!

[dO_Ob]

Here's my experiences with SD support in D2 port.

After running rb off of 16GB Transcend card for about a week, got the panic saying it couldn't write fat_something (wanted to grep the sources but forgot). Anyways fsck says the FS got severly fscked up. The card is still alive though.

I thought I'd better off running a 4GB microSD card for the time being, copied .rockbox dir, and got another FS related oops straight away (I was in a hurry, so can't be more specific, sorry). Afterwards rb was running for ~8hr without incidents. Got home, fsck'ed the card and the only complaint was about 'Free cluster summary wrong (4294967295 vs. really 96623)', so I take it as lightly fscked up. I'll be keeping an eye on it.

Oh, while on 16GB card I ran battery_bench two times and it was ~17.5hrs both times and I bought this D2 couple of moths ago.

[Voluspa]

Just from normal playing I see that rockbox drains the battery significantly, but that's a problem for later as Rob says.

I've now done database tests on the 1 gig SanDisk Ultra II. Not a hickup. Rock solid.

I used four different music collections (9 mp3 albums, 2 flac albums, 32 mp3 albums, 2 flac albums) and copied one to the D2 internal memory and one to the SD card - alternating collections between the runs. The D2 also had its usual internal collections untouched (ca 6 gig).

After the copying, rockbox was booted and the database created by going to Settings -> General Settings -> Database -> Initialize Now. Then rockbox had to be rebooted (don't know why that must be done) and the database was committed successfully.

I did that time-consuming exercise six times.

The next five times I choose not to copy any files and just delete the database by "rm -f /media/disk/.rockbox/database_*" on the SD card in a USB reader. When clicking the menu Database I was asked if it should be created, yes, and then reboot etc...

The default options in the database settings menu were used.

I'll use the player normally now :-)

[darkwolf2008]

forgiveness for the English, I tried to install the new version of rockbox with the ability to read and write sd cards, tracking all steps in a strict, but the message still appears not. rockbox directory, incomplete installation, I tried to please all files . rockbox and nothing happens u.u

Please help me

Edit : use the version rockbox-20090720-cowond2 of rockbox and it works: D seem to have to be the same version of the bootloader osea 21076

[shotofadds]

The SD driver is disabled in current builds because it can damage your cards. If you are gonig to try an older build, please be careful and only use cards that you don't mind losing!

[Snacho]

is there any way to enable SD driver? if it exists, please explain it.

[m21rt]

Success![thumbsup] loaded it onto my 1 gig SD and have had complete success so far. All settings are saving and database was loaded sucessfuly. i plan on using rockbox much more in the future. this really makes it usable. I am using This (http://www.mediafire.com/?z4rjzzwwm5t) build (revision 21990) Running Fw 3.10 using bootloader andrewthecoder posted in his how to guide.

[bkd11]

is there any way to enable SD driver? if it exists, please explain it.
Simply use a build older than r21999 but newer that about r21972 like the one andrewthecoder has so graciously provided us under the SD Card section of his HOW TO: Install Rockbox (http://iaudiophile.net/forums/showthread.php?t=28773) guide.

[shotofadds]

Guys, don't forget the whole reason I disabled the driver in recent builds: it might fry your SD cards. [blink]

If you want to ignore the warnings and try an older build anyway, that's fine, but don't forget you have been warned.

[carmenm]

What happened shotofadds?
You disabled the sd drivers?
Does that mean we are back to the state we were before?

I dont mean it the bad way i just want to know if i have to put rockbox back on the memory in the alst build.

[TackyTiger]

What happened shotofadds?
You disabled the sd drivers?

Errr, your question was answered one post up from yours.

Guys, don't forget the whole reason I disabled the driver in recent builds: it might fry your SD cards. [blink]

[carmenm]

Errr, your question was answered one post up from yours.
That is not what i was asking, i wanted to know if the latest buid was in the exact same state as the ones o1 or 2 weeks ago.
I did see the driver was disabled

[Traveler0612]

Has anyone tried using the Panasonic formatter to recover a "fried" SDHC card?
It seems unlikely that code could physically damage a card.

