Hacking Corrupted microSD still readable by R4

Princess21 · Dec 21, 2010

I have a problem with the microSD card I put into my R4, and I don't know where exactly to go for help.

My computer won't recognise it in windows explorer unless I use Device Manager to disable and then enable it again, and then it tells me to format the card before using it.
My DS can still read the card through the R4, so I know I haven't lost the data, but I still can't access the files on the computer.

All I want is to extract the save files to backup, then I can format the card properly.
If you want more info, just ask.

Please help, I don't have the IT skills to fix this myself.

boktor666 · Dec 21, 2010

Hmm, intresting. The SD card should be fine though, if it can be read by the R4. It's quite simple tough.

Step 1: Open that card on the computer, like you do.
Step 2: Select everything from the card, copy it to a folder where you can find the games, saves and firmware you just copied.
step 3: Go to My Computer, and look for the card (if it can be found)
step 4: If you have found your drive, right click (right mouse button) on the drive (its a letter, like L, K J, or something)
Step 5: A menu will pop up, look for the format button.
step 6: Always choose FAT or FAT 32!!!!!

This should do nicely, if you did it right, your card should be formatted. Questions? PM me

GH0ST · Dec 21, 2010

I assume you system is windows and I guess the logical partition of your card was damaged. It happens from time to time after a freeze by example or after some wrong write operation on the card (Windows error message is usually The type of the file system is RAW or The disk in drive X is not formatted ). It happens when the tables of the card were messed up.

You can recover your card usually with TestDisk ( a powerful free data recovery software! It was primarily designed to help recover lost partitions and/or make non-booting disks bootable again )

It is no as hard as it looks ( you just need to read carefully and choose the drive attached to your card ... don't mess with your windows system disk )

The win version is attached below: decompress the archive and run testdisk_win.exe from the win folder.

Choose Create (log file) than Select the FlashDisk ( usually the last partition in the list you can check the name and size in MB to be sure ) with arrows and enter to proceed than Select Intel type and than Analyse (answer Yes for Vista type Analyse)

See http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Step_By_Step for assistance with screens.

You can check http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/Data_Recovery_Examples and if nothing else is wrong you should recover your card like in the first example.

PM me for online assistance if needed.

If it looks to hard for you... you better simply reformat the card. If you have access to a linux system like Ubuntu try to read the card ( even if it fails in windows there is a chance the card is readable ) and backup your datas before reformatting.

Always format with SDFormatter a dedicated utility for SDcards ( http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/sd/download/index.html or http://filetrip.net/f10976-SDFormatter-Version-3-0BETA.html )

http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk-6.11.3.win.zip

Princess21 · Dec 28, 2010

Thankyou boktor666, but it wasn't being recognised by the computer at all, so opening the card on the computer shouldn't have helped. GHOST's idea sounded more spot on, as the card had corrupted after I had been trying to write a file to the card. And yes I use Windows... Vista :{

However...

It's strange, I put the card into the computer and did my usual thing that I do with my spare SD card to get it working (uninstall and reinstall driver, swap card reader, disable and enable card reader... pain in the ass to do this everytime I plug it in).

For some reason it was able to read the data on the disk.
As you might have guessed, I quickly took the saves only off the card, as the roms and firmware were already backed up on the computer. I formatted it after that, and didn't touch it again.

I don't know why it works now, but thankyou to you both for your help.

GHOST, sorry I wasn't able to try your method, but I bet it would have worked. I'll keep your answer in my back pocket just in case this happens again, and it might.

Hats off and kudos to you both,
Princess21

Hacking Corrupted microSD still readable by R4

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