topic Older EOS Rebel T1i in EOS DSLR & Mirrorless Cameras

Older EOS Rebel T1i

AlaskaBev — Thu, 12 Jul 2018 16:25:35 GMT

I gave put a brand new card in camera and get error message saying card cannot be accessed Reinsert or format card with camera why

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

BurnUnit — Thu, 12 Jul 2018 17:08:45 GMT

Exactly what brand, model and capacity of card are you using?

Is it a full sized SD card or a Micro SD card with an adapter?

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

AlaskaBev — Thu, 12 Jul 2018 18:44:39 GMT

I’ve been using a micro but needing more space for pictures to take at Denali Park so tried another micro and it said same them went back to 32 reg and still won’t

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

RobertTheFat — Thu, 12 Jul 2018 19:02:03 GMT

@AlaskaBev wrote:
I’ve been using a micro but needing more space for pictures to take at Denali Park so tried another micro and it said same them went back to 32 reg and still won’t

32GB may be too large for a T1i. Has your camera ever worked with a card of that size?

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

AlaskaBev — Thu, 12 Jul 2018 19:45:59 GMT

Oh yes . 64 is what I have

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

kvbarkley — Thu, 12 Jul 2018 22:19:51 GMT

Did you try to format it?

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

BurnUnit — Fri, 13 Jul 2018 00:33:08 GMT

The consensus around here is that Micro SD cards with an adapter can be frustrating, unpredictable ,erratic, undependable, etc., when used in cameras. They seem to work OK in some instances, until they don't.

Do you have a full size SD card available that you can try in your T1i?

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

TCampbell — Fri, 13 Jul 2018 16:46:44 GMT

The T1i can read MS-DOS FAT32 filesystem format. I cannot read exFAT format.

Standard "SD" and "SDHC" cards use either FAT-16 or FAT-32 formats.

But "SDXC" cards use exFAT format. An "SDXC" card canot be used in a T1i because it doesn't understand the filesystem on the card.

The exFAT filesystem is a relatively new invention. The MS-DOS FAT32 filesystem because fairly universal/ubiquitous. Not only can Windows computers read it, but so can Macs, Linux computers, and many others. But the filesystem is so old and was made in an era when computer didn't have big disk drives. The maximize size of the filesystem is limited to 32G.

Later, as computers got bigger filesystems, Microsoft came out with their proprietary NTFS filesystem ... but they demand royalty payments from any other vendor who wants to use it. Apple came out with HFS+ ... but they demand royalty payments from anyone other vendor who wants to use it. And so on.

Ultimately the "exFAT" standard was proposed as a common middle-ground that everyone can use. You can insert an exFAT card into a Windows PC, or a Mac, or a Linux machine, etc. and they all know how to use it. Also camera companies like Canon can implement it.

But this is a moderately new-ish idea. The T1i pre-dates the existence of this standard and thus doesn't know how to deal with these really large memory cards (which didn't exist when the T1i was a current product.)

For your T1i:

Get an "SDHC" card ... make sure it is not an "SDXC" card. Also make sure it's a true "SD" (physical) size card and not a "microSD" size card with an adapter.

The first time you use the card in the T1i, perform a format by using the in-camera menu and tick the "Low Level" check-box. You only need to do this once.

That card should be used exclusively by the T1i (except to copy images to your computer). Don't share memory cards between different devices. If for any reason you DO use the card in another device, it's a good idea to re-format the card (low level) on the camera again.

You want the card to be formated with a filesystem and directory structure laid out the way the *camera* wants to get optimal performance. You may think "Yeah... but I could format this on ___ instead". You could... but you wouldn't necessarily get the same blocking factor, etc. and it wouldn't be optimal (sometimes devices refuse to read them.)

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

ebiggs1 — Sat, 14 Jul 2018 16:26:27 GMT

"Get an "SDHC" card"

That is the correct answer. However, don't buy huge SD cards. Instead buy several smaller ones like 8GB. They are far safer especially for a long vacation trip to Denali National Park. Also never use the tiny micro SD cards with adapter. Never!

"You want the card to be formated with a filesystem and directory structure laid out the way the *camera* wants..."

You know I used to claim and say the same thing. I guess because it is what I've always heard. Since I have tried using my computer to format CF cards I have not seen any adverse or noticeable difference. If it makes you feel better use your camera but I doubt you will see a difference.