[shotofadds]

Has anyone tried using the Panasonic formatter to recover a "fried" SDHC card?
That could only possibly work if the computer recognizes the SD card in the first place. When I say fried I mean it, no matter how unlikely it seems.

[vampire666]

[...]
It seems unlikely that code could physically damage a card.
Code can easily phisically damage things...just think of a program that can change the clock and tensions (vcore) of a CPU...you can easilly damage the cpu (same with graphic cards, ram, ecc...).
A SD card to function needs energy...feed the card with an unappropriated tension and you can damage it.
So code can damage things. [sad]

[shotofadds]

If you haven't seen it yet, I've posted a new SD-enabled build for testing over at the Rockbox forums. It's still very much "at your own risk" and you might still end up damaging your cards, so only try it if you're feeling brave and have an old card that you don't mind risking in the name of Rockbox progress!

[kulhous]

If you haven't seen it yet, I've posted a new SD-enabled build for testing over at the Rockbox forums. It's still very much "at your own risk" and you might still end up damaging your cards, so only try it if you're feeling brave and have an old card that you don't mind risking in the name of Rockbox progress!

Am I understanding well, that if I am just now using bootloader build 21979 and RB build 21977, an update to new test version will decrease the potential risk of damaging SD card? If then, should I update both bootloader and RB firmware, or just RB is enough? Thanks

[shotofadds]

Am I understanding well, that if I am just now using bootloader build 21979 and RB build 21977, an update to new test version will decrease the potential risk of damaging SD card?

Maybe, although I don't know how much the risk is reduced. It's a test build, so that is what I hope to find out! ;)

If then, should I update both bootloader and RB firmware, or just RB is enough? ThanksBoth is best, but if you already have an SD-enabled bootloader you won't see much difference since the only changes were to the shutdown mechanism, and the bootloader never shuts down...

[kulhous]

Fair enough...If the risk isn't increased it would be stupid not to update:)
---
Edit: working fine, no noticable difference, SD still working...

[darkwolf2008]

Hi, I could give the link of the new build compatible with SD Card please

[centerfold]

Got rockbox to work on my D2 (using 3.11+ firmwire), using my SDHC card.
It is super fantastic so far, but will see how it is a few days later.

However, now it won't play the music that's on the internal memory. : ( Is this supposed to happen, or is there a way around it?

If I select a song from the SD card first, all plays well, but the moment I choose a song from internal memory, the player will refuse to play any song from either memory. No error message, just it stops playing and will freeze if I use the power switch.

Edit: lol what would happen if I put a .rockbox directory in both the SD card and internal memory? Probably won't do anything I assume

[shotofadds]

I've not seen anything like that before, I can switch between tracks on the SD card and the internal memory fine. Anyone else having this problem?

[bkd11]

Edit: lol what would happen if I put a .rockbox directory in both the SD card and internal memory? Probably won't do anything I assume
Actually, that's the best way to have it. That way if you don't have an SD card inserted, it will still boot from the internal memory.

By the way, I've been testing this new build (r22056 with the SD driver enabled) using a Kingston 2gb microSD card with an adapter. Working great so far. I've been turning it on and off multiple times (trying to fry it) :P, but so far it continues to work error free.

[centerfold]

Well it looks like I've solved the problem haha.

Was solved by placing the normal .rockbox directory onto internal memory as well as having the SD .rockbox directory as well. Looks like my initial idea was the right one after all!

Worked so far using my 'testing' 512mb SD card, and now on my 16gb SDHC card as well (the one that I actually use).

Grrrrreeeatttttt work everyone! I also noticed that it also saves your preferences now! +1

[Snacho]

shotofadds (http://iaudiophile.net/forums/member.php?u=16454), does the sd-card problem come with the ability to write files on it? if it is, maybe a build with read-only sd-card would be better. i think many would enjoy it, if it leads to smaller risk.

[shotofadds]

I don't know if the problem is/was related to writing data to the card, so I'm not sure this would help.

There is already a testing build available at the Rockbox forums that has full read/write support, but I need to wait a week or two to see the results of the testing build before deciding what to do next.

If enough people test it and report no problems I will enable the SD driver in the main build again. Obviously if there are reports of damaged cards I will have to think again. [cry]

[Biaxident]

were there any more cases of burned SDs sines the new SD bootable reales?

