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Help Samsung Galaxy S3 KILLS SD CARDS!!!!!!

Based on what I am reading this sounds more like a problem with the SD card standard than any particular device, if you spend enough time goggling you will find people saying their SD card is failing in almost any device.

The S3 is now one of the most popular phones that has a SD card slot so its not surprising the number of issues people are having.
 
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If you read through the thread you'll see that Samsung told me my phone was defective and should be serviced. Babelfish had SanDisk perform a full diagnostic of the card he sent for warranty exchange. They reported that the card had been completely corrupted because of a voltage failure during a write process. The card had no physical problems and they were able to restore the card to full function.

I'd like to hear from other members who have contacted any type of tech support for service of either the card or phone.
 
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If the corruption occurs when the cards are written to by the phone (as a poster earlier suggested),it would be interesting to know if their have been failures of cards used for READ ONLY.If you put music on an external card from your pc and then put the card in your phone then shouldn't your card remain uncorrupted if this is true? Just a thought....
 
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If the corruption occurs when the cards are written to by the phone (as a poster earlier suggested),it would be interesting to know if their have been failures of cards used for READ ONLY.If you put music on an external card from your pc and then put the card in your phone then shouldn't your card remain uncorrupted if this is true? Just a thought....

You might be right actually... but the problem is that most people want the camera to save photos to the sdcard as a way to have their pictures saved outside of the phone memory. This would obviously risk corrupting the card.

I suppose if you relied on backing up photos to Dropbox, say, you could avoid writing to the card but not everyone has a large or unlimited data plan.

It's not really acceptable to have to avoid writing to external memory. The device should be capable of this basic function without corruption and data loss.
 
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For such an ardent believer in hard numbers and statistics it sure looks like you take liberties making up your own percentages in items 1, 3, and 6.

I get your point, nobody knows exactly what is causing the SD failures. However, for the people who are experiencing the issue with an S3, statistics mean very little. The problem is very real for them and it should be ok for them to discuss the issue or even infer the problem may be related to the phone. In the world of statistics, this is after all a viable possibility, even if a remote one.

Don't get so hung up on what people may or may not think after reading this or any other thread. As a statistics guy, you know that a miniscule percentage of Galaxy S3 owners frequent web forums. Also, it's true that hardly anyone ever comes to a forum to say "my phone is working fine". The nature of the forums lends itself to discuss problems so most threads are just that.

The point of the forum should be to discuss, whether we agree or not. I have read these forums as I research my next phone. Tonight, I will be buying an S3 to replace my iPhone 4S. This thread is not going to keep me from buying the phone or using an SD card but I'm glad I read about it and I'm going into it making an informed decision.

30 million sales by November 2012. Add November, December, January and it will be at least 35 million.

0.001% is 350. We have less than 200 in this thread, but let's assume that as our start number.

You are still right, everyone has the right to discuss the issue. I just see no reason to make such far fetched conclusions and ASSUME S3 kills all of those cards.

Reasons for a card to die.

1. The phone is actually defective and kills it.
2. The SD Card is defective
3. The Phone is connected to a PC and disconnected improperly.
4. The card is taken out of the phone without unmounting it.
5. The PC the phone is connected to has a virus, etc.
6. The media placed on the card is corrupt.

It is all just an assumption, but divide the number of users here by 3 and we get the number of 100 users affected.

Did not even bother checking what percentage that is as it already is negligible.

Discussion of course is a good thing, but drawing conclusions about anything on the basis of 0.001% of its population is not a great idea and this thread's title is simply inadequate.
 
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In my situation, this is definitely a hardware issue...

I have two SGS 3s (one is 16GB and one is 32GB)... they are both running the exact same custom ROM and have the exact same SD Cards in them. One of them has now gone through three SD Cards... the other has not had a single problem.

I will be sending this thing back to Samsung immediately for a replacement. Perhaps I can ask them to upgrade as well in the process as I've read this seems to be an issue with the 16GB versions.
 
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I'd like to hear from other members who have contacted any type of tech support for service of either the card or phone.

I have just had a 2nd card failure on the Note 2, both of which occurred after 19 days, exactly. There were no warning signs that the card was about to fail, I just woke up to the card removed unexpectedly error message. On the first card, it happened while the phone was on charge overnight & on the second it happened while the phone was just sitting on my table, again overnight.

