Defective Sd Slot...

[GameGod]

Hey guys,

I just got my GP2x for Christmas, and my SD slot is busted! The SD slot worked the first time I put an SD card in, but now something is messed up and it won't "lock" the SD card into place. (Everytime you insert the card, it just pops right back out like you were ejecting it...)

Any ideas?

 

[gnyffel]

Unless there's some nifty way of fixing it (and even then, really), I'd say you have to return it.

 

[GameGod]

Unless there's some nifty way of fixing it (and even then, really), I'd say you have to return it.

Gah, this such a pain in the rear end!!!

Just out of curiosity, did this ever happen to anyone else? (It's a weird part to be defective...)

 

[sy7robc]

Hi, I just tried to use my new Apacer 150X 4GB sd card in my GP2X (christmas gift) and it doesn't work! It does not click in correctly and I can not eject it by pushing it. -Yes, I have inserted it the right way. It goes down the whole way, but it does not say "clic". When I install the card the GP2X freezes! When I eject the card, using nails, the GP2X is usable again. I suppose I have to return the GP2X. This sucks extra bad since I live in Sweden and postage cost a lot.

/A so far pretty disappointed user

 

[Squidge]

Hey guys,

I just got my GP2x for Christmas, and my SD slot is busted! The SD slot worked the first time I put an SD card in, but now something is messed up and it won't "lock" the SD card into place. (Everytime you insert the card, it just pops right back out like you were ejecting it...)

Any ideas?

You can normally fix that, but it'll void your warrantee. Just remove the spring, as you don't need it anyway.

There's two ways of using the SD slot normally: The first is to click it in, and then push further in for it to release. The second is to click it in, and simply pull to release. If you remove the spring, it'll always be the later, but it doesn't damage anything (I've done it this way on my 2x since the beginning).

Or, you can purchase a new sd slot online and replace it yourself.

Hi, I just tried to use my new Apacer 150X 4GB sd card in my GP2X (christmas gift) and it doesn't work! It does not click in correctly and I can not eject it by pushing it. -Yes, I have inserted it the right way. It goes down the whole way, but it does not say "clic". When I install the card the GP2X freezes! When I eject the card, using nails, the GP2X is usable again. I suppose I have to return the GP2X. This sucks extra bad since I live in Sweden and postage cost a lot.

I'd try another sd card first. Freezing upon inserting an SD card is the usual sign of either a faulty sd card, or an sd card it can't recognise. May want to make sure you have the latest firmware first though.

 

[GameGod]

Thanks for the advice Squidge.

Weird thing just happened. I figured out that if I insert the card further into the socket than I thought I previously had to, I can get it to click and lock in just fine. Now the problem is that my GP2X freezes when the SD card is inserted, and it's not a compatibility issue with the card, since it was working just fine before. (I even reformatted it just now to make sure the card wasn't corrupt or something.)

I think the spring or something might be out of place and is shorting something out in there. Also, based on the couple of threads that have popped up with people complaining about SD cards freezing their GP2X's, I'd guess maybe there's a batch with faulty SD slots...

Thoughts?

 

[GameGod]

Ok, after telnetting into my GP2X, here's what dmesg spits out after I insert/remove an SD card:

MMC/SD Card Detected
Partition check:
 mmcsda:###[mmcsd_slot_mmsp2.c:333]->sdi_interrupt: SDIDSTA_TOUT
Read Time out :0
MMC/SD card ejected
Read error => cmd->nSectors:1
CMD17 failed, ret = -19
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 0
CMD17 failed, ret = -19
end_request: I/O error, dev 3c:00 (mmcsd), sector 0
 unable to read partition table
Register SD: 29MsB
mount...1 
mount...2: 
mount... error
del...1
del_mmcsd_device: umount /mnt/sd...-22
del...2

Something's majorly weird...

 

[Blah]

If I were you, I'd get it returned before they make up some excuse to not replace it.