The main thing I want you to do is stop buying huge SD cards. Go for several smaller ones. Don't put all your eggs in one basket.

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

TCampbell — Sat, 14 Jul 2018 19:33:12 GMT

@ebiggs1 wrote:

"You want the card to be formated with a filesystem and directory structure laid out the way the *camera* wants..."

You know I used to claim and say the same thing. I guess because it is what I've always heard. Since I have tried using my computer to format CF cards I have not seen any adverse or noticeable difference. If it makes you feel better use your camera but I doubt you will see a difference.

I've learned this based on "luck". I formatted a memory card using my Mac and discovered that I had a Windows computer that couldn't recognize it even though it claimed to support exFAT. What I later learned is that it didn't like the blocking factor (the number of bytes per block) that the Mac used. Apple was able to adapt to different blocking factors, but the Windows PC was fixed to just one blocksize that it wanted to use and refused to work with anything else.

This wasn't a camera issue... but it taught me that just because it's the same filesystem, doesn't necessarily mean there wont be something about the format that a device doesn't like.

If the camera formats the card, then you can be assured that the card is formatted in a way that the camera will like.

If you prefer to have your computer format the card... just make sure you test it in the camera to verify there are no issues ... before you need to rely on the camera for something important. It may work fine.

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

ebiggs1 — Sat, 14 Jul 2018 19:44:50 GMT

"If the camera formats the card, then you can be assured that the card is formatted in a way that the camera will like."

You are right. I should have qualified my statement that I only have done it on Windows machines. Mac's are weird and funcky so who knows if it will be OK? If you are on a Mac, I too, suggest you format with the camera.

From Windows I see no difference. Which I suspose you can say I am just lucky but I must be awfully lucky!

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

Waddizzle — Sun, 15 Jul 2018 15:40:51 GMT

“You know I used to claim and say the same thing. I guess because it is what I've always heard. Since I have tried using my computer to format CF cards I have not seen any adverse or noticeable difference. If it makes you feel better use your camera but I doubt you will see a difference.”

The only harm in using a computer to format an SD card is the computer does not set up default folders that the camera wants to see. But, the camera seems smart enough to create a default folder structure if one does not exist.

[Low Level] Formatting sets up all of the “pigeon holes” where data will be stored. “Blocks” of [these] storage locations are also initialized. Blocks can vary in size. It is the block size that can vary, which can cause one device to not be able to read data formatted by another device.

BTW, due to their nature, CF cards are not exactly [low level] formatted. A CF card is more akin to a memory chip, which has an internal physical layout. In other words, the “block size” of a CF card is fixed. “Formatting” a CF card simply erases some of the data, and sets up new default folders.

[EDIT]

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

RobertTheFat — Sun, 15 Jul 2018 16:42:29 GMT

@Waddizzle wrote:
“You know I used to claim and say the same thing. I guess because it is what I've always heard. Since I have tried using my computer to format CF cards I have not seen any adverse or noticeable difference. If it makes you feel better use your camera but I doubt you will see a difference.”

The only harm in using a computer to format an SD card is the computer does not set up default folders that the camera wants to see. But, the camera seems smart enough to create a default folder structure if one does not exist.

[Low Level] Formatting sets up all of the “pigeon holes” where data will be stored. “Blocks” of [these] storage locations are also initialized. Blocks can vary in size. It is the block size that can vary, which can cause one device to not be able to read data formatted by another device.

BTW, due to their nature, CF cards are not exactly [low level] formatted. A CF card is more akin to a memory chip, which has an internal physical layout. In other words, the “block size” of a CF card is fixed. “Formatting” a CF card simply erases some of the data, and sets up new default folders.

[EDIT]

In any case, a low-level format isn't a panacea. As a card (or almost any modern file storage device) is used, the operating system identifies unreliable areas and warps them out of the file system. What a low-level format does is wipe out that accumulated wisdom and replace it with a new, but not necessarily more accurate, assessment. So the system may perform a little more slowly at first, while it re-identifies bad areas that it may actually have known about before. That's not to say that there are never benefits to doing a low-level format - just that the benefits may not tell the whole story.

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

ebiggs1 — Sun, 15 Jul 2018 16:48:35 GMT

"In any case, a low-level format isn't a panacea."

Correct, and it is probably only needed once on any SD card.