[shotofadds]

Was solved by placing the normal .rockbox directory onto internal memory as well as having the SD .rockbox directory as well. Looks like my initial idea was the right one after all!
Hmm, that's not right. There have been a few cases of people not being able to boot from SD - if anyone else has this problem please let me know! I suspect I'm not waiting long enough for the card to power up or something, will need to do some more testing soon.
were there any more cases of burned SDs sines the new SD bootable reales?
No, there have been no reports of any dead cards using the new SD testing build. There have been one or two reports of filesystem corruption (chkdsk or re-format needed) but I don't know whether Rockbox was responsible for that.

[ezzieyguywuf]

I'm about 5 boots in and still no SDHC problems. I did notice that once while I was rapidly changing WPS in the settings, it corrupted the music file I was listening to and crashed the player anytime I tried to let it play that song. I will try to replicate and post the error code. It was a pretty specific error.

[Scarab]

i just "scrobbled" 45 songs to last.fm :D [thumbsup]
no problems so far (8 GB SDHC)

thanks shotofadds!!!

[nickschot]

oops wrong place

nothing was here....

[andrewthecoder]

i just "scrobbled" 45 songs to last.fm :D [thumbsup]
no problems so far (8 GB SDHC)

thanks shotofadds!!!

I just scrobbled 768 songs to last.fm :P
no problems for the last month (32 GB SDHC) [rolleyes]

thanks shotofadds!!!
(and paul stead; http://scrob.paulstead.com/)

[Elderbear]

So I've got 3.11 installed on my legacy D2, and have used Andrew the coder's appropriate bootloader and the latest rockbox, but find that if I try to use rockbox to play a shuffled playlist, with more than one album on it, it will play a cut or two, but rarely more than five before giving the high-pitched whistle and crashing. Maybe everyone else finds this no biggy, but I wonder if I'm having more of a problem than others using rockbox. Andrew seems to find this problem rare enough not to be worth much attention, but is it happening that often to him?

[andrewthecoder]

Well elderbear I don't use playlists or the database, I simply browse by folder and select the album I feel like listening to, so it is very possible I do not experience the same problems other people do.

Is the crash frequency the same if the files are on the internal memory?
What about if there isn't more than one album in the playlist?

Basically, can you provide more details? (be really anal about them ;))

[yitzc]

I'm having a problem with playlists.
Whenever I try to play a playlist, either just opening it through "Files" or through the Playlists/View Catalog, it will open the playlist, start playing the first song (the icon will become the "play" icon in the menu bar), stop (before playing anything - showing the "stop" icon instead of the "play" icon), and if I opened it through the "Files" view, it will also close the WPS.

Upon going to the "Resume Playback", it opens up the WPS, changes the icons from "stop" to "play" and immediately changes them back (from "play" to "stop"), and closes the WPS (returning to the main menu) without playing anything. I noticed (in the split second the WPS is on the screen) that it does not display the "next track" information (it's blank).
I know that it successfully loads the playlists (I tried a few) because it shows all the tracks (correctly) when I go to Playlists\View Current Playlist.

My music is on the D2's internal memory and rockbox is on the SD (a 256mb one).
The lines of the playlist are like this: \<microSD1>\Music\**Artist**\**Album**\**Song**, with about 400 files.
My songs are all mp3s or ogg, and I'm running r224466-090821 that I downloaded from andrewthecoders mediafire.

When copying the playlist and files to the rockbox simulator, and removing the \<microSD1> from every line in the playlist, it plays fine (in the simulator).

[Elderbear]

I have rockbox installed on the SD card, with the 3.11 bootloader in the D2 root. It appears that the problem I'm having is in having a playlist that has both mp3 and ogg files in it. The crash seems to occur either playing from the SD card or internal memory when I have put a full album into playlist, then "insert shuffled" another album in the other codec. It will play the first song and continue on the playlist until it comes to the first instance of the codec that isn't the one the first song is in. Then it crashes. On restarting, the second album, the one that was "inserted shuffled" will not appear on the "view current playlist list. On a single album with both codecs in it, it will crash when it reaches a cut that's in a different codec than it started in. In then trying to remove the playlist cuts one by one, it will crash and give the message "PANIC stkov codec" when one reaches the cut in the different codec from the first songs. It will not crash if the same procedure is followed with two albums in the same codec,either on internal or SD.

