micro sdcard IO errors not mounting

[Cattivello]

Greetings,
I am having quite some troubles reading any microsd card I insert in my laptop.
I made my home work.. back in the days when drivers where not installed, an apt-get install would have solved the issue(sudo apt-get install exfat-fuse exfat-utils)
However now this is no longer needed as is installed by default.
Yet, no joy!
I have a dualboot with windows 10. When I boot on windows, I do get to read my SDcard. This lead me to think my hardware is functional and so my microsd card too.
TESTED:
Samsung Evo 32GB U1 HC I -> not responding and not mounting
A local shop brand: MicroSD A1 U1 16GB not mounting not respondinh IO errors
Same local shop brand MicroSD 10 U1 HC I 16GB: no issues; read and mounted
Same tests in windows 10: all cards mounted and readable.
My system:
Lenovo ThinkPad L480
lsusb returns:
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 058f:9540 Alcor Micro Corp. AU9540 Smartcard Reader

I hope someone can help me solve this issue.
If you need more details, please ask me.
Thank you

[Cattivello]

PS
Not sure the smartcard reference is the correct reference.
This is the all output from lsusb:
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 006: ID 06cb:009a Synaptics, Inc.
Bus 001 Device 005: ID 04f2:b604 Chicony Electronics Co., Ltd Integrated Camera (1280x720@30)
Bus 001 Device 007: ID 8087:0a2b Intel Corp.
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 058f:9540 Alcor Micro Corp. AU9540 Smartcard Reader
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 0715:0206
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

[senjoz]

Bus 001 Device 003: ID 058f:9540 Alcor Micro Corp. AU9540 Smartcard Reader

That is not an SD card reader. That is a Smartcard reader. Try with lspci. You should get something like
04:00.0 SD Host controller: O2 Micro, Inc. SD/MMC Card Reader Controller (rev 01)

Same local shop brand MicroSD 10 U1 HC I 16GB: no issues; read and mounted

In Mint your SD card reader can read one SD card, therefore, it looks that the reader is working. Which file system have other two SD cards? How were these cards formatted?

Regards, Jože



EDIT: With inserted problematic SD card, open Disks or Gparted application and check, if it can see inserted SD card.

[Cattivello]

Bus 001 Device 003: ID 058f:9540 Alcor Micro Corp. AU9540 Smartcard Reader

That is not an SD card reader. That is a Smartcard reader. Try with lspci. You should get something like
04:00.0 SD Host controller: O2 Micro, Inc. SD/MMC Card Reader Controller (rev 01)

Same local shop brand MicroSD 10 U1 HC I 16GB: no issues; read and mounted

In Mint your SD card reader can read one SD card, therefore, it looks that the reader is working. Which file system have other two SD cards? How were these cards formatted?

Regards, Jože



EDIT: With inserted problematic SD card, open Disks or Gparted application and check, if it can see inserted SD card.

Correct, the lspci command output is:
04:00.0 SD Host controller: O2 Micro, Inc. SD/MMC Card Reader Controller (rev 01)

The samsung SD was with a linux installation (specificallly Volumio).
the local shop brand MicroSD 10 U1 HC I 16GB: no issues; read and mounted is formatted with ext4 and fat16 (I believe was a buster installation).
The MicroSD A1 U1 16GB was just coming out of the box. Brand new purchased card.

Gparted gives error when trying to read the card: See attached message from gparted

With the Samsung card I have the exact error from Gparted. Eventually it will show it in the list as an Unallocated space. however, what ever I try to do with it I have warnings and errors: (see Samsung screenshot) And when following gparted suggestion, I get the IO error back again.

Obviously I am doing something wrong as it would be impossible not to be able to use a brand new card. I use a lot of raspberry pi that I keep change and need to install new SDcard frequently .
I hope there is a solution.
Reagrds
Cattivello

[senjoz]

It looks like your SD card has no partition table. You must create it. Only after that you can create partitions and later on use the card.

Insert SD card and open Gparted. In the top-right corner select your SD card. In the menu bar select View - Device Information. When you are sure that the SD card is selected (that is crucial), select in the menu bar Device - Create Partition Table.... In the opened window select partition table you wish to create, probably msdos will be okay, and create it. After that you can create partitions. With right mouse button click on the unallocated space and select New. In the opened window enter appropriate data for the new partition and create it.

SD card in the attached Gparted screenshot is from my Raspberry Pi 4 B.

Regards, Jože

[Cattivello]

I would normally agree with you.
HOwever,...
I tried (of course) that procedure. But as soon as I try to create the table, I siply have the IO erros back again.
Also, when booting in the windows partition (I do have dual boot) I have no issue reading the card.
This behave I have on 2 sdcards (I only tried 3 SDcards.)
Therefore, I am afraid to say .. this procedure is not working.

