Trouble with CF cards and XP... NEED HELP!!

[teresa_earnest]

I will try and describe my problem as best I can, but I am very

confused by this, so here goes...

I use 512 MB lexar CF cards in Large format (I know I know...Raw,

yada yada LOL ), and have always been able to get around 178 images

give or take. Recently while shooting an out of town wedding I

returned to my hotel to load the images on my laptop and burn them

to CD as I needed the cards for a wedding the following day. I

always use this laptop BTW. Well, I use XP, and depend on that

little window to pop-up asking me what I would like to do, View them

as a slideshow, save to a folder, etc etc. NO WINDOW. OK, no

biggie. I put the card in again, nothing. So I have to go the bass-

ackwards way of loading them, and open my USB drive that my card is

in and copy and paste them all to the folder I have set up in my

documents. This took forever!!! The card was divided into

subfolders. The worst part was now my cards were stuck at 120 pics

max at large format when formated. This just won't do. Any ideas

on what went wrong and how I can fix this?

 

I hope I have been clear on what the problem is, and I really

appreciate any help.

 

PS, please don't respond with this is why you don't shoot

digital.... I know there is a simple fix here. THANKS!

 

Sincerely,

Teresa

[davidmadsen]

Clear enough, I think. I know that my XP has stopped opening that window intermittently as well. I am not sure however why it ook longer to move them than normal. When the box does come up and you select "save to folder" it is only saving about two steps from manually doing it.

 

Images in subfolders on a CF card can effect how many pictures it can hold because you camera will only write to the one it is set up to write to. If the other folders have stuff in them there won't be as much room for the camera's folder.

 

Also, CF cards need to be formatted fairly frequently. If you have not done that recently, do. It will clean up file fragments that erasing won't get rid of.

 

Hope some of this helps.

[Ed_Ingold]

If you get 178 images on a 512 MB card, you must be saving JPEG files, which will vary in size, depending on the amount of detail in the image. I get 63 RAW files (D1x), regardless of the image content.

 

I don't think normal variations will cut the capacity down to 120 images. There must be something left on the card. XP may open a file recovery directory, which is wasted space for your purpose. There may also be indexing information stored in hidden files. XP is pretty innocuous if all you do is download images.

 

The key is to refrain from saving or erasing files on the card, or reformatting the card under XP. Instead, clean the card each time by formatting in the camera. That way, everything gets erased, and the shooting directory is set up.

[todd1664878707]

I always reformat the card prior to every wedding. I NEVER select "delete all images" or even delete single images from the card. I noticed one time that my card was segmented like you said and each folder contained only a fraction of what the whole card could hold. It happened because I put it in a second camera that created it's own folder when the camera wrote to it. I solved the problem simply be reformatting the card within my camera. Give it a try and let us know.

[teresa_earnest]

I too format my cards in-camera before each wedding. This is something with XP, it just has to be. I just don't know what it could be. I have to open the subfolders from my card reader drive, select all of the images and then copy and paste them in the folder of choice. This has to be done up to three times per card at 6-7 minutes per sub folder. It's a huge pain!! It's just no longer automated. Also folders I create now I cannot view as a slide show (the XP way). It's just not shown as an option.

 

Please keep the help coming, and let me know if I'm not being clear about my problem.

 

Teresa

 

PS, I will try formatting the cards in my 10D once I get Saturdays wedding off of these cards.

[nstock]

I use an external CF reader and then go to Windows Explorer and select the images and then copy them (right click after selecting all)and save them to a folder I have already created somewhere else on my HD.

 

I hate "pop up" windows and I prefer to do things manually so that is how I do it.

 

The Card gets reformatted in the camera.

[todd frederick]

I use Olympus cameras and Olympus indicates that the card should be reformated after every download, which I do.

 

On my laptop XP, I use a card reader and download directly through Windows Explorer: right click on "Start" and left click on "explore" and then I open the card (on my system "removable Disk F")and open the images, select all, and drag the images to the file I want under "My Pictures" and either "move" or "copy" them to the folder. I usually "copy" them first if it is a wedding, make a CD and then remove them from the card. For me that is quick and simple.

[todd frederick]

Nancy, we're mind reading here. Spooky!

[teresa_earnest]

my biggest problem 5s that 58 images are being eaten on my cards (5 of them!!) even though they are formatted in my camera. I would however prefer the ease of the pop-up window as this is what I am used to. Plus the card dividing the images into the subfolders makes it such a pain to drag each folder (with 700 images) to a file.