[andrewthecoder]

Bug. Hence "touch screen" is under "partially working" in the current status sticky.

[Elderbear]

So I've figured out how to use playlists despite the crashing when ogg and mp3 files are mixed. I open my SD card, where all the music is stored, use the windows search function to find "**.mp3 or ***.ogg, enque the results in winamp playlist, randomize it in the "sort" menu, save the playlist and put it into the playlist folder on the SD card. I can then play either the mp3 playlist or the ogg playlist from the catalog under the playlist menu on rockbox.

[shotofadds]

There is currently a bug that can cause a crash when playback switches between different track formats (eg. mp3 to ogg, etc). It'll be fixed soon.

btw. I'm not sure this is the right thread for playlist issues...

[paulr]

If anyone cares, I see Toshiba announced a 64gb SDXC card a few weeks ago, though it won't be available til spring and it will probably be a while longer before it becomes affordable. But it will be awesome if Rockbox can eventually support SDXC on the D2. 16GB D2 plus 32GB SDHC is already the highest capacity flash player available today (matched by 32GB Sansa View with 16gb Micro SDHC) but supporting 64gb expansion cards will pull the old D2 past everything else again.

[chromatose]

I've searched around and can't seem to find this exact problem mentioned anywhere else, or see it mentioned in any of the caveats on rockbox unless I'm overlooking it??

Whenever I unhook my D2 from my computer and go to boot into rockbox, I get the error about "installation incomplete" and "No .rockbox directory" and it boots into basic mode with no WPS and basic fonts and all that and can't recognize the SD card. I see other people have this problem too.

However, if I boot into the Cowon firmware and let the database refresh itself, then turn off the D2 and boot into rockbox it works perfectly and can read the SD card again. I don't receive the error ever again and everything is great until I reconnect the D2 to a PC, then can no longer get rockbox to successfully notice the SD card until loading the stock firmware once again.

What could be the reason for this?

[MartyLK]

I'm using a 16GB Lexar MicroSDHC with andrewthecoder's #2 Button config with no problems whatsoever. Everything is working as smoothly as the AMS Sansas Rockbox....which is to say, for me, it is as smooth as a Sony Walkman.

[shotofadds]

Whenever I unhook my D2 from my computer and go to boot into rockbox, I get the error about "installation incomplete" and "No .rockbox directory" and it boots into basic mode with no WPS and basic fonts and all that and can't recognize the SD card. I see other people have this problem too.

However, if I boot into the Cowon firmware and let the database refresh itself, then turn off the D2 and boot into rockbox it works perfectly and can read the SD card again.
I think Rockbox has a problem powering up certain SD cards. I'm waiting for one to arrive in the post, then I can test it out and hopefully fix it. It's unlikely to be anything wrong with the card, or anything you've done wrong.

[aussieg1]

Hi Shottofads

Have A 4gb Kingston mini. Works in camera works in cowon D2 with 3.11 but does not boot rockbox although 2 other cards do with the same rockbox folder

message is

ATA
mount
file not found

If you pm me i can send you the card from Australia

[darkwolf2008]

Hi Shottofads

Have A 4gb Kingston mini. Works in camera works in cowon D2 with 3.11 but does not boot rockbox although 2 other cards do with the same rockbox folder

message is

ATA
mount
file not found

If you pm me i can send you the card from Australia

The same trouble, im from Chile and have a 2 gb Kingston, works in everything but no in rockbox, I Have other 2 sd cards (sandisc and micro sd kingston) and work fine.

Thanks

[lordfrikk]

I think Rockbox has a problem powering up certain SD cards. I'm waiting for one to arrive in the post, then I can test it out and hopefully fix it. It's unlikely to be anything wrong with the card, or anything you've done wrong.

Will there be any progress on this one? I bought A-DATA 16GB and it shows the dreaded "Installation incomplete"... won't say I bought the card JUST because of Rockbox but it was part of the reason, so it'd be nice to have it working :(

[robbedoes007]

The same trouble, im from Chile and have a 2 gb Kingston, works in everything but no in rockbox, I Have other 2 sd cards (sandisc and micro sd kingston) and work fine.

