Hello.

I'm having issues with a SanDisk 16GB microSD card. This card works fine in devices outside of my N900, but the N900 itself seems to hate it - time out I/O errors all over the place.

This includes when reading the card on a PC when mounted in mass storage mode - the PC then has all the I/O errors too.
However if I stick the card in a card reader then I have no problems with it.

Is anyone else getting errors with their SD cards? I though perhaps the N900 didn't support them, but I've read on the forums that other people use them without issues. Naturally I'm concerned that it's in fact a problem with the N900's hardware now.

Is it an SD/HC card?

I've heard of a few instances where people are having problems with SanDisk cards, but I believe the card has to be SD/HC if it's above 2GB capacity.

There's one or two threads on here http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=13531 and a couple on Nokia Support Discussions.

Yes - it's SDHC class 2. I've seen that thread, but it relates to the N810.
Most people seem not to have issues with their 16GB cards. I was just wondering if it could be a SanDisk specific issue, or a dodgy N900.

Hmmmm. Strange one.
Have you had a close look at the contacts in the memory card slot? Maybe one of these could be slightly out of shape, also try giving them a gentle clean with a pencil eraser, and maybe do the same to the contacts on the back of the card. See how that fares up.

And try starting x-terminal and typing: dmesg | grep mmc0 and see what it reports.

I take it the magnet on the back cover of your N900 is OK. Other than the above, you could have a hardware problem with the 900.

Sounds a bit drastic, but not sure if reflashing the 900 will fix the issue.

P.S. Sorry for leading you off to an 810 thread, should have checked that before posting the link.

Yes, I've cleaned the contacts and the magnet is firmly in place.
I've tried a 4GB card and that works fine. I wonder if perhaps class 2 is too slow?

The dmesg suggests timeout errors:


[83775.788574] mmcblk1: error -110 sending status comand<3>mmcblk1: error -110 sending read/write command, response 0x0, card status 0x0
[83775.788635] mmcblk1: error -110 transferring data, sector 10403861, nr 3, card status 0x0
[83775.788635] end_request: I/O error, dev mmcblk1, sector 10403861


It's a bit of a nonsense.

I'm suffering the same problem with one SD card, a card that works without problem in all my phones (Symbian and Android)

What seems more irritating is that I appear to be able to write and read to/from the card using DD without problem.. only filesystem actions seem to be affected..

the unix-engineer in me tells me it isn't specifically file system actions that are failing, as that in itself is gibberish..I expect it is certain actions that filesystem drivers are performing that cause the incredibly descriptive -110 error.

sequential read/writes don't appear to suffer, something else does..

my "faulty" card is type 2, but other type 2 cards work.. most are 16 gig, some eight though..

Just have one card with a problem..

(edit: all the cards are sandisk cards.. )

Same problem with my San Disk 16gb SDHC card. I can only use it with my Card reader.

I have issues with my 16gb sandisk card, specifically with the music player. The card is always recognized and can be read from the file manager but it seems every day or two the music player (i only have music files on the card) can't find the card and I have to reboot.

ive had no probs with my sandisk sdhc 16gb card and have used it for over a year
there is a free windows tool i found from the sd website that removed the partition from my card that nitdroid put there, i just ran a format that took over an hour, maybe formating with that tool will fix your card, as i think the formatting was much deeper than the windows format tool

Just to add..

The card I'm suffering with is in fact a Sandisk 32gig card..

The card works in my (symbian) Nokia N97, 5800
The card works in my Android Nexus one
The card works in all my card readers (Windows, Mac and Linux.. various hardware)

The card works in a Fuji Camera (via microsd to sd adapter)

The card does not work correctly in my N900 or a friend's N900

I believe the card works correctly when mounted read only, it seems the errors occur after the first write action (which itself occurs when the card is mounted, before an filesystem copy/move actions occur).. I'll double check that later..

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/mmcblk1 bs=1024k
dd of=/dev/null if=/dev/mmcblk1 bs=1024k
both ran without problems provided the card was not mounted first.

I've not tried using the card in mass storage mode via the N900.. I suspect errors might occur though as the problem appears to be the mmc controller

The fact the card a) does not work in two N900 systems and b) is a not officially supported 32gig size may suggest I'm pushing my luck or that the fault is on the card..

The fact the card has worked in about 8 or so other devices (phones, cameras, other) just irritates me more.. I swear the Nokia tablets have had crummy mmc interface equipment / drivers..

my investigation continues (and I may raise an RMA for the card)

All my other SD cards (2,8 and 16, various classes, all Sandisk) appear to work without problems in the N900

Since OP reports problems with a 16 gig card, I get the feeling some cards under some circumstances won't work.. and the N900, as previous tablets were, is just too fussy