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October 4, 2003
A Trouble at Paradise--T3 Update
There seems to be a major problem with the new Palm Tungsten T3 SD card drive system. I've been using Sandisk SD card with the Palm T/C, and when I started to use the card in the T3, I ran into all sorts of problems. I had a problem with file corruption and had to reformat the whole card, and when I ran my backup programs (such as BackupMan and JBBackup for OS5). So, I thought the card went bad, and went out and purchased a PNY SD card (manufactured by Toshiba). Unfortunately, I am still getting the backup error (such as system error #0x2908 "A sector that was accessed is bad." or unknown error). However, I have never had these error with my T/C, and the Sandisk card that gave me the problem is running fine when I returned it to the T/C and reformatted. So, I was both puzzled and disturbed to say the least.
However, when I got in touch with Mike Waldron at Bits' n Bolt Software, it seems that the problem is more wide-spread. According to his website, there is a SD driver problem in the T3 that exhibits such symptoms, and there is a big warning not to use any Sandisk SD cards.
So, there seems to be a trouble at Paradise, and let's hope palmOne takes action to remedy this situation quickly.
Posted by Ken in PalmCorner
Comments
Ken,
Wow, same issue here. I've got 128 Lexar SD card, and 3 times now I've had the T3 corrupt the card to where neither it nore our T|T can use it. Funny thing is, when the same card is read in stuck in a card reader on a PC, the card reads just fine. Still, it needs to be reformatted in order for it to be used again by a Palm device. This same card has given us no problems in a Treo 600, T|T or a Palm m505. It's only the T3 that causes it to become "damaged".
Posted by: Bryan Nystrom at October 5, 2003 1:07 AM
I had a 256M Sandisk SD card that died completely. In other words, I can't even reformat and use it somewhere else.
Posted by: T. Davies at October 6, 2003 4:50 PM
I just purchased a dozen T3 for client up grades and all have SanDisk 256 cards. So far we have not had any problems. In the past when we have had problems it was caused by inserting and removing the the cards improperly.
Posted by: David Graham at October 7, 2003 1:09 PM
I believe the problem is quite specific (with regard to file writing manipulation). So, if you don't use any of the backup programs, or interchange the card with other Palm devices, or PC, you might be fine. Otherwise, you might want to be careful.
Posted by: Ken at October 7, 2003 3:20 PM
Ken
Thank you for the information.
Yes my clients backup data to their cards, swap cards and use their on PC.
The T3's (12) and TE's (4) have been in use for almost a week.
How long does it take for this problem to manifest itself?
David Graham
HHS
Posted by: David Graham at October 7, 2003 7:47 PM
It happened to me right away. I have used both BackupMan and JBBackup to back up my RAM, and both programs were giving me errors (BackupMan was more serious than JBBackup). If you are backing up RAM, check the log to make sure everything is getting backed up. I guess the error/corruption happens when certain things come together. For my normal activities, I haven't noticed any problem with my card for a few days.
Posted by: Ken at October 7, 2003 8:49 PM
Palm have release a bug fix for the SD card corruption & high number of interrupts...
http://www.palmone.com/us/support/downloads/tungstent3/t3_update.html
Posted by: Rik at November 6, 2003 9:05 PM
I have the 1 gig and a 512. I use them in my canon SD400 and on my MP3 player. The only problem I have ever had was with the 1 gig. I filled up the entire disk with MP3's and it didn't seem to like that very much. Formated it, only used about 8/10 of the card, no problems.
From what i have been reading it seems to be more of a problem when people are tying to load different things (pics, mp3's, mpegs, back up files, .etc) but it seems to work fine for everyone who keeps it in the same devices and uses them for just one or two things at most.
Posted by: Colby at February 10, 2004 1:11 PM