Galaxy S4 Micro SD Card Unmounting During Boot

[CCNasty]

I haven't seen an update yet, do they differ by carrier?

I'm brand new to the droid world, have the S4 but with all these problems with sd cards wished I bought the 32g phone instead. Should of did some reading prior to my 14 day return policy that just expired, geez.

Most of the above problems seem to be with the 64gig cards, maybe ill just buy the Samsung 32gig. Would prefer 64 of course but I don't see any updates on my Verizon phone.

Any thoughts?

 

[samgamgee84]

I know this sounds silly, but I got desperate and took off the blue pieces of tape covering both the microSD and SIM card slots. Since then, I haven't had that error after a reboot. I even had the message pop up after the latest OTA update, before I took the tape off. Try it, can't hurt.

 

[XRayLexx]

Finally updated my S4 to the new version of firmware on Kies and since then I've done a couple of re-boots and the memory card hasn't unmounted. Fingers crossed all is fine.

 

[garublador]

I've rebooted a handful of times since the latest update without seeing this as well. I used to get it 1/2-2/3 of the times I rebooted.

 

[chisoxfan802]

Same here, I got a Samsung 64GB card and the new software update and so far things are working fine, about 5 days now.

 

[vijer]

This might be a design problem with Samsung Galaxy phones. My S3 kept giving me the same problem with a 32GB SanDisk, "the SD card is damaged or blank". It did that for about 3 months, then a couple days ago the SD card wouldn't work at all not even in my PC. So I though maybe the card really was the problem; I bought a Kingston 64GB card and thought the problem was solved. But in the last couple days I have had two problems with the card not functioning. I had to remove the card and put it in my PC (unmounting, mounting, rebooting, didn't solve the problem) and immediately got an error message that the card was damaged and needed to be scanned. Scanning found no problems. Back into the S3 and everything is working fine again. For how long though?!?

This is really nonsense considering a 64gb card costs $55 at retail, Samsung could just build 128gb into the phone, christ we already pay $600 for the phone what is $55 going to hurt.

 

[ZodiacKiller]

i have the same issue with the PNY 32gb class 10. Any fix for it yet?

Verizon GS4

 

[qxr]

Same problem here. Even exchanged my S4 for another...same problem. Tried another 32gb card still does it from time to time. My problem does not relate to rebooting. It is random but occurs more often when utilizing the camera or gallery. New to android and S4 so I do not have a lot of apps installed. Never experienced any hardware issues with my micro sd cards, each one I have tested on my laptops. I doubt the cards are the issue.

Posted via Android Central App

 

[markilou]

You're right this seems to be a Samsung issue more than a specific model.

I have similar issue with my S4 mini GTY-I9195; first tried with a Sandisk 64Gb where the problem was ocurring not only upon reboot but sometimes while I was playing music; I thought it was a card issue, went down to a 32Gb (also Sandisk ultra). It's now happening less often with the 32Gb but still happening, even after the mid August software update.

I also use iSyncr & Rocket Player but I don't think this has to do with it.

 

[chisoxfan802]

markilou, I also use Isyncr and Rocket Player. I think this causes the problem but is not the problem. It seems to me (and other posts I have read) that as soon as Isyncr starts to load lots of Music the Samsung S4 starts having SD card problems. After I got the Samsung 64GB card my problems decreased but did not go away. I still have problems where the Android Media Scanner runs for hours and drains the battery before I force it to stop. There is a setting in Isyncr to show when the media scanner is running. My workaround is to put a .nomedia file in my Isyncr folder on the SD card. This stops the media scanner from looking at the Isyncr folder, I can't use the Samsung music player but I don't care. It is interesting that Rocket Player can scan the music folder in minutes.

 

[markilou]

thanks for the advice chisoxfan802. I wrote iSyncr didn't have to do with it because I also tried using the phone and the 64Gb SD Card WITHOUT isyncr : I was using Spotify instead and the unmounting issue occurred again a couple times: interrupting the Spotify playback. I'll try the .nomedia in the isyncr folder on the SD Card though. Could you elaborate on how you create & place the file there ?

 

[chisoxfan802]

The .nomedia file is a text file with nothing in it named .nomedia. You can create one with windows and notepad. I use astro file manager to copy and paste the .nomedie file into Syncr folder. To get the original file I found one in one of the app folders and just copied it. Now I have a folder called nomedia on my root SD card with a .nomedia file in it. This way I always have one to copy just in case some app decides it should delete it. I hope this makes sense.

 

[and101an]

According to Sandisk support when I talked to them around June, 2013, and all over the Amazon reviews for months, is a known incompatibility between the Sandisk Ultra Micro SD cards (possibly others), and the Galaxy phones (possibly others). The card can "fail" any time from days to many months down the road. Sandisk says that Samsung won't admit it, and so Sandisk created a ROM patch that is applied only during manufacturing, to circumvent the problem.

Contact Sandisk for free replacement. I was told that the new card batch started after March, 2013, but the only way to tell, is based on a small serial number on the card, that requires a magnifying glass, if you can even then read it.

I do not know if other cards from other mfgs are involved, but Sandisk says they have stepped in and solved it on theirs. Good luck!

