sudomod

Hi, I have a bunch of micro SD cards that I have used in the past on raspberry pi builds and lots of them are not usable for different reasons. Anytime I try to reformat it tells me it is security enabled or locked or encrypted. I have tried using windows PCs, Macs, Digital Cameras, Programs...ect.

Does anyone have a tried and proven method to reformat sd cards that dont want to be written over?

Check this out

This is not the issue.

I have never heard of SD cards that can't be formatted. You have physical access to the cards and formatting is a destructive procedure. Have you tried something like Disk Utility in Mac OS or fat32formatter (not exact name, google it) on Windows?

Some of the micro sd cards I have that wont format were previously used in smartphones and may have some sort of security lock but others were used on raspberry pie's and they also will not let me format.

I have tried using 'SD Card Formatter', Mac Disc Utility, Fat32Format, Formatting in a DSL Camera.

I have like 6 unusable micro SD cards and it makes me so sad.

Only time I have seen that was when the card was corrupt.

Seems odd to have 6 corrupt cards all at once though.

I have collected them over the years. A few from old smartphones and a couple from past projects. I was able to format one of the cards that I thought was corrupted after several attempts.

Basically once its corrupted there is no fixing it?

What is the size of the cards? Are they over 32GB? What is the exact error message you're getting? I've used Etcher on Mac and that works for me, formats and installs Retropie all in one step. https://etcher.io


Do these links help?:
"how to format a write protected sd card" : https://www.easeus.com/partition-master ... -card.html
"format corrupted unreadable sd card" : https://www.easeus.com/partition-master ... -card.html

You can probably find some free software that checks if your sd cards are bad.

"Cannot format write protected card" is the error Im getting in SD Card Formatter on this 16GB card.

On my 32GB card it wont read in my micro SD reader but will give me a, "Cannot format write protected card" when I put it in the SD card adapter and read it that way.

On another 32GB card it acts like it will format and then once the process is finished it will come back with a "failure to format"

Now it looks like one of my 16GB cards might be formatting.


I'll look into those other links in a bit. Trying to finish up my second build right now!

i have used some formatting tools and its working like charm. These tools may help you.
SDFormatter v4
SDFormatter can format your card with a single click. It can solve the write protection error and return your card to it’s normal state. Many memory cards have a ‘confidential area’ and the SDFormatter will not erase anything from that space.

HDD LowLevel Format
This format tool has all the features associated with SDFormatter. The advantage is that it is not only compatible with SD, but also HDD, MMC, and CompactFlash memory devices.

source : https://techboxup.com/how-to-remove-wri ... o-sd-card/