 

[Squidge]

CMD17 is Read single block. In other words, it knows the card is there (though that isn't much use as it's a simple switch) but can't actually talk to it. Maybe one of the pins has broken inside?

 

[GameGod]

On closer inspection, yeah, it does look like one of the pins is severely bent inside. Pin 8 (furthest to the right) looks like it's been compacted and is stuck further back than the rest of the pins. I could open it up and void my warranty, but I don't know how fragile the pins are, so I'd rather not...

Here's a rough diagram of what it looks like:


(I have no idea how a single pin could get messed up like this, just from using a normal SD card. Something must have been off about it in the first place...)

Thanks again Squidge.

 

[Squidge]

I'd say the slot has had some foreign object shoved into it as some point. Returning the unit is the best way forward from this point, unless you feel like trying to repair it yourself. Depends on how much the postage is really.

 

[sy7robc]

Hi, I just tried to use my new Apacer 150X 4GB sd card in my GP2X (christmas gift) and it doesn't work! It does not click in correctly and I can not eject it by pushing it. -Yes, I have inserted it the right way. It goes down the whole way, but it does not say "clic". When I install the card the GP2X freezes! When I eject the card, using nails, the GP2X is usable again. I suppose I have to return the GP2X. This sucks extra bad since I live in Sweden and postage cost a lot.

I'd try another sd card first. Freezing upon inserting an SD card is the usual sign of either a faulty sd card, or an sd card it can't recognise. May want to make sure you have the latest firmware first though.

I have tried another card. A 256MB SanDisk SD that I use in my digital camera and it gives the exact same result on the GP2X - the screen and the whole GP2X freezes! The second I take the card out of the slot it works fine again. Both cards work fine in mydigital camera or on my PC (winXP) using a card reader...

 

[pencilneck]

So I'm not alone here...

I purchased a second GP2X for my wife but the SD card wouldn't "click" into place, there was no spring-ie to it when you slid the card it. The card would go in as far as it does with my GP2X. With any SD card installed, it would not boot up to the menu screen. Without the a SD card in it, it would boot up and she could play the Vektar game in NAND memory.

Two issues.... first the no latching/springy of the SD card. If you look down in the SD slot, on the right side is a thin black plastic finger that normally the card presses against as you insert it. This black plastic finger is spring loaded and works like a clicky ball point pen. Her unit was in the down position. I was able to slip a thin screw driver down into the SD slot and depress the black plastic finger down a little and then it unclicked and came up. Now the SD card will click in and lock down, then depress the SD card and it springs up. Weeee.... still won't boot up to menu screen with SD card in it.

The other issue was a bent contact pen, in my case the one on the far left side was bent into a "Z" shape.

With a fine tip pair of needle nose pliers, I improved it:

Sadly, the metal doesn't take to sharp bents very well and the downward tip of the contact snapped off.

I'll warn everyone.... this repair was a bit of a pain in the butt to do. I'm not going to go into detail because quite simply, if I you can't figure out how to do this on your own, it might be best to not try. It took me over an hour to do this.

The SD card now pops in and out without issue and the system will boot up... and I notice the LCD screen is a dud... something I had kind of wondered about from the start. On green boot upscreen, there is says "GP2X" I could see faint ghosting lines running across the screen. It has always done that. Then when I boot it up for the first time with the SD card in it, I load up the game Mraid game, you can see ghosting strips across the screen, real bad on high score screen. :angry: Already tried firmware update. Mym GP2X is clear as a bell.

Hope you enjoy the pics and if anyone knows of a fix for the screen ghosting, I'd like to know.

Thank you.

 

[gaterooze]

It seems this (the bent pins) has happened with several units around Xmas. Must be a bad batch. Weird, I'd never heard of it happening on a GP2X until very recently.

 

[piphil]

So I'm not alone here...