 

[SharpShark]

Same problem with my Patriot Signature 64GB Class 10, though it doesn't seem damaged yet. It reads fine on my PC. I have the feeling that it happens when I play HD movies. The micro SD card can get really hot. Perhaps my thick silicon/plastic case isn't helping.

 

[vvulture]

Similar thing happening here.. I have a S4 Mini DUOS and will not accept 64gb cards.. Phone gets hot when charging and freezes. When using a 32gb card it works just fine.. The 64gb card i tested is a Sandisk Ultra and it tested fine on my PC using H2testw 1.4 .

 

[JammyBap]

Ive had the same problem with randomly unmounting micro SD cards on my Galaxy s4. I checked every forum I could find, but there was no solution. I wedged bits of paper under the memory card, formatted it with different programs, tried different sizes and different brands of memory card, but nothing worked.
Last week I installed 2 custom roms, cyanogenmod and slimbean. Neither one of these roms had any memory card problems whatsoever, so I think it's pretty obvious that it's a problem with the stock samsung software. Just install a different rom, and everything works. Its a bit of hassle, but it's better than frying your memory card and/or losing irreplaceable files.

 

[GalaxyUser1]

Hi, I've been having the same problem everyone else on this forum has - a "damaged" sd card on a reboot. I was wondering how to exactly install a new rom to hopefully fix this problem. Any help is appreciated!

 

[Glenn Soltes]

Sadly I know exactly what the problem is as I tested many 64gb cards ..... and the solution is simple

The problem is Google's and they will not fix it because they are in a conflict of interest situation ..... it happens with the Galaxy S3 too.

The problem is this the Android program mediaserver ....... mediaserver is horribly bugged and when it ties to catalog a MP3 collection of any complexity it corrupts the card.

Google will not fix this as they do not want you to store music on the phone .... they want to force you to use their on line music services.

The only solution is to store all your music in one directory and add a .nomedia file to it. Then media server will skip this directory and you will have no problems with 64gb cards in the S3 or S4 unless you try to write files with a old SD reader that doesn't support 64GB .... that will immediately destroy all the data.

But to do this you need to use PowerAmp or another MP3 player that catalogs its own files and ignores .nomedia... The stock player will not work

Be wary about updating Android as Google will eventually figure this out and simply disable .nomedia support so the S3 and S4 will not be able to use 64GB cards for music ..... this will force you to use Google Music or the like.

Why do you think every smartphone company except Samsung and Sony have abandoned microSD? Google and all the other smartphone makers hate microSD because it is way better than the on-line services they are flogging...

You may say micro SD is buggy and unnecessary ..... it isn't the slightest but buggy if you disable mediaserver .... my Sandisk hasn't had a single issue for almost 8 months once I prevented mediaserver from cataloging my MP3s.... before I did this my SD card wasn't stable for 1hour.

Once you have your entire MP3 collection on a microSD card you never sync again and your music is always right there and cataloged ..... nothing can compete with that.

If you have issues with your card unmounting on boot it is because you have apps moved to the microSD card. On a S3 and S4 there should be no apps on the SD card anyway .... it is a very buggy feature and the #1 problem people have with micro SD. Just move all apps to main memory and this problem goes away.

 

[jay_dubb2k5]

Sadly I know exactly what the problem is as I tested many 64gb cards ..... and the solution is simple

The problem is Google's and they will not fix it because they are in a conflict of interest situation ..... it happens with the Galaxy S3 too.

The problem is this the Android program mediaserver ....... mediaserver is horribly bugged and when it ties to catalog a MP3 collection of any complexity it corrupts the card.

Google will not fix this as they do not want you to store music on the phone .... they want to force you to use their on line music services.

The only solution is to store all your music in one directory and add a .nomedia file to it. Then media server will skip this directory and you will have no problems with 64gb cards in the S3 or S4 unless you try to write files with a old SD reader that doesn't support 64GB .... that will immediately destroy all the data.

But to do this you need to use PowerAmp or another MP3 player that catalogs its own files and ignores .nomedia... The stock player will not work

Be wary about updating Android as Google will eventually figure this out and simply disable .nomedia support so the S3 and S4 will not be able to use 64GB cards for music ..... this will force you to use Google Music or the like.

Why do you think every smartphone company except Samsung and Sony have abandoned microSD? Google and all the other smartphone makers hate microSD because it is way better than the on-line services they are flogging...

You may say micro SD is buggy and unnecessary ..... it isn't the slightest but buggy if you disable mediaserver .... my Sandisk hasn't had a single issue for almost 8 months once I prevented mediaserver from cataloging my MP3s.... before I did this my SD card wasn't stable for 1hour.

Once you have your entire MP3 collection on a microSD card you never sync again and your music is always right there and cataloged ..... nothing can compete with that.

If you have issues with your card unmounting on boot it is because you have apps moved to the microSD card. On a S3 and S4 there should be no apps on the SD card anyway .... it is a very buggy feature and the #1 problem people have with micro SD. Just move all apps to main memory and this problem goes away.

Any fix to keep pics and media from becoming corrupted?

Posted via Android Central App

 

[UJ95x]

Any fix to keep pics and media from becoming corrupted?

Posted via Android Central App

Are you trying to prevent corruption or fix already corrupted data?

Sent from my Galaxy S4 running SlimKat 4.4.2