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Sentinel Bizzare Sentinel & SD card issue

Discussion of the Senitnel Software
W1KNE

W1KNE

Owner - Webmaster
Staff member
Owner/Webmaster
Location
Bristol County, MA
So in one of my 536HP scanners, the Sentinel to SD card will NOT read the scanner, nor will it write to it. I made a change in the DB I downloaded from the scanner, but it won't actually write it. And when I download, where it should flag a change, it does not. I have done a full format of the SD card as well as updated Sentinel to no avail. I suspect the card is having an issue, and needs to be replaced. I still hate the whole SD card concept of these scanners, vs using a standard EEPROM instead. Still this is an odd one.
 
I'm a bit confused. Are you trying to read the card while it is in the scanner? I "think" so but not sure. You mention "one of my 536HP scanners". Have you tried exchanging the cards to see if the behavior changes? I know some people use external SD card devices to do this.

I agree, the SD cards are not ideal, and I'm not saying this is the case here, but primarily due to user error. I tell people about five times when I'm on the phone with them, "before you even think about replacing the card, make sure there is no power going to the scanner." I've had people remove them while the scanner is on. Not good. Also, people touch the contacts on the card, which isn't great either. One neat trick to clean said contacts is to use a pencil eraser. I've had people be able to recover cards by doing that.
 
Just throwing this out there and I'm sure you have already done a thousand of these...could the little slide lock
on the card been bumped into the lock position?
Jeff
 
Scott said:
I'm a bit confused. Are you trying to read the card while it is in the scanner? I "think" so but not sure. You mention "one of my 536HP scanners". Have you tried exchanging the cards to see if the behavior changes? I know some people use external SD card devices to do this.
Click to expand...
I didn't think to try wapping the SD cards between receivers. The issue follows the card. So I suspect the card has hit the end of it's useful life. It is one of the originals so it's overdue for replacement anyways. I've had SD cards go south on me with just how much gets written and read from them.

Scott said:
I agree, the SD cards are not ideal, and I'm not saying this is the case here, but primarily due to user error. I tell people about five times when I'm on the phone with them, "before you even think about replacing the card, make sure there is no power going to the scanner." I've had people remove them while the scanner is on. Not good. Also, people touch the contacts on the card, which isn't great either. One neat trick to clean said contacts is to use a pencil eraser. I've had people be able to recover cards by doing that.
Click to expand...
No worries, I know all of this. Being a semi professional photographer, SD card handling is something I take seriously.

@jeffkett if the record inhibit switch is turned on, the BCD will throw an SD card error as the record feature can not write to the card.
 
OK update to the update. After a non quick format. (Windows Full format) of the card, and writing to it in the card reader, the card has now taken the program. Which tells me the card is failing as a whole. It's short money for a new card so one is going to go into it.

And after doing that, put back into the original scanner, mounted the drive, and tried to read from it, Sentinel was successful at reading it this time.
 
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