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Nitro microSD getting corrupted & loss of files

I was working on an Excel 2010 file on my Win 7 x64 laptop & it's running low on battery so I saved
the Excel file to a Nitro MicroSD (that's inserted inside an SD adapter that comes  bundled with the
Nitro).

Then I worked on another laptop (Win XP x32bit) that has more battery that uses Excel 2003 with
an MS converter: amount of data entered into Excel is like 3 over hours of data entry: Excel 2003
 disallows me to do "Save" as it indicated "Read Only" so I did "Save As" to save another file name
& the converter saves it to the Nitro as an .xlsx (this is an Excel 2010 format) after conversion
without any error message & I hibernated my Win XP laptop properly.

Now both the Excel 2003 on the Win XP as well as the Excel 2010 on the Win 7 laptops (as well as
my kid's MS Excel 2013 on her Macbook when I emailed it to her) could NOT read this saved xlsx
 file, giving the error message shown in attachment 1.

Q1:
I need back this Excel file as it's worth more than 3 hours of work.  How can I recover back the
Excel file with 3+ hours of work?

Q2:
What's the next best courses of actions I should take now?  I reckon there's something wrong with
this Nitro microSD which I got from Amazon.  All my previous SD & thumb drives which I work &
copy Excel files between the 2 laptops never gave this issue, so don't think it's a laptop nor
Windows nor MS Excel issue but the Nitro or the microSD to SD adapter issue.

Q3:
How do I determine which component is at fault?  Do I copy out everything first from this Nitro
& reformat it to prevent future recurrence?  Read that this Nitro is a fast thingy, so not sure if
the two laptop's SD reader slots cant copy with the speed?

Subsequently when I copy more files to this Nitro from the Win 7 laptop & did a directory listing, it
gave lots of garbage characters as shown below:

 Directory of E:\ipfeb

[.]
[..]
010215-080215.csv
16to28T25Feb.zip
16_28Fb.csv
16_28T25.csv
16_28T25Tr.csv
1to22T25Feb.zip
1_15Febt25T.csv
1_15Febt25Tr.csv
1_28Febt25Tr.csv
1_28FebT25Tr_Rejonly.xlsx
1_28FebT25Tr_RejonlySml.xlsx
1_28Febt25Tr_woAction.csv
1_28Febt25Tr_woAction_DropMononly.xlsx
1_28Febt25Tr_woAction_DropMononlySml.xlsx
1_8Febt25T.csv
9_15Fb.csv
9_15Feb.csv
9_15t25FebT.csv
alT25Feb.csv
alT25FebTnogood.csv
BBBFebtopIps.xlsx
Cl_Top5_Event_Feb15_V2.xlsx  <== good original Excel
Cl_Top5_Event_Feb15_V3.xlsx <== bad unreadable Excel
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              76 File(s) 185,396,831,180 bytes
              41 Dir(s)   5,086,674,944 bytes free
CorruptExcelNitromicroSD.jpg
SOLUTION
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Member_2_406981

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Avatar of sunhux
sunhux

ASKER

I'll need someone who has tried the freeware recovery tools to advise which ones
they're comfortable with
Avatar of sunhux

ASKER

I combed thru my local c:\ drive by issuing
" c: "
" dir/s *top5*v3.xls* " & got the following :

 Directory of C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Application Data\Microsoft
\Office\Recent

03/08/2015  04:05 PM               386 Cl_Top5_Event_Feb15_V3.xlsx
03/08/2015  11:27 AM               389 Cl_Top5_Event_Feb15_V3.xlsx
               2 File(s)            775 bytes

 Directory of C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Recent

03/08/2015  04:05 PM               406 Cl_Top5_Event_Feb15_V3.xlsx
03/08/2015  04:04 PM               409 Cl_Top5_Event_Feb15_V3.xlsx
               2 File(s)            815 bytes

     Total Files Listed:
               4 File(s)          1,590 bytes


Are they of any help?  I think the link files link to the file on microSD
sometimes this also can happen when you have a faked card.

how full was the card at the time of the incident? was it nearly half full?

if file gots defective coz pf a fake size report than there is nearly zero chance to recover.
Avatar of sunhux

ASKER

>how full was the card at the time of the incident? was it nearly half full?

About half full.  Doubt Amazon will sell fake stuff or wont it?
Avatar of sunhux

ASKER

Before I next reuse this card (or any other microSD card), is there any tool or
any function (such as reformatting it or test it writing/reading it to the full)
that I can do in advance to ensure the quality of the microSD before actually
using it for production (ie actual data)?
Avatar of sunhux

ASKER

Well it's actually more than half full judging from the output in my very first post:
Total capacity published is 16GB and the output I gave has only about 5GB free:
     41 Dir(s)   5,086,674,944 bytes free
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PS the recovery of the files you can run from the image you created before, it will run much faster than from the flash memory itself.
But you also can restore that image an a stick/external HDD wich is same size or a bit bigger and try recovery from there.
Avatar of sunhux

ASKER

>is the output from b4 the data corruption or from now, the corrupted state?
Output is taken after the corrupt state occur.

Thanks;  haven't got the chance to copy out the data & reformat it yet.

Other than copying files to it & trying to access files on the microSD, is there
any other way to sort of "sanity-check" if the card is good after reformatting?

I suppose I should not do "quick format" but a "full format", right?
Avatar of sunhux

ASKER

Any specific freeware tool that I can use to increase my chances of recovering
as much data from the microSD?
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