The first time it happened, I tried rebooting the phone to see if the card would be recognised - nothing. Then, I tried a different card in the phone - it was recognised instantly. So, I tried the defective card in another phone & PC (Windows & Linux) & it was not recognised. I had the card replaced by the retailer the first time & thought no more of it - putting it down to being a faulty card & just one of those things.

This time, I decided to ring Samsung tech support. Amazingly, the operator tried to tell me that it is a software issue & that it would need to be fixed by having the software updated. When I queried the logic of this, she proceeded to waffle on about how this was somehow Google's fault in the way they release software and/or the initial release of each version, before telling me how she had, different, multiple (software) issues with her HTC One X as some kind of validation. She then gave me the phone numbers of the service centres I could use to get my phone 'fixed'.

I rang the numbers she gave me & the guy I spoke to immediately said that the issue was almost certainly hardware related & would necessitate the phone being sent away for repair.
 
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So, to give an epilogue - after working again with almost no problems for well over two weeks my sd card finally failed me completely this time (full format previously solved the issues). This time there seems to be no easy chance of recovery. I can actually see it in disk management, but it says that card has 30MB and is write protected, so no way to format it. Tried few other apps, but no go...

Any ideas? Phone etc. dont recognize sd card, it is only in computer that i can see it as some unknown file system format which I cannot reformat due to weird size and write-protection.

Ah, it happened while watching HD movie over wifi, so no activity on sd card at the moment... And phone was barely noticeably warm due to movie i suppose, but nothing that should in my opinion effect sd card of reasonable quality...

32GB was sweet spot for me in terms of space i need and price of card, so i hope next one will outlive this one or at least last until i get replacement via warranty - could be up to one month. :)

edit: now it just says no media.

Anyway, old Sandisk doesn't even show up anymore on computer. Obviously it died completely. Company where i bought the card said they actually heard of failing cards, but also said it happens to other phones with sd card to. They will take it back no problem and give me another card. I hope I can also exchange it, since I already purchased new 32gb c10 Kingston. For now it works perfectly and without a glitch. We'll see for how long. :p
 
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Ok well it didn't take long for me to finally become the latest victim of this BS. Got my card early December after black friday sale...SanDisk 32gb ultra. Last night shortly after I finished recording a video, all of a sudden it started giving me that "blank SD card" message everyone on this thread is quite familiar with now.

Card is still able to read by my PCs, and I put it into my gf's S2 this morning and it was reading the card just fine as well. It's back in my phone now...and it's sporadically cutting in and out...being able to read the card for a while and then not.

I'll be getting in touch with Samsung shortly
 
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This was posted on another forum last week:

Mine has started acting very flakey... It will mount and unmount randomly and then disappears all together for a while. I called Samsung today and was told to reset my phone and that there is no reported problem.... blah blah blah. I then went to best buy to talk to them who informed that that I can exchange my phone but there is no point as they have had lots exchanged for the same issue and that it will happen again. The guy told me that one customer exchanged his phone 3 times in 2 months and it happened to each phone after a period of time.
 
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Tapatalk is acting up on me.

Badically what I'm trying to say is in MY own personal experience the higher class of and SD card I use in a SMARTPHONE, the more likely it will be ruined. (In cameras it's fine)
The write speeds might be too fast for your phone, causing data loss in the transfer process, corrupting the card.

After all, 32gb IS 32gb, no matter how fast it writes.

Try using a class 4. Never had a problem on ANY phone with those. When I DID have my s3, it never gave me an issue. I'm still using the same card in my current phone.
 
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Tapatalk is acting up on me.

Badically what I'm trying to say is in MY own personal experience the higher class of and SD card I use in a SMARTPHONE, the more likely it will be ruined. (In cameras it's fine)
The write speeds might be too fast for your phone, causing data loss in the transfer process, corrupting the card.

After all, 32gb IS 32gb, no matter how fast it writes.

Try using a class 4. Never had a problem on ANY phone with those. When I DID have my s3, it never gave me an issue. I'm still using the same card in my current phone.

Who makes a class 4 32gb or 64 gb micro SD?
 