I purchased a second GP2X for my wife but the SD card wouldn't "click" into place, there was no spring-ie to it when you slid the card it. The card would go in as far as it does with my GP2X. With any SD card installed, it would not boot up to the menu screen. Without the a SD card in it, it would boot up and she could play the Vektar game in NAND memory.

Two issues.... first the no latching/springy of the SD card. If you look down in the SD slot, on the right side is a thin black plastic finger that normally the card presses against as you insert it. This black plastic finger is spring loaded and works like a clicky ball point pen. Her unit was in the down position. I was able to slip a thin screw driver down into the SD slot and depress the black plastic finger down a little and then it unclicked and came up. Now the SD card will click in and lock down, then depress the SD card and it springs up. Weeee.... still won't boot up to menu screen with SD card in it.

The other issue was a bent contact pen, in my case the one on the far left side was bent into a "Z" shape.

With a fine tip pair of needle nose pliers, I improved it:

Sadly, the metal doesn't take to sharp bents very well and the downward tip of the contact snapped off.

I'll warn everyone.... this repair was a bit of a pain in the butt to do. I'm not going to go into detail because quite simply, if I you can't figure out how to do this on your own, it might be best to not try. It took me over an hour to do this.

The SD card now pops in and out without issue and the system will boot up... and I notice the LCD screen is a dud... something I had kind of wondered about from the start. On green boot upscreen, there is says "GP2X" I could see faint ghosting lines running across the screen. It has always done that. Then when I boot it up for the first time with the SD card in it, I load up the game Mraid game, you can see ghosting strips across the screen, real bad on high score screen. :angry: Already tried firmware update. Mym GP2X is clear as a bell.

Hope you enjoy the pics and if anyone knows of a fix for the screen ghosting, I'd like to know.

Thank you.

Bump!

Having had a thread of my own with my GP2X displaying the same symptoms, I finally got round to fiddling with telnet this afternoon, and it turned up the CMD17 error described further up in this thread. I had looked at the pins before but couldn't see any problems. Of course, once I knew that it was the left-hand pin - damn, it was bent...

So, I used to have a warranty, but I opened the thing up. I will repeat penclnck's advice - if you have no electronics background, DON'T FIDDLE. Send it back. Anyway, I managed to wroughly force off the SD card cover and spent the next hour or so trying to slowly bend the pin back into shape.

Once it was all back together, the SD card slot worked without any problems. :lol:

One problem - I managed to ping the spring for the SD card spring mechanism somewhere. So I don't have spring loading any more, but at least the damned thing works!

Many thanks to all you guys on the forum for providing advice, especially penclnck for having the guts to take the thing apart and find the problem, and ID1OT for his excellent advice on telnet (see this thread). If this forum would allow you to give mod points, you two would be getting about +10 from me each.

Anyway, hopefully I'll be back to the forum at some point to talk about more mundane things. I'm off to stick a few videos on this thing!

 

[Vimacs]

yep, gph seems to have switched to another (crap) sd socket in the last batch, if i where you i would just send it in and get a good one.
there seem to be so many sd problems in the last weeks its not normal any more, there never where any (mechanical) sd problems before.

 

[GameGod]

I ended up sending mine back.... I have the feeling it's going to be like a month before I get a new one. :/

 

[EvilDragon]

Unfortunately, it's true.
I had quite a few gp2x coming back from the latest batch. All worked fine when I upgraded the firmware but had this exact same issue that you all had when I got them back.

I reported this to GPH.

 

[kornalius]

Same problem here. Ordered my unit from GamerSection.ca around Dec. 6th. Only try the unit Dec. 25th (present to myself! ). The last pin is bent too, with a flashlight I can see it.

I will send the unit back.

 

[GameGod]

Just out of curiosity, did any of you write down the exact revision on the back of your GP2X?
Mine was:
2006.11.04 - GP2XV127

Man, I'm really hoping I don't just get another one that's going to have the same problem...

(BTW piphil, the bent pin in the Z shape looks like what happened to mine...)