2.0 firmware and old SD cards funkiness

[adan]

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Just thought I'd toss this out in case anyone else sees the same thing and thinks it's just them.

 

Firmware 2.0 is now on both my cameras.

 

I noticed that when installing and formatting some of my SD cards, even after formatting they still showed the wrong number of pictures available on startup.

 

E.G. a 1-Gig card would show "256" when in reality it will only hold 93-94 DNG files. (and - yes the camera was set for DNG-only). Formatting it or taking a picture changed the count to the correct number, but it reverted to "256" if the camera was turned off/on.

 

To make a long story short - my 1 gig SD cards bought just before or at the time of my M8 purchase (fall 2006) seem to not play well in SDHC-capable devices (as the M8 is now). My 2-Gig cards of the same manufacturer/lines bought at the same time - once formatted ONCE by the camera, behave correctly. (Lexar Pro 133x and Sandisk Extreme III)

 

The 1-Gig card I bought in Dec. 06 behaves correctly. (PNY Optima)

 

The 4 Gig SDHC, and 2Gig non-SDHC cards I bought today behave correctly. (SanDisk Ultra II)

 

In the process of testing all this I zero-erased the troublesome cards in the computer, and then reformatted in the M8. No improvement.

 

Seems like some 1 Gig cards built around the time of the introduction of SDHC may be missing something in the circuitry, whereas 2 Gigs from then, and 1 gigs made later, were changed to be forward compatable with SDHC-cameras.

 

Tossing the misbehaving 1 Gigs - they SEEM to record pictures OK, but if they are squirrely I don't want to depend on them. Plus, of course, I like an accurate picture of how many shots are left.

 

There it is.

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[jaapv]

It probably is Leica adhering to the standard and the card makers not. As card makers are wont to do...

[UliWer]

Just thought I'd toss this out in case anyone else sees the same thing and thinks it's just them.

 

Firmware 2.0 is now on both my cameras.

 

I noticed that when installing and formatting some of my SD cards, even after formatting they still showed the wrong number of pictures available on startup.

 

E.G. a 1-Gig card would show "256" when in reality it will only hold 93-94 DNG files. (and - yes the camera was set for DNG-only). ...

 

 

Are you sure it was set on DNG only? After updating on new firmware all the settings go back on standard, which is JPEG for the M8. So even if you had it set on DNG-only before updating, it was not on DNG after the update.

[35mmSummicron]

I have some 1gig Sandisk UltraII Plus cards and also noticed that after fw2.0 turning the camera on initially reads 263 frames (DNG only).

 

However, if I take a shot, the camera will revert back to the proper number.....I just attributed it to a minor bug, as it doesn't seem to do any serious damage.

 

I'll likely be buying bigger, faster SDHC cards anyways.

 

/a

[adan]

UliWer - Uhh, Yes - that's why I included the phrase "(and - yes the camera was set for DNG-only). ..." in the original post. I'm not generally in the habit of using words when I don't mean them.

[grduprey]

Just thought I'd toss this out in case anyone else sees the same thing and thinks it's just them.

 

Firmware 2.0 is now on both my cameras.

 

I noticed that when installing and formatting some of my SD cards, even after formatting they still showed the wrong number of pictures available on startup.

 

E.G. a 1-Gig card would show "256" when in reality it will only hold 93-94 DNG files. (and - yes the camera was set for DNG-only). Formatting it or taking a picture changed the count to the correct number, but it reverted to "256" if the camera was turned off/on.

 

To make a long story short - my 1 gig SD cards bought just before or at the time of my M8 purchase (fall 2006) seem to not play well in SDHC-capable devices (as the M8 is now). My 2-Gig cards of the same manufacturer/lines bought at the same time - once formatted ONCE by the camera, behave correctly. (Lexar Pro 133x and Sandisk Extreme III)

 

The 1-Gig card I bought in Dec. 06 behaves correctly. (PNY Optima)

 

The 4 Gig SDHC, and 2Gig non-SDHC cards I bought today behave correctly. (SanDisk Ultra II)

 

In the process of testing all this I zero-erased the troublesome cards in the computer, and then reformatted in the M8. No improvement.

 

Seems like some 1 Gig cards built around the time of the introduction of SDHC may be missing something in the circuitry, whereas 2 Gigs from then, and 1 gigs made later, were changed to be forward compatable with SDHC-cameras.

 

Tossing the misbehaving 1 Gigs - they SEEM to record pictures OK, but if they are squirrely I don't want to depend on them. Plus, of course, I like an accurate picture of how many shots are left.

 

There it is.

 

I have not experienced this at all, both my old SD and the one new card are working just fine, with no erroneous indications.

 

Gene

[vertekijker]

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I have some 1gig Sandisk UltraII Plus cards and also noticed that after fw2.0 turning the camera on initially reads 263 frames (DNG only).

