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The Cabin >> Raspberry and Other Pies >> SD Card Problems on Older R-Pis.
http://www.hondosackett.com/yabb/YaBB.pl?num=1461435496

Message started by Fernando on Apr 23^rd, 2016, 2:18pm

Title: SD Card Problems on Older R-Pis.
Post by Fernando on Apr 23^rd, 2016, 2:18pm

This is for the older Raspberry Pi Model A and Model B. Despite their limitations with I/O, they are still useful and great little computers; their CPUs and RAM footprints is equal to the Plus Counterparts (Model A+ and Model B+).

In switching SDs between R-Pi Units, I have ran into a major problem which I thought was an R-Pi System or SD Card Failure. It's a little of both. The older R-Pi have a couple of weak links, both associated with the SD Card Socket (on right hand side of image).
http://blog.adafruit.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/window-2-103.jpg

The Symptoms are: the R-Pi turns on, the red or green LED Lights up, there's black Screen, and the R-Pi does not Boot. This is usually an SD Card or SD Card Socket issue.

On the SD Card Socket itself, one of two things happen:
1) The side rails wear down and the SD Card gets loose in the socket.
2) The flexing of the pins from removing and inserting SD Cards loosens the pins off the board.

The second one is easy to fix, by resoldering the pins back to the board. But the makers of the R-Pi systems use a high temperature lead-free solder, which makes it harder to desolder and then resolder.

The first part, you need to remove the socket entirely and install a new one. You can get them here...
http://www.ebay.com/itm/111486438485
http://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/iJwAAOxyo4lRk545/s-l600.jpg

But again, their use of high temperature lead free solder makes it difficult to remove the socket (I think I wrote a post on this before...). You need to flood each pin with regular solder and repeat desoldering it, removing the lead-free solder bit by bit. At the anchor points, you need to remove all the solder there to clean out the anchor point holes. Then you can clean the board tabs where the socket goes onto, line up the SD Card Carrier to the tabs, solder the two socket anchors in place in their holes and then solder the pins in place. This takes about an hour to do, much of it in desoldering!

The other problem is in the SD Card itself:
http://ak1.ostkcdn.com/images/products/5919439/SanDisk-SDSDB-032G-B35-32-GB-Secure-Digital-High-Capacity-SDHC-P13621856.jpg
http://www.newpromoproducts.com/uploads/1/6/6/2/16621350/8609030_orig.jpg

Their side rails also wear down.

In the case of the Micro SD Card, you can buy a adapter (second image). But you can't do that with the full sized SD Card. A new socket on the R-Pi socket will improve its connection to the board, but the SD Card will continue to wear out. There is no Ifs, Ands or Buts about this.

Another one of two more problems I ran into, was the full size SD Card was the plastic bending and cracking above the connector end. The card seems to be good but it does come up with "sector errors", so I'm wondering if the media itself is broken or not. To test this, you would have to reformat the SD Card and install an OS on it and see if it boots. I have not done this yet because there is some data I need to recover first from it. But I'll let you know if it does work.

The last problem was the Micro SD Adapter going bad. All the adapter does is extend the connector from the Micro SD Card to a Full sized one. Somewhere inside the connector goes bad and the micro card becomes unreadable. This is on top of the other problems of the side rails failing. The only solution to this is get a new SD Card Adapter.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/13/SD-microSD_adaptor.jpg

In all these cases, I found out that there was nothing wrong with the R-Pi itself, putting in a new SD Card with tight side rails got them to boot up! But these older SD Cards and Socket issues is a matter of concern. In some cases, as mentioned, can be fixed. There are various solutions for this problem on Ebay, and several blogs that say you can "cut the sd card" to make it flush with the board. I even read one website where the person soldered his sd card to the R-Pi!

Broken R-Pi's Model A & B are popping up on Ebay with a specific problem - "Red or Green LED Lights up, Black Screen, and Does Not Boot." This usually means a problem with the SD Card or the SD Card socket. But because people are buying the newer R-Pi2 and P-Pi3, they are selling their Model As & Bs for next to nothing. I just got one for $3.50 (plus $3.45 shipping, should be here by 4/30). Its former owner even stated on the auction that he/she believes that its an SD Card Socket problem but instead of trying to fix it, they got a R-Pi2. When I get it I will verify that it is the SD Card problem and fix it. I will have to get new SD Card Sockets as I am low on them.

So lets see what happens.

EDIT: I did replace a couple of bad SD Card Sockets on R-Pi Model Bs before, but in searching the forum, I did not post that repair. Again, it is an easy repair, the only difficulty is their use of high temp lead-free solder, which makes desoldering the socket difficult.

Title: Re: SD Card Problems on Older R-Pis.
Post by Hondo I. Sackett on Apr 23^rd, 2016, 4:29pm

Great info

Title: Re: SD Card Problems on Older R-Pis.
Post by Fernando on Apr 24^th, 2016, 11:27am

Managed to bring back the dead Full Sized SD Card by formatting it with Windows SD Formatter using the Write-Out option. (For Macs you would use Disk Utility, delete the SD's Partition, Create a new one, and format it using the "Zero Out All Data" Option.) Then I installed an old copy of Wheezy on it.

Because the SD Casing is cracked and bent, and the SD Card Rails on worn on the R-Pi and the SD Card, the connector does not make proper contact on the SD Card to the R-Pi. Because of this, the R-Pi was dead with a bright red LED on, and not booting. I used a small hand clamp like this one hold the SD Card in place and then it was able to boot:
http://techno.com.my/online/images/ken539-5300k.jpg

It was slow as Molasses going up-hill in a cold day in January! But it booted!

In short, since it was a fresh and new install of the OS, it reverted the R-Pi to the original state: No Over-clocking, Audio set on auto, memory get to 50% CPU / 50% GPU, Text Console Boot, and so on. I had to reconfigure the settings to what I'm used too, which was modest Over-clocking (800 - 900 MHz instead of 700 MHz), Audio set to Headphones, Graphical Desktop Boot, and so on. Then it booted up as I'm used too.

But the issue still lies in the SD Card Casing being worn, cracked and bent. I need to figure something to fix the SD Card now that I got it working again.

EDIT: Tested the bent and crack SD Card on two other Model B and a Model A R-Pi's that I have. Using the clamp on the R-Pi's Model Bs got it to boot. Looking at the SD Card, it definitely bulges out of the SD Card Socket slightly, clamping down the SD Card to the R-Pi to just hand tight gets it to work. The Model As I have are nearly new, only using them a few times for testing, but the SD Card failed to boot on these as well - as it also bulges out of the SD Card Socket. Using the hand clamp here to hold the SD Card flat in the socket also got it to boot!

In all this, I forgot to fix and test the other SD Card which is a Micro SD with the bad adapter, though the Micro SD does work when put into other adapters, the issue is to try to get the broken adapter to work again.