[senjoz]

Also, when booting in the windows partition (I do have dual boot) I have no issue reading the card.

Unfortunately, I do not know why the card works okay in Windows but not in Mint. Can you also write to the card in Windows?

Many faked SD cards with meager quality are on the market. Maybe your problematic card is one of them.

Regards, Jože

[Cattivello]

Hi Jože,
I made a test:
On windows I formatted the SDcrd with SDcard formatter
I also have checked it with H2testw and got no errors:
Warning: Only 15191 of 15192 MByte tested.
Test finished without errors.
You can now delete the test files *.h2w or verify them again.
Writing speed: 28.9 MByte/s
Reading speed: 86.0 MByte/s
H2testw v1.4

Unfortunately the Libpart error remain the same
Cant open or read the same SDcard.
The Disk program do show the sdcard. (see snapshot).
When I try to format it, an error message appears (see snapshot)
Any idea what else I can try?

[senjoz]

@Cattivello
Maybe next will be interesting for you.

Just out of curiosity I tested in LM20.1 five SD cards with Gparted and Disks. With four of them I had no problems. With one old 2 GB card I got a similar error as you, udisks-error-quark. That card is from an old gsm mobile phone. It has one fat16 partition.

I rechecked that card with sudo parted -l and lsblk -f, no partitions found, parted complained about the wrong label. I transferred the card to the Windows machine. There was no problem with reading. I opened Disk Management and changed the volume label of the partition on the SD card to sd2gb. I ejected the SD card and transferred it to the Mint machine. Gparted, Disks, parted and lsblk correctly displayed SD card properties. Files on the card can be read and written with the file manager.

Strange and hard to understand.

Regards, Jože

[gittiest personITW]

@Cativello,
Could you try plugging the cards, one at a time, directly into the USB port on the computer and test them.

@Senjoz,
I'd place money on that 2gb stick failing soon. 'Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but sometime' soon.

[senjoz]

@gittiest personITW
We are discussing here about SD cards and SD card readers and not about USB flash memory sticks. SD cards cannot be plugged directly into the USB port! I took that 2 GB SD card out of the naphthalene just for testing purposes and I will not place any money on failing or not failing soon.

Regards, Jože

[AndyMH]

For info, I've had SD cards up to 256GB slotted into the built-in SD reader in my T430, no problems. But, plug the 32GB card from my camera into it - no go. Stick same SD card into a SD/usb adapter and plug that into a usb port - it works. Gave up trying to figure out why.

[gittiest personITW]

@senjoz

Yes, but if, for instance, you are plugging a card into a reader into a hub into a port that is sharing other USB devices, that might not be the same as
plugging a card into a reader into an unshared USB port.

[senjoz]

Yes, but if, for instance, you are plugging a card into a reader into a hub into a port that is sharing other USB devices, that might not be the same as
plugging a card into a reader into an unshared USB port.

Discussion was regarding built-in SD card reader with PCIE connection.

Regards, Jože

[Cattivello]

For info, I've had SD cards up to 256GB slotted into the built-in SD reader in my T430, no problems. But, plug the 32GB card from my camera into it - no go. Stick same SD card into a SD/usb adapter and plug that into a usb port - it works. Gave up trying to figure out why.

Interesting!
Before reading this post, I looked for an older usb card reader. And tested the very same SDcards.
By my surprise, they all work fine.
So, ... if windows would also fail reading the SDCards, I would say is a HW failure. However, that is not the case...
Windows reads and write well, linuxmint does not.
New cards (A1 type) are not recognized in linuxmint. Older cards yes (not A1)
Basically I guess I have to live with the fact that the built-in PCI card reader is not completely well functioning in Linux. Or this specific model!!
Sad as I have to use an external device when I have an internal same device.

[Cattivello]

@Cattivello
Maybe next will be interesting for you.

Just out of curiosity I tested in LM20.1 five SD cards with Gparted and Disks. With four of them I had no problems. With one old 2 GB card I got a similar error as you, udisks-error-quark. That card is from an old gsm mobile phone. It has one fat16 partition.

I rechecked that card with sudo parted -l and lsblk -f, no partitions found, parted complained about the wrong label. I transferred the card to the Windows machine. There was no problem with reading. I opened Disk Management and changed the volume label of the partition on the SD card to sd2gb. I ejected the SD card and transferred it to the Mint machine. Gparted, Disks, parted and lsblk correctly displayed SD card properties. Files on the card can be read and written with the file manager.

Strange and hard to understand.

Regards, Jože

Will try this solution.
however, I think is a hard workaround to keep up with (if working).
One of the tested card came straight from the shop.
It would be complicated to first modify all new cards in windows before being able to use it in Linux.