Solving the Issue: SD Card Says Full But Nothing on It

I. The reason why the SD card shows that the space is full but the file cannot be found

When the SD card shows that the space is full, no new data can be stored in it, but when the user opens the SD card, the file cannot be found. The possible reasons for this phenomenon are as follows:

1. The files in the SD card are hidden, and the files are not visible at this time.

2. The SD card is not properly formatted.

3. There is a problem with the mobile device (such as camera, Android phone) connected to the SD card. (It is recommended to go to the official after-sales department for maintenance)

II. The solution to the problem that the SD card shows that the space is full but the file cannot be found

1. Delete the NOMEDIA file in the SD card

If there are NOMEDIA files in the SD card, the Android phone cannot read the media files in it. At this time, even if the SD card is full, the files cannot be found. You can remove the SD card from the Android device and connect it to the computer through a card reader, check if there is a .nomedia file in the folder containing the media files, and delete it if so. Then reinstall the SD card into the Android device and check whether the media files can be displayed normally. The NOMEDIA file will only affect the Android phone to read the media files of the SD card, and the computer can still see the SD card files normally.

2. Show hidden files in File Explorer

After the SD card is connected to the computer, but the files in it still cannot be found, you can display the hidden files according to the following methods.

Method 1: Open the file explorer, select the SD card drive, click (View) on the top, check (Hidden items), and then the hidden files will be displayed.

Method 2: Search for “Control Panel” in the taskbar search box, open (Control Panel) > (Appearance and Personalization) > (Show Hidden Files and Folders), and then you can check the advanced settings in the (View) interface Select the (Show hidden files, folders, and drives) option, and finally click (Apply) > (OK). At this point, the computer can view the hidden files in the SD card.

3. Use the attrib command to clear the hidden attribute of the file

Step 1: Connect the SD card to the computer through a card reader. Enter (cmd) in the search box, right-click (Command Prompt), and select (Run as administrator).

Step 2: Enter ( attrib -h -r -s /s /d g:\*.* ) and press the (Enter) key. After the command is completed, please open the file explorer to check whether the SD card files are displayed normally.

The above methods mainly solve the problem that the files cannot be found because they are hidden. If you still cannot solve the problem that the SD card is full but the files cannot be found, you can try to restore the SD cardreformat orUse the diskpart command Clear all data in the SD card and rebuild partitions. Both of these methods may lead to data loss, so it is recommended that you use data recovery software to recover the missing files first.

4. Use Renee Undeleter to recover SD card data

When the files in the SD card cannot be found, you can use professional data recovery software to scan and restore them. The following uses Renee Undeleter as an example to illustrate.

① What is Renee Undeleter?

Rene.E Laboratory ™ data recovery software It is a software specially used to restore system data files. When you accidentally delete important files, empty the recycle bin, or format the disk/storage, you can use this tool to retrieve the lost data. The software covers four functional modules, including file recovery, format recovery, partition recovery and image creation, which can help you solve all data loss problems in an all-round way.

② How to recover SD card data with Renee Undeleter?

Step 1: Connect the SD card to the computer through a card reader, download and install Renee Undeleter on the computer, and run Renee Undeleter. Select the (Format Recovery) option on the main interface.

Step 2: Next select the SD card partition. After the selection is complete, click (Next).

Step 3: Please wait patiently for the scan, the scan time will depend on the memory size of the SD card. After scanning, you can double-click the file to preview, then select the file to be recovered and click the (Recover) button. Notice: It is recommended to save the recovered files in other partitions instead of the original SD card to avoid data overwriting. If (Format Recovery) cannot find the file you need, you can also try (Partition Recovery) function.

5. Re-format the SD card

Step 1: Connect the SD card to the computer via a card reader.

Step 2: Open File Explorer, right-click on the SD card drive, and select (Format).

Step 3: In the formatting window, choose an option from “File System”. Select (FAT32) if the SD card is 32GB or smaller; select (exFAT) if the SD card is larger than 32 GB.

Step 4: Tick (Quick Format), click (Start) to start formatting the SD card. Then check whether the SD card can store new data.

Also refer to: How to detect and repair SD card

6. Use the diskpart command to clear all data in the SD card and rebuild the partition

Step 1: Connect the SD card to the computer through a card reader, enter (cmd) in the search box, right-click (command prompt), and select (run as administrator).

Step 2: Next, enter the following commands in sequence in the command prompt window, and press the (Enter) key after each command:

diskpart

list disk (The disks in the computer will be listed, and the disk number of the SD card can be judged according to the capacity)

select disk 1 (1 is the disk number of the SD card)

clean (The partitions and volumes on the disk will be deleted, and all information will be cleared, but the cleared data will only be marked as deleted and may be recovered)

Then please continue to enter the following command:

create partition primary (Create a primary partition. If necessary, you can enter it on the next command line assign letter = H , H is the drive letter of the new partition)

format fs=fat32 quick (fs=fat32 refers to format the SD card as a FAT32 file system, and quick refers to quick format)

exit (quit)

Also check: Features and differences of FAT32, NTFS, exFAT file systems