Thanks
here also, but hot plug works.

[phunni]

I've come across 2 issues with SD cards since trying rockbox on my D2+

1) Any attempt to use a micro or mini card (which I have spare ones of) via an adapter doesn't work. When I try and boot into rockbox I get the file not found error.

2) After encountering that problem I started using my paltry 256Mb card that I had lying around. This worked but, obviously, left me with no space. Yesterday I tried my 32Gb Transcend card. Everything seems to work until I try and update or initialise the database. Then, whenever I try and use the database viewer I get:

Building Database... 2584 found (OFF to return)

It never seems to get past this message. This only happened with the 32Gb card - the 256Mb one presented no problems beyond being a pathetic size.

[shotofadds]

2) won't be because of the card, it'll be the database getting stuck on some of your files. It's really picky about certain ID3 tags, unfortunately I know next to nothing about that code so can't really help (other than to try starting from an empty card and adding tracks until you find the ones that cause the problem).

[phunni]

It looks like you're right. I actually only have one album on that card (most of my music is on the D2+ itself), but when I tried to delete it it looks like it's horribly corrupted.

Thanks for that.

[dmitankin]

After I broke my Transcend 16 GB SDHC card, I decided to stick with something cheaper and asked a friend who's into the mobile phone business to find me the smallest/cheapest SD card. He came up with this:

http://img718.imageshack.us/img718/1301/75780626.jpg
A 32MB SD card (no brand), which gave me the "ata mount, file not found" error.

I returned it and got a Nokia microSD with a Sandisk adapter that looks like this on the back:
http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/6571/sdhc.jpg
And it seems to work with rockbox.

Is there anyone that got rockbox running with a card that has less pins? If not then we can safely say these types of cards are not supported, so people should avoid them.

[lordfrikk]

Is there anyone that got rockbox running with a card that has less pins? If not then we can safely say these types of cards are not supported, so people should avoid them. My 16GB card has 9 pins and it doesn't work.

[Aevum]

wasnt that the differance between SD and MMC ? the extra 2 pins for encryption and DRM ?

[dmitankin]

I see. It seems I've been testing with MMC when I got the "ata mount, file not found" error.
I've always thought MMC has a different form-factor than SD, but I guess I've been wrong.
Thanks for the clarification.

Also I've been wondering: how is that message appearing on the screen if the card can't be read. It's not like the message and the image are embedded into the original firmware file when patched to load rockbox. All of it comes from the card, right? And if yes, then why all the other data can't be read?

[shotofadds]

Also I've been wondering: how is that message appearing on the screen if the card can't be read. It's not like the message and the image are embedded into the original firmware file when patched to load rockbox. All of it comes from the card, right? And if yes, then why all the other data can't be read?
No, the message and image are part of the Rockbox bootloader - that's what gets patched into the Cowon firmware.

[RaduSpeedy]

I installed RockBox on a 16 GB SanDisk Ultra II and all works perfect , very happy with it. I used the RButil app .

[vaughan]

Hi Andrew. First, thanks for all the great Rockbox help you've given here. I have a broken screen on my D2 so the flexibility of Rockbox has been a godsend. I have a D2 DAB flashed to a D2+ (3.13) running off a 16gb PNY SD. 3 problems which may or may not be card related:

1) it takes many attempts to get the bootloader installed (NAND error)

2) if I boot into Cowon firmware I then have to reinstall RB bootloader because I get NAND write error

3) RB never sees the internal drive (it reports that it isn't present)

Any ideas?