I know you see all the stories on the ole inner web about how you have to do this or that. You can't do this or that. So I basically decided to try some things for myself. That's what got me going on lenses. Lot's of BS out there about lenses so it isn't too hard to find it on CF and SD cards, too.

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

TCampbell — Wed, 18 Jul 2018 14:12:23 GMT

@RobertTheFat wrote:
@Waddizzle
In any case, a low-level format isn't a panacea. As a card (or almost any modern file storage device) is used, the operating system identifies unreliable areas and warps them out of the file system. What a low-level format does is wipe out that accumulated wisdom and replace it with a new, but not necessarily more accurate, assessment. So the system may perform a little more slowly at first, while it re-identifies bad areas that it may actually have known about before. That's not to say that there are never benefits to doing a low-level format - just that the benefits may not tell the whole story.

This now occurs at a level below the filesystem level.

In a traditional mechanical hard drive, the drive is organized into "sectors" (pizza-shaped wedges) and "tracks" (concentric rings). The intersection of a "sector" and "track" is what they'd call a "block". When a "block" is unreliable, the filesystem could mark it as "bad" and avoid using the block.

Operating systems take advantage of the physical layout to choose how they will fill the device... (e.g. start on the outside and work inward, or start at the inside and work outward... or start in the middle, etc.) These strategies resulted in some parts of the disk being used more often than others.

This created a problem for solid state devices... becuase it meant that some memory "blocks" were used heavily ... while some were hardly used at all. The process of writing to a memory card is technically physically destructive (just a tiny bit) and after the same block is written too many times, it's damaged to the point where it can no longer reliable record data. This caused solid state storage to fail prematurely.

To counter this... the card manufacturers use something called "wear-leveling" technology. The idea is the card itself has a notion of blocks... below the filesystems notion of a block.

In a gross over-simplification... let's say the memory card uses letters to name it's blocks (it doesn't but it'll help avoid confusion) and the filesystem uses numbers.

If you write a file to "block 1 & 2" in the filesystem... that might get recorded to "block a & b" on the card. But if you delete the file (so now we're back to an empty card) and write to "block 1 & 2" in the filesystem again... that would get recorded to "block c & d" on the card. It wont record to the SAME physical block at the low level.

This is the cards "wear leveling" technology which tries to make sure all the physical blocks get used evenly. The "block" at a filesystem level no longer has any real relationship to a true block on the solid state device.

This means when a real physical block is wearing and not reliable, the card itself has to map the block as bad and avoid using it... and not the filesystem (because each time you write to that SAME block in the filesystem, it actually goes to a different block on the physical device each time you use it.)

Doing "wear leveling" massively improved the lifespan of memory cards from the earlier days.

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

ebiggs1 — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 00:14:26 GMT

SD cards use their own weird protocol. CF cards use the IDE protocol like a HD. CFast is based on the SATA protocol.

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

AlaskaBev — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 02:26:52 GMT

You all are above my capacity for understanding ‘this . All I wanted to know is WHY I’m all of a sudden getting this reading on my camera. “ can’t read pleas format “ all I wanted to put a clean card in but it said it wouldn’t / couldn’t read so I put the old one ( mini sim) that I had erased and still works fine

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

RobertTheFat — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 02:44:05 GMT

@AlaskaBev wrote:
You all are above my capacity for understanding ‘this . All I wanted to know is WHY I’m all of a sudden getting this reading on my camera. “ can’t read pleas format “ all I wanted to put a clean card in but it said it wouldn’t / couldn’t read so I put the old one ( mini sim) that I had erased and still works fine

As Albert Einstein is supposed to have once said, "Everything should be made as simple as possible - but not simpler."

Re: Older EOS Rebel T1i

ebiggs1 — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 14:59:44 GMT

" I put the old one ( mini sim) that I had erased and still works fine"

Use what works. Who knows why, it shouldn't be that way.

The real only thing you can do is buy another top quality SD card, not a mini, from a top retailer and give it a go. If that does not fix it call Canon support 1 (800) 652-2666. Although they won't repair a T1i they might be able to answer your dilemma.

If you buy a cheap SD card or even a top quality one that is a counterfeit who knows how it will work? You can't spot counterfeit SD cards you just have to trust your retail store. Places like B&H, Adorama, Roberts, and local stores like Best Buy, Mrcro Center, etc are good choices.