[gus1]

Teresa,

 

I believe you have two separate issues that you are dealing with and this may be causing your confusion. One issue is the that when you plug in your CF card into your USB card reader the application that you are use to using does not automatically start. The other issue is that your 512 MB cards do not appear to be storing as many JPEG images as it used to. These are not related to each other.

 

Issue #1 - In order to fix the first problem in Windows XP (I am assuming you are using Service Pack #2), first make sure that your card reader is plugged in to a USB port and one of your CF cards is in the card reader. Secondly, click on the "My Computer" icon. Thirdly, find the card reader in the list under "My Computer". Next, right-click the CF reader and select properties. In properties select the "Auto Play" tab. Finally, select the application that you were using to preview and copy the files from the CF card.

 

Issue #2 - I believe you are using the Canon 10D. As others stated, the number of JPEGs can vary. You may need to try a new CF card and see if this makes a difference. Also as others stated try re-formatting your cards with the camera. Additionally, you may need to use the menu function to restart numbering.

[mark_jacoby___raleigh__nc]

I think Gary may have your answer with the autorun function being turned off.

 

I turned this function off about a year ago to avoid some kind of problem (that I can't even recall what it was but it was bad). Now I open my destination folder, put my card into the reader, and under Start, Run, Browse, I select the drive and the file and drag the file over into the destitation folder. Takes about 2-3 minutes to copy the images.

 

Maybe this would work ok for you.

[KenPapai]

Nancy Stock has the best and most obvious answer. Occam's Razor. That is how I do it and I am a certified Windows expert (and have used and programmed every version since Windows 1.0 in 1985 and PC-DOS 1.1 in 1982!). Don't make such a BASIC part of your workflow so cumbersome.

[KenPapai]

(Todd F. reads a few minds)

[teresa_earnest]

Gary,

Thank for the advice,

I tried resetting the auto play function to no avail. Also, I am using a 20D. I had mentioned I would try formatting the cards in my 10D.

 

Everything has always been the same until one day 28 fewer images per card, and no autoplay. I am stumped! Also before my cards never had subfolders on them.

 

Thanks for all of the help. I will keep working on this.

[kapaniris]

I'm only guessing here, but maybe CF cards operate the same way as hard drives. When the O/S finds a bad sector, it marks it as bad and no longer writes to that part of it.<p>

I have 2 x 512 CF cards, same brand, same model bought at the same time. It's the only reason I can explain why a fresh format on both cards shows available room for 51 images on one and 52 images on the other (RAW).

[twmeyer]

When you access the card through "My Computer" you have multiple folders, even after formatting the card in camera? Has the card been used in different brands of camera? In an emergency I loaned a card to a friend with a Nikon (I use Fuji) and the second folder created for the Nikon files, could only be deleted in the computer. <p>Sometimes when my Fuji creates a new folder (after writting 9999 files to a folder a new one is created) The old folder has to be deleted in Windows. I then reformat the card in the camera, and all is well... t

[jo_bla]

CF cards as well as any card that has the ability to store memory when powering off is flash memory.

 

There are million and billions of silicon logic gates that store memory. Each gate stores a 1 or a 0 to store your information. The more gates the more memory. When a card is reformatted or erased all of the gates are reset to 0 or low state. I am not sure but there may be times where information is left in certian locations on the disk when using the delete function.

 

Reformatting a card resets the entire disk and in using a camera certain information the camera needs will be saved back on.

 

Reformatting works the same way for hard drives and other disks. There is really only two way to store information. On a disk using lasers or magnatism or silicon logic gates in portable cards. The memory in your computer uses logic gates as well but they are static meaning the data is lost when you power down.

 

A little 101 on memory devices.

[jo_bla]

I want to add that I use a card reader writer to upload my cannon images to my computer. I really recommend a card reader, they save on batteries and it takes a very short time to upload (This depends on your card).

 

I use my reader with XP. I put in my disk and it brings up picasa and automatically uploads the photos. I have the option checked remove photo's after uploading and I havn't had problems as of yet.

 

My Cannon manual told me to format new cards and should not need to be formatted again. I have done this and have never had any problems. I have a 512mb CF Card and take a lot of photo's. If any of you wanted to know I do photo restoration as well. Formatting as I can see is a good idea and won't hurt.