 

However, if I take a shot, the camera will revert back to the proper number.....I just attributed it to a minor bug, as it doesn't seem to do any serious damage.

 

I'll likely be buying bigger, faster SDHC cards anyways.

 

/a

 

Same experience I had. Even though it seems harmless, it created the unpleasant feeling that this might not be the only bug that passed quality control...

---------------------------

Frans

[Shootist]

Just tried a 1GB Sandisc Ultra II with a brand new M8 updated to 2.0 and yes I see the wrong shot count.

I formatted the card and it read correct but then after turn off then back on it had the wrong count again.

[perb]

Just tried a 1GB Sandisc Ultra II with a brand new M8 updated to 2.0 and yes I see the wrong shot count.

I formatted the card and it read correct but then after turn off then back on it had the wrong count again.

 

I noticed the same problem a few months ago using the prevous firmware. I remembered reading about it here, so I made a search and found this:

 

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/leica-m8-forum/59649-two-possibly-related-m8-problems.html

 

Regards

Per

[Guest DuquesneG]

Anybody know if Leica is planning to offer a high-capacity battery anytime soon? Right now I have to pop the baseplate to change the battery anyway around the same time as I fill a 2-GIG card, so I may as well take another half-second to swap in a new card...and not have all my eggs in one basket to boot. Not like a handful of 2GB SD cards weighs anything or takes much space (well, unless you keep each one in a separate case, inside a separate padded zip case). Another reason I'm not upgrading the firmware. Maybe when the next upgrade has the new lens codes...if the 24/3.8 better suits the C/V 25/4.

[Shootist]

Anybody know if Leica is planning to offer a high-capacity battery anytime soon? Right now I have to pop the baseplate to change the battery anyway around the same time as I fill a 2-GIG card, so I may as well take another half-second to swap in a new card...and not have all my eggs in one basket to boot. Not like a handful of 2GB SD cards weighs anything or takes much space (well, unless you keep each one in a separate case, inside a separate padded zip case). Another reason I'm not upgrading the firmware. Maybe when the next upgrade has the new lens codes...if the 24/3.8 better suits the C/V 25/4.

Who's to say this firmware doesn't have the new lens codes included?

I haven't looked inside the new firmware but I bet someone will.

What the problem is right now is we don't know what those codes are.

[norm_snyder]

I've had two issues with the new fw--The first is exactly what is described by others: When the card is first formatted in the camera, it reads a number of exposures that is consistent with a setting of jpeg only. This is even with the camera set to DNG+jpeg fine. Turning the camera off, then on has no effect, nor does removing the battery and doing a "soft reboot." As with others' descriptions, things are perfect once the first exposure is made. The counter reverts to 132--what I would ordinarily get with the regular 2 Gb SD Extreme III card in the camera.

 

This only happened with a couple of 2Gb SD cards, one Sandisk UltraII and one Sandisk Extreme III. The others seem OK.

 

A second issue was the inability to rest the numbering to run sequentially with the count prior to the update of the FW. I had a card that had last been used in my no. 2 body, which starts at 400xxxx. Normally, I can just reformat if I put one of these in body no. 1, and the numbering on that one will run 200xxxx. No go on the same card with the above issue; numbers continue to run in the 400xxxx sequence.

 

I suspect there is some incompatibility with older cards. I'll see what happends when I get some SDHC cards later today.

 

Cheers,

Norm;

[Guest DuquesneG]

Who's to say this firmware doesn't have the new lens codes included?

 

Leica's to say it does...but they didn't. But you're right, since Leica clearly believes our intelligence and skill is on the auto-ISO/Snapshot-mode level and our heads would explode if we had a menu to manually input lens codes, there isn't any way to say for absolutely certain that the new lens codes aren't already in there...until someone cracks open the firmware code and has a look.

 

Nonetheless, I still think it's a hoot that we can now use a single SD card through needing to remove the baseplate sixteen times to change batteries

[geoff]

...Firmware 2.0 is now on both my cameras.

 

I noticed that when installing and formatting some of my SD cards, even after formatting they still showed the wrong number of pictures available on startup.

 

...To make a long story short - my 1 gig SD cards bought just before or at the time of my M8 purchase (fall 2006) seem to not play well in SDHC-capable devices (as the M8 is now). My 2-Gig cards of the same manufacturer/lines bought at the same time - once formatted ONCE by the camera, behave correctly. (Lexar Pro 133x and Sandisk Extreme III)

 

...In the process of testing all this I zero-erased the troublesome cards in the computer, and then reformatted in the M8. No improvement....

 

 

My findings are similar but not exactly the same.