[Eriol1]

i'm not sure what build i'm using and i'm to lazy to check right now, but i've been using rockbox along with firmware 3.54 about as long as 3.54 exists. i copied the rockbox folder to 2 cards, both SDHC. a Sandisk 4 GB class 2 and a Kingston 8 GB class 4. (i also have an 8GB 30MB/s sandisk but i decided not to risk it...).
both cards worked fine with dual boot until recently when i tried viewing some photos from one of these cards on the D2 firmware. i could see the folders on the card but when i tried to enter the folder containing the pictures the player froze. this would happen every time but only with the pictures from the card. video and music on the card were fine, for a while. eventually the card stopped responding to the D2 firmware altogether while rockbox still worked.
i tried deleting, recopying, formatting but nothing worked, so i reinstalled the D2 firmware (3.54) without rockbox, and after copying all my files back i got my first DB corruption. i again reinstalled the firmware and recopied my files and now the player works fine and so do the cards. i don't have rockbox anymore...
if anyone experienced something similar and has any idea how to fix it... i would like to use rockbox again but i really need my cards working...

[robbedoes007]

The same trouble, im from Chile and have a 2 gb Kingston, works in everything but no in rockbox, I Have other 2 sd cards (sandisc and micro sd kingston) and work fine.

Thanks
LOL

Just copy the .rockbox to your ATA (SD card) and everything works just fine !!! (I just found out!)

[d(d_b)b]

I need help. I used Kingston 2 gb but nothing worked. I did everything according to rules but I couldnt turn on Rockbox.


So I am asking you. Which Card Should I buy (what brand, I want to buy 16 gb card))to user Rockbox without problems?

[zardoz]

I use a Sandisk 16GB micro SDHC with a Transcend microSD adaptor and it works fine

[andrewthecoder]

Something like this should do fine: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B001W1BSM0/
In theory there is no reason any card shouldn't work with Rockbox, if it isn't there's a chance you are doing something wrong :)
If anyone is certain they have a card which isn't compatible with Rockbox on the D2 in it's current state, I'd be grateful if they could PM me the details and I'll do a few checks with them to ensure it's a genuine incompatibility then update my first post with info, make a list of known cards which work and don't.

[shotofadds]

@andrewthecoder,

I was sent an ADATA 16Gb Turbo (Class 6) card by a Turkish user on here a few months ago, which I've confirmed definitely does have problems when used with Rockbox.

I did some testing and know what the problem is (the card fails to reinitialise between the bootloader and main Rockbox stages) but not why it happens or how best to fix it.

I'll look into it more eventually and will hopefully be able to find a fix. Sorry for the long absense - I've been kinda busy lately: I recently got engaged, got a new job and am in the process of buying a house.

For now I think the best advice is to stick to the "known" brands - Sandisk, Kingston, Transcend etc all seem good as far as I am aware.

[bkd11]

^^ First of all congratulations!

I just wanted to add I've been using that very card since the sdcard driver came out and I haven't seen this problem. ADATA 16Gb Turbo Class 6 bought off of newegg.com.

[andrewthecoder]

Wow, nice one shotofadds :)

I must admit I too have an A-Data 16GB "Turbo" which works perfectly, as have all the cards I own, so I can't be of any help.
I bought it from eBay, but I'm certain it isn't a fake as the packaging was sealed and looked identical to this: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AData/Turbo_Series_16GB_SDHC
Can't think why there would be any difference between my/bkd11's A-Data 16GB SDHC cards and the one you were sent to test though.

To everyone else, my post above still applies, I think making a database (however ad-hoc) of non-working cards could be very useful, even if just to guide people planning to buy a card to use with Rockbox on what not to buy.

[Ezraghast]

Congratulations shotofadds.

A-Data 32GB, working perfectly with Rockbox. See first post

[motorbit]

my adata 32 gb turbo class6 is working fine with rockbox, too.

edith says:

that card was bought at amazon, im pretty sure its an original.

some notes on what i did with my card, just in case it does matter:
the card worked fine right out of the box. when i first used it, i thought the poor transfer rates where the fault of the card where in fact it was the fault of the slow d2´s controller. so i used that panasonic tool to reformat it. didnt helped anything, best i could achive where even slower db-update times and transfer rates. so i finaly reformated it with the defaultparameters i googled. this restored the speeds the card have had when i unboxed it.
i dont know the parameters anymore, and from all i learned meanwhile its a verry bad idea to do this reformating thing at all. most sd cards will be shipped formated with optimal values already and these values varry with the cards size and depend on what flash chips are used.

[RaduSpeedy]

Still using the SanDisk Ultra II , 16GB , class 4
and never had a problem
Alles OK :D