Issues with formatting / imaging SD cards?

[Vex]

Hey all,

We're chugging along on this project and got to the part where we format the SD card and see if it displays on the screen! We didn't get the adafruit screen, we got the BW screens (variant 1 & 6 from the wiki) and we are testing with variant 1 right now since someone else already has the modifications needed for 5V, which we did. When we put everything together, the screen stays black but I am hoping it is for some reason the SD cards fault..

I have 2 SD cards and when I plug them in, they both say 56.8MB free. When I format it it will say 8GB / 16GB free. When I image it using the instructions in the guide, it says write successful, and goes back to 56.8 MB free. If I use etcher, it has been erroring out or now it is just failing validation. I just picked up a multi reader from Walmart but it reads fine so I'm not sure what is going on. Has anyone else experienced this? Any help would be great!

Thanks!!

[chiz]

Have you tried using a different video source to display video in the 3.5in. screen? Also try a different working video display and plug in the Pi's mini HDMI. This way you can isolate which has the problem -- the SD card image or the display.

[Vex]

Have you tried using a different video source to display video in the 3.5in. screen? Also try a different working video display and plug in the Pi's mini HDMI. This way you can isolate which has the problem -- the SD card image or the display.

Hi Chiz,

Thanks for your response! How could I go about getting a different source to play on the 3.5 in screen? Also, I don't have anything with a mini HDMI port so I might ask around and see if anyone I know does.

[chiz]

That BW backup monitor should come with a RCA jack (connector with yellow barrel). You can use a xbox perhaps or an old dvd player that you may have.

I assume you didn't desolder the RCA jack but if you do, just resold it again. Be mindful of the soldering connections though specially the postie and ground leads