 

Some of my memory cards exhibited the readout count problem, but I found that after I reformatted them under the new firmware, in the camera, they behaved correctly without any reoccurrence.

 

As a habit, I always reformat my memory cards in the specific camera for which they are intended to be used in before each shoot. It seems as if my practice will be extended to include new firmware updates too.

 

I cannot attest to what the actually source of the problem is for others. However, one thing I do know is that one of the intended aspect of the SHDC format, by the SD Card Association, was to tighten up on standards adherence and rein in some renegade manufacturing. Another related intention was to insure full backwards compatibility for previous SD cards that specifically adhered to previous SD specifications.

 

Many Secure Digital card manufacturers (well know brands included) played fast and loose with previous SD specs for their own advantage. As a result there has been much incompatibility and consumer confusion. Now, with strict SDHC guidelines, there’s little room for manufacturers to wiggle around in other than some creative marketing verbiage. Read between the lines in reviewing a particular products specification listing or marketing hype.

 

One job I held in the past was that of support technician for a software company. I beta tested applications, fielded tech support calls from customers and reported findings back to development. I’m reminded of the advice Apple Computer would give to developers to strictly adhere to development guidelines and not to write code into specific reserved areas. None-the-less, many developers (big names included) ignored Apple’s warnings and went ahead anyway in order to introduce new features that would up competition, sell product, and gain quick profit returns. However, these same applications would end up behaving erratically once Apple released a new System update. But that was down-the-road after the sale had been made.

 

The resulting impression, assumed by many, would be that the new system release was buggy since there was a high degree of applications which all of a sudden would stop functioning correctly. The rational would be, and still is to this date, that all these apps worked fine beforehand, but now they don’t, and since it is occurring to more than one app, the logical conclusion is that the new system at fault. However, all along the cause was the result of improperly written programs that held a hidden time bomb.

 

Another example, bare with me as I know I’m going off on a tangent, is that of the RAF during WWII. There was a high degree of Allied planes being shot down and it was impractical to armour a whole plane due to weight constraints.

 

Studies were conducted to best isolated the most important places that should receive protection. Careful inspections were conducted on all the planes that had returned from difficult missions, notating the areas hardest hit by anti-aircraft mortar. Where do you think they finally decided to place additional amour?

 

My point being is that the source of the problem might not be with the firmware update itself, but rather that the update brings a hidden preexisting issue to light.

 

 

Geoff

myspace.com/geoffotos

[adan]

BTW: Coming at it from a slightly different angle - I just also just discovered than my 3-year-old pre-SDHC multicard reader can't read my new 4Gig SDHC card. Time for a $29.95 trip to the computer store.

 

(Fortunately my new 2-month-old pop-in SD reader for my MacBook handled it fine, so for tonight I used the MacBook to copy my first SDHC images to a flash drive and then to my main computer.)

[vertekijker]

Yesterday I had the issue with incorrect sequence of numbers with the old SD card, now I have it also with the SDHC card. I shot a few hundred pictures yesterday with that card - today the first count showed a completely empty card; only after I shot my first picture, did I get the correct count back... I hope that I'm not always going to have to shoot a picture to know how many pictures I can still take with the card...

--------

Frans

[KM-25]

I have some 1gig Sandisk UltraII Plus cards and also noticed that after fw2.0 turning the camera on initially reads 263 frames (DNG only).

 

However, if I take a shot, the camera will revert back to the proper number.....I just attributed it to a minor bug, as it doesn't seem to do any serious damage.

 

I'll likely be buying bigger, faster SDHC cards anyways.

 

/a

 

Same here, not a big deal though. So, if we get cards that are twice as fast as say, a Lexar 2GB 1.33X, does that mean we can possibly get a 4GB card per battery now?

[graeme_hutton]

Similar experience yesterday when I apgraded the firmware. 'Card Full' flashed up but on pressing play 'No Images to Display' came up.

 

Emptied the card via pc and reformatted in camera. This seems to have sorted it.

 

Otherwise no problems.

 

Is it just me or is the text on pressing 'set' larger than before?

 

Graeme

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Look here: Leica M

[stunsworth]

So, if we get cards that are twice as fast as say, a Lexar 2GB 1.33X, does that mean we can possibly get a 4GB card per battery now?

 

I think the battery life depends on how you are shooting. Earlier this summer I was at the Appleby horse fair and in the space of about 90 minutes shot over 500 images, filling one 4 gig card and taking some space on another. I managed this with a single battery, and when I finished there was still some life left in the battery.

 

If there's a lot of time between shots, and the camera is still awake, it must be using some of the charge from the battery. I'm beginning to think it's this 'awake, but doing nothing' that causes the battery to drain.

[odyocu]

One good news is that, camera formats the cards in a fraction of the time it used to take with the previous firmware.

 

Seyhun