Argh "CF card error" messgae on camera, is there any hope...

[DontlookatmeImshy]

that i'll ever be able to retrieve the photos of the kids

Has anyone ever manage to retrieve photos/data with this arror. I can see lots of software to download that claims to be able to retrieve stuff but do they work or am i better off taking it to a camera shop or something.

I don't know, but it's possible that it could be recovered by software so if they are free it's worth a try. I wouldn't spend any money on them. You could ring a camera shop, but somehow I doubt they'd be able to do more than replace the card.

Have you another method of reading it that you can try? If you are using a usb cable then have you a card reader that you can put it into or vice versa.

take the battery out for a bit and the put it back in. what make is it?

Hi I've tried the battery thing, also tried rechargeing it. HAve tried it in another camera (both Canon) but now it does nothing at all.

You could try it in a card reader as well. Otherwise, as onager says, there is software available that often does a good job. Even some of the paid software you can download a free trial that you can run to see what it can find on the card, and then just pay for the upgrade if you want to go ahead and retrieve those files.

I've heard good things about this software (and it's free for use on digital camera files)

And more general discussion here

Thanks, will try out the software.

Let us know how it goes!

No luck I'm afraid

After reading those links though i was quite hopeful.

The Zar Software didn't work so I took it into a couple of camera shops, one of them said it just kept crashing their software! the other one tried for along time, sent me away to come back later, but no luck there either, I think they were a bit flumoxed and almost reluctant to have to give up and admit they couldn't do it. He did say that there are specialists who could possibly open up the card and try to retrieve stuff but its extortionately expensive £300ish.

Fortunately I found some more recent photos of the ds's on another card so it wasn't quite the disaster i first thought it was.

Will be making sure i back up photos more regularly on the computer and cd's though.

Put it in the freezer for an hour and then try again. Seriously - worked for mine when it did the same thing.

Really! Funny thing is last night after it failed dh said do it again when its colder.

I'm willing to try anything though, doesn't look like i've got anything to lose.

It's to do with the components - when they are cold they shrink and if it's wear on the chips it can be enough to get them into the right places to work. I did it with my hard drive too when it failed. It worked for long enough for me to remove everything.

I had this just the other day with a sd card though, this software worked for me & was free

Thanks for the tips, unfortunately no success.

Card appears to be well and truly dead.
I'm just glad that when i first bought the camera i got a 256mb card that went wrong within days so i took it back and swapped it for 2 128mb cards otherwise i would've lost everything taken in the last 6 months instead of just the last 2 months.

Ho hum.