Formatting SD Card

[DRV]

I purchased a Kingston 32 GB microSD card for my Nook Color.  When I insert it and reboot my NC, I get this message:


     ! SD card format required
     -----------------------------------
     This memory card is unrecognized and
      needs to be formatted

     Cancel     Format Now

When I press "Format Now" I hear a tone and the same message appears.  When I press "Cancel", it goes away and I see a notification symbol on the bottom left of the screen.  Pressing it brings up this notice:

     Damaged SD card
     SD card damaged.  You may have to reformat it.

If I attach my Nook to my PC and check the properties of the H: drive, it appears to be a functioning 32 GB removeable drive as far as my PC is concerned.  I note, however, that the card is formatted as a FAT drive.  According to the User Manual, the NC needs a FAT32 drive.  (My NC's "drive", G:, is FAT32 according to the PC.)

Can I format the SD card from my PC?  Or is there some way to force the NC to format it even though it doesn't like the format of the card it's seeing?  The User Guide (p. 87) says if the card is unformatted the NC is supposed to reformat the card as soon as it's inserted.  It doesn't say what to do if the card is already formatted but to something other than FAT32.

Suggestions?

[Desert_Brat]

If you have an sd adapter (looks like an sd card but has a slot to put a micro sd card into it). Go ahead and try formating it on the computer at FAT32.

If that doesn't work. The card could be defective. Or it could be a card the NC is quirky about. My camera doesn't like Kingston cards, but is fine with PNY or Sandisk. Sometimes it's just that way.

Good luck, let us know if the computer format fixes it.

[DRV]

---

Desert_Brat wrote:

If you have an sd adapter (looks like an sd card but has a slot to put a micro sd card into it). Go ahead and try formating it on the computer at FAT32.

I don't have an adapter or a way to format on my PC.

If that doesn't work. The card could be defective.

That's what I thought ... when it happened the first time!  This is the second card and it does the same thing as the first.  I could believe the card(s) were bad except this one looks fine to my PC and I can copy files to it and read and delete them just fine.

Or it could be a card the NC is quirky about. My camera doesn't like Kingston cards, but is fine with PNY or Sandisk. Sometimes it's just that way.

Yes, I guess that could be the case.

Good luck, let us know if the computer format fixes it.

If I don't hear of a better suggestion in a short while, I'm just going to let the PC format it while it's in the Nook.  I can't imagine any harm form doing a format.  It's just writing some file system headers and such on the card.  Or does the Nook create some folder structure (Books, Magazines, etc) similar to what's on the main "drive" when it does a format of an SD card?

[Desert_Brat]

Mine hasn't created any folders on the sd card, but it probably wouldn't matter if it did. Although Adobe Digital Editions will put a folder on it and I have no idea why. With ADE you can only drag a book to the nook icon, which is the main memory, and not to the card.

A lot of folks put their own folders on an sd card. Calibre makes a separate folder for each book it adds to the sd card. The nook works just fine with them.

[DRV]

Success at last but not without a few hiccups.

I purchased an microSD adapter, two, actually. One, a standard SD card that you plug into a card reader and the other a USB adapter.  I already had a reader that would take an SD card (but not a microSD).  Neither adapter worked on my PC.  I connect them to my PC and it did nothing.

I put the microSD card back into my Nook and connected it to my PC.  As before, the PC sees the card but I cannot format it.  Disk Manager says there's no media in the drive.  This was all on a Windows 7 PC.

I have an XP machine so I tried the USB adapter and it was recognized.  I was able to format to FAT32 and when I put the card in the Nook it found it and everything was fine.  I did, however, see some default folders the Nook put there when it booted but I haven't studied it closely enough to fully understand what's what.  I'm just thrilled to have 32 GB of space for videos and music.

[Desert_Brat]

@DRV

Glad to hear you got it working.

Makes me wish they had left Windows at XP and had quit trying to improve on something that worked well. I also wish there was a choice of operating systems when you get a new computer. I'd pick XP every time.

 I bought a new laptop and had no choice but to go with Vista, and also had to get a new printer that was compatible with it. Some of the companies offered an OS "rollback" for $150 more you could get XP instead of Vista.

Anyway, good to hear you got it working. And yes, there will be some default folders on the card. Usually in the manner of My Files folders.

[SaulSK]

Same here. Windows 7 format of a Sandisk SD not recognised by Nook and reported as card damaged. Format with HPUSBFW.EXE and everything is fine. 

[Erbear87]

Mine does the same thing with a 32GB #4 MicroSD card from SanDisk.  I don't have a computer with XP on it however (I just have Windows 7).  Has anyone found a way to get it formatted through Windows 7?

[Savoir_Faire]

SD cards use a different breed of format, using Windows to format could lead to data corruption and is not recommended. Download and install SD Formatter from here: https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_3/ .

[Savoir_Faire]

I should mention, even after my card was properly formatted I've had a few occasions where upon boot I've gotten that same warning with the option to format. Each time I just selected cancel, powered completely down and cold booted after which the card mounted normally.

[Fish027]

I just tackled the same issue.  Formatted multiple time with windows then with SD Formatter with same results.  After trial and error I found the fix.

A.  Boot device without the SD card

B.  After boot, put the SD card in the Nook

C.  Goto Settings, Device Info

D.  Unmount SD card

E.  Format SD card

After that it works fine.  Hope this helps everyone.

[Parlin09]

Have a Kingston 32gb class 10. After experiencing problems outlined in previous posts tried your directions and they worked!!!

THX!!!

[MsLeah]

Fish- I followed the steps you listed but there is no option for format sd. It only says erase sd card. Im trying to convert my nook back to 1.40 using a zip file and I was told I need to format a sd card before I can do this. Any other ideas?

[PivotalSpark]

I had this same issue with a 32GB PNY card in my Nook Simple Touch Glowlight (running 1.1.5).  The Nook simply could not recognize/format it... regardless of whether I booted up with the card inserted or put the card in after powering up.

I took the card to my local B&N and had them try it in another Nook.  Same result.

So, I went back to Best Buy and exchanged the card for a new one (same model).  Same result.

While at Best Buy, I picked up an SD-to-USB interface for $11 so that I could attempt to format it on my PC (running Windows XP).  I downloaded the SD Formatter app that someone suggested in this thread and formatted the card.  Same result.

My last hope was to use the Windows OS to format the card.  I selected FAT32 and formatted the card.  Result... SUCCESS!

So, for me, the solution was to format the card with the Windows OS in FAT32 format.

I hope that this saves someone from the tremendous amount of aggravation that this issued caused me. 

Happy Reading!

B.

[jackie106]

I am having simliar issues with my sd card. I have to format everytime I add a new book on there. It says error  dialog sorry can not open book. But if I format the sd card and put it back on again it works. I have a 32g card. What is the problem with this? Can any body help me. I shouldn't have to format every time a put a new book on here.