jcraf Posted March 2, 2014 Share #1 Posted March 2, 2014 Advertisement (gone after registration) Lovely day today, walking through the City of London's alleyways and byways with my MM and M7. About 100 shots with the MM and it suddenly dies. This is my second MM, owned for about 4 months now. The first one died after 4 days, freezing and locking constantly and was replaced by my dealer, so I'm maybe a bit sensitive! Battery had plenty of juice. Took it out and put it in, but no joy. Changed it for a fully charged one and the camera came to life again. But it then said that I had only taken 5 shots on the card (a relatively young 8GB Sandisk Extreme Pro 95mb/s) but the card was full......oh dear, pit of the stomach feeling coming on. That took the edge off the day, and having no more film for the M7, I stopped shooting and headed for home. On getting home, the card is unreadable. Nothing, either with a card reader, Mac SD slot, or connecting MM to Mac. The MM now does not see the card either. I cannot get anything back with Sandisk recovery software either, since nothing sees the card. Mind you, at least I have 36 shots......from a roll of HP5 and my M7. Long live film! So my question is this. Could my MM have fragged the card somehow, or is it simply a card failure? This has never, ever happened to me in years of digital photography with all manner of brands of cameras and cards. It's sad day for me as I've lost some good shots, and given my track record with MMs, I have now lost a bit of confidence in this second camera. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted March 2, 2014 Posted March 2, 2014 Hi jcraf, Take a look here Fragged Card in MM. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
jaapv Posted March 2, 2014 Share #2 Posted March 2, 2014 If the camera is fine with another card, your card simply died. That may happen, reason I always carry at least one spare card, but it may well be that you got a fake Sandisk. Those are quite common, I have read figures of 33 % of the cards sold even by reputable dealers. I had two cards die on me, one Sandisk, one Lexar in different cameras. For the Monochrom I prefer the Panasonic Gold cards, as those are extremely stable. I don’t quite see how a camera would kill a card stone dead. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wattsy Posted March 2, 2014 Share #3 Posted March 2, 2014 PM me. I had a similar problem last year with a card in my Monochrom. I can help you retrieve your photos. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wattsy Posted March 2, 2014 Share #4 Posted March 2, 2014 If the camera is fine with another card, your card simply died. That may happen, reason I always carry at least one spare card, but it may well be that you got a fake Sandisk. Those are quite common, I have read figures of 33 % of the cards sold even by reputable dealers.For the Monochrom I prefer the Panasonic Gold cards, as those are extremely stable. I don’t quite see how a camera would kill a card. My card which also died was given to me by Leica in Mayfair so you'd hope they weren't giving away fakes. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jcraf Posted March 2, 2014 Author Share #5 Posted March 2, 2014 If the camera is fine with another card, your card simply died. That may happen, reason I always carry at least one spare card, but it may well be that you got a fake Sandisk. Those are quite common, I have read figures of 33 % of the cards sold even by reputable dealers. I had two cards die on me, one Sandisk, one Lexar in different cameras.For the Monochrom I prefer the Panasonic Gold cards, as those are extremely stable. I don’t quite see how a camera would kill a card stone dead. Thanks Jaap. Neither do I, but I'm running a bit scared at the moment with this, my second MM!! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaapv Posted March 2, 2014 Share #6 Posted March 2, 2014 My card which also died was given to me by Leica in Mayfair so you'd hope they weren't giving away fakes. Freebies… Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frase Posted March 2, 2014 Share #7 Posted March 2, 2014 Advertisement (gone after registration) With all the trouble between Leica and sandisk I wouldn't even use a free sandisk card. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
doolittle Posted March 2, 2014 Share #8 Posted March 2, 2014 +1 on the Panasonic Gold cards. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
FrozenInTime Posted March 2, 2014 Share #9 Posted March 2, 2014 +1 on the Panasonic Gold cards. I used to have absolute faith in the Panasonic Gold cards; but I've fried one 8GB card in my M9 and one of my 16GB cards produces banding on my M9-P. I have a suspicion that in general higher speed cards of all brands draw more current so are more likely to cause occasional banding. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Londonmember Posted March 2, 2014 Share #10 Posted March 2, 2014 Sounds like a card failure. It happens.... But very annoying and I would certainly want to do some testing with the MM before relying on it again (just know how you feel, but I'm sure the MM will be fine). If its any consolation it got cold and wet and windy later in London... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaapv Posted March 2, 2014 Share #11 Posted March 2, 2014 +1 on the Panasonic Gold cards.Yes, but on my M the Lexar Pro 600 are very much faster than the Panasonics. So I use the Lexars there. After all the grief they caused, I am not keen on Sandisk any more. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jcraf Posted March 2, 2014 Author Share #12 Posted March 2, 2014 Sounds like a card failure. It happens....But very annoying and I would certainly want to do some testing with the MM before relying on it again (just know how you feel, but I'm sure the MM will be fine). If its any consolation it got cold and wet and windy later in London... I have thankfully retrieved the images now via a bit of jiggery pokery......and the errant Sandisk card has been shredded. I am going to try some different card brands with the MM. After my experiences with MM No1, I felt that the Sandisk cards were the ones which caused the least number of lockups with that (defective) unit, so I stuck with them. But there's no logic there as the camera itself was deemed faulty. MM No2 seems fine this evening with the silver Samsung SDHC 16 and 32 GB cards which I have been using with my M240 without issues (and which were being given out by LFI as a freebie with subscriptions last year......whatever that says...) I feel a bit of a trial coming on. We'll see....... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
A miller Posted March 2, 2014 Share #13 Posted March 2, 2014 Very sorry this happened to you... Fwiw, I had an occassion to visit the NJ Leica facility a couple of weeks ago and discussed the issue of SD cards and the MM with the manager of the service center (Bill). He said that they have had good results with the Lexar cards and recommend them over the other cards they tested. He has not ever used the Panasonc Gold so couldn't comment. But he did say that the slower the write speed the better, and the Lexar card he recomended was the basic one. A little counterintuitive for such a modern device... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ted Lemon Posted March 2, 2014 Share #14 Posted March 2, 2014 Lovely day today, walking through the City of London's alleyways and byways with my MM and M7. About 100 shots with the MM and it suddenly dies. This is my second MM, owned for about 4 months now. The first one died after 4 days, freezing and locking constantly and was replaced by my dealer, so I'm maybe a bit sensitive! Battery had plenty of juice. Took it out and put it in, but no joy. Changed it for a fully charged one and the camera came to life again. But it then said that I had only taken 5 shots on the card (a relatively young 8GB Sandisk Extreme Pro 95mb/s) but the card was full......oh dear, pit of the stomach feeling coming on. That took the edge off the day, and having no more film for the M7, I stopped shooting and headed for home. On getting home, the card is unreadable. Nothing, either with a card reader, Mac SD slot, or connecting MM to Mac. The MM now does not see the card either. I cannot get anything back with Sandisk recovery software either, since nothing sees the card. Mind you, at least I have 36 shots......from a roll of HP5 and my M7. Long live film! So my question is this. Could my MM have fragged the card somehow, or is it simply a card failure? This has never, ever happened to me in years of digital photography with all manner of brands of cameras and cards. It's sad day for me as I've lost some good shots, and given my track record with MMs, I have now lost a bit of confidence in this second camera. I had the same problem - Extreme pro cards do not work in my MM I use Panasonic gold 8gb - they are fine. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
menos I M6 Posted March 3, 2014 Share #15 Posted March 3, 2014 Basically you could follow one of the endless threads, that crawled the boards back when the SD card issue with the M9 were big. General rule with first gen Leica digital M cameras is: - the slower the card the more reliable it may work in your M8/9/MM - the smaller the card the more reliable it may work in your M8/9/MM I used SanDisk cards since I can think and continue to use them in my Leica cameras. I restrict first generation M cameras to maximum size and speed: M8: max 8GB, max speed: 30MB/s M9: max 8GB, max speed: 30MB/s MM: max 16GB, max speed: 45MB/s (somehow these cards worked without an issues since day one with my Mono, while they gave me endless headache with my M9 and several firmware revisions). ALWAYS carry spare batteries and spare SD cards (when not sure, which card works, carry different speeds and manufacturers and restrict yourself ideally to 8GB). Once a card throws an issue, make sure, to check it thoroughly in your computer with a disk tool (I use Disk Utility and Drive Genius 3 on a Mac). Ideally do not use these cards in the offending camera another time. Cards that my M9 would have issues with often worked without any issues in other cameras thereafter. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
fotografr Posted March 9, 2014 Share #16 Posted March 9, 2014 With all the trouble between Leica and sandisk I wouldn't even use a free sandisk card. That's all I use in my MM and don't have any problems with them. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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