PowerShot G9 X files not showing on card or laptop

[Lightning]

I took a photo a couple of days ago and had no problem seeing it on the card. Today my files are missing on the card when I read it on my laptop. As it was 93% full, I removed them from the card and copied it to a folder on my laptop. It said it copied 893 files. However when I tried to look at them in the folder they are not there. The folder says it is 1GB big.

[Tronhard · Accepted solution]

In all honesty I would suggest you overloaded the capacity of the card.  The cards keep some space for temp and admin files and you my have simply seen the images in the cached format but there was not the file space capacity to save them permanently.

A good rule of thumb is to always have a spare card, and then switch cards when you get to 80% capacity.  Once you have shot your project, always download the files to your computer's storage system.  Once you have verified that they are all there safely, remove your card and, having put it back in the camera, format it clean, ready for the next shoot.  Cards do not make safe long-term storage.

[jrhoffman75]

Good morning. I have a few questions and comments for consideration.

Lightning -

1. when you said you originally had no problem seeing the images on the card was the card in the camera and you were using the camera preview button or had you removed the card and placed in in the reader, using the computer OS to read the card?

2. you state you "removed them from the card". Did you do a cut/paste or move operation, did you copy them or did you use an importer program like Lightroom or Apple Image Capture? 

3. you state the transfer process reported 893 files copied into a folder ~1GB in size. Does that folder size seem reasonable based on what was in it before you added the 893 files? 

4. You state card was ~93% full (I am guessing that was reported by the computer OS). What size card was in the camera? What type of files were on the card? In other words, does 893 files at 93% seem reasonable based on card size and file type?

Hi Trevor - I have no actual understanding of exactly how an SD card OS or the camera disk OS works, so I can't challenge your theory, but I can say that on more than one occasion I have received actual Card Full messages from camera and never lost images. 

[Tronhard]

Hi John:

One way of telling the initial load on the card is to look at the amount of space lost just after a format.  This is before the card starts recording at all. I don't have the G9X myself, but on similar units this takes up some space.  My thoughts are that for some reason the recording of both images was not fully completed and that they became defragmented.  As you say, one way to try to assess that is to copy the context of the card to a computer, measure the file size there and compare that to the space used on the card, less that initial overhead.  However, this may come to grief if file compression on either system, or the file block size on the two units is different.

Personally, I will stick with my suggestion that NOT filling a card to the brim is a good idea.  In that regard it would be great if cameras gave a warning set to 80-90% of a full card to say that the card is getting full.