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My experience, Samsung Galaxy S III:

Team 32 Gb card - after a month, 'SD card removed' (while still in the device), no access to music or other files on the card. Removed, into a Win7 machine - can't complete a full format, totally busted. Maybe a bad card, RMA for a new card.

A couple of months - SAME THING.

OK, Team cards maybe low quality, replace with a SanDisk. Guess what, took a couple of months, but that cards has also failed, also can't be regognized by phone, can't be formatted in Win7.

Samsung sez maybe I have a 'corrupt file'. Sigh. This is a real problem, prehaps low frequency, perhaps a range of manufacture batches - I don't know. But a real problem and requiring a real response...
 
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I have been having this problem too. First with a Samsung 16GB class 6 then a sandisk ultra 32gb class 10. Now the most recent is a lexar 16GB. This is crazy no matter what I do it keeps messing up my sd cards. Im on jelly bean and bone stock. No root no custom nothing. It's ridiculous that I can't use an external sd card. Going to call Samsung
 
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Ok well it didn't take long for me to finally become the latest victim of this BS. Got my card early December after black friday sale...SanDisk 32gb ultra. Last night shortly after I finished recording a video, all of a sudden it started giving me that "blank SD card" message everyone on this thread is quite familiar with now.

Card is still able to read by my PCs, and I put it into my gf's S2 this morning and it was reading the card just fine as well. It's back in my phone now...and it's sporadically cutting in and out...being able to read the card for a while and then not.

I'll be getting in touch with Samsung shortly

Once it starts acting up, it seems like only a matter of time before it dies. I'd back up anything you want from that SD card while you still can.
 
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Tapatalk is acting up on me.

Badically what I'm trying to say is in MY own personal experience the higher class of and SD card I use in a SMARTPHONE, the more likely it will be ruined. (In cameras it's fine)
The write speeds might be too fast for your phone, causing data loss in the transfer process, corrupting the card.

After all, 32gb IS 32gb, no matter how fast it writes.

Try using a class 4. Never had a problem on ANY phone with those. When I DID have my s3, it never gave me an issue. I'm still using the same card in my current phone.

My first card was SanDisk 32gb, class 4. They only had that one in stock where i purchased my phone, so after assuring me that card will do full hd and everything and that difference is minor, I went ahead with it and for sure all was fine for 1.5 months. I think class shouldn't be an issue, class 10 is most cards sold these days and it's working fine for some users apparently. Maybe sd cards just became junk in terms of quality control. The guy in store told me that they don't even bother customers with warranty any more, because card failing happens all the time. They just give out new sd card and do claim on their own. Cards are all original ofc.

And it's not only siii issue, since i have Note ii. But this topic has more users and responses then similar Note ii topics, which are also many... Also saw some xperia threads. Might even be an Android os issue?
 
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The Sprint "Basics Guide" that came with my phone does mention on page 56: "It can support MicroSD cards of up to 16GB."

The 244-page manual I downloaded has slightly conflicting info on page 211: "Be sure to use only recommended microSD cards (<64GB)." [That means "less than 64GB"]

For what it's worth...
-- Ron
 
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My white 32GB GS3 killed two cards. The first card was a Sandisk 32GB card, class 4. I used that card for 4-5 months before it died while having photos being written to it.

When that card died I switched to the 16GB class 2 card that came with my Droid X. The 16GB card performed perfectly for nearly 2 years before putting it in my GS3, and then it died after about 3 weeks.

I can't say that all GS3s kill SD cards, but mine sure did.

These problems, plus the awful battery life, will be pushing me back to an iPhone when my new every two is here in March 2014.

(My wife's iPhone 5, with LTE, wifi, and bluetooth radios on all day, with playing games and checking internet moderately, will have at least 75% battery left after being off the charger for 11-12 hours. It's incredible. And yes I realize iPhones do not have card slots for expansion).
 
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(My wife's iPhone 5, with LTE, wifi, and bluetooth radios on all day, with playing games and checking internet moderately, will have at least 75% battery left after being off the charger for 11-12 hours. It's incredible. And yes I realize iPhones do not have card slots for expansion).

same here with my GS3. though i did switch off double tap home button for S-voice and wakelocks. with that it would be 70%.

gaming will kill my battery however, but i play stuff like FFIII and choas rings.

what games does your wife play?
 
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