Recovering From Card Errors

Multitrack recorders, controllers, and other studio equipment
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anthony_
Posts: 6
Joined: 08:27, 2 March 2008

Recovering From Card Errors

Post by anthony_ »

Below I provide instructions for how to recover an SD Card that has gotten a Card Read Error, or Card Write Error, or Drive Busy problems. This error makes your card unusable and will cause you to lose your recordings. The procedure below will allow you to recover your card with minimal loss. You'll need a PC to complete all the steps.

Like many here, I've been plagued with Card Read/Write errors and Drive Busy errors on the Micro BR. It's a great product when it works, but I'm convinced this is a fundamental flaw in the product. I've requested a refund, don't know if I'll get it. I've already had my unit replaced once, but the problem persists.

Recently I got a Card Write error during a vacation where I had made several recordings that were very special to me. So tonight I spent several hours trying to figure this out, and I was finally able to recover my card. I hope this can help others who might have lost important recordings.

The instructions are below. But first, what I believe is happening is the Micro BR is running into some failure while writing a single track. Since the tracks are all stored in a single file, an entire song becomes unusable, as any attempt to play or record leads to a Card Read or Write Error. Also, because the Micro BR always powers up to the last loaded song, and tries to save the song when switching to other songs, the entire card becomes unusable because you cannot switch to other songs. This means a lot of work can be lost with a single error.

When I get the error, the card is useless. Even backing up the files to my computer, re-formatting the SD Card, and copying the files back to the SD Card doesn't fix the problem, because the file itself is corrupted.

Try to back up often. But if the problem occurs, the first step is to try to power down the unit. Often I've found you cannot actually shut down because the attempt to write the song out fails. Do your best and it if it won't shut down, then take out the batteries as a last attempt.

Insert the SD Card into a computer and backup the entire SD Card to your computer. Copy ALL files to a folder on your computer. There should be a ROLAND folder and an MP3 folder. Don't mess with this backup as it may take several attempts to recover. Don't move, delete or edit any files.

OPTIONAL STEP, not really necessary but may help in some cases: Re-format the SD Card. It's best to do this by re-inserting it into the Micro BR and using the INI command so it's formatted with the correct options for the Micro BR. Put the card back in your computer and copy all the files from the computer backup to the SD Card. Again, you should have two top level folders on the SD Card: ROLAND and MP3. (You can skip the MP3 files if you don't need them).

If the song where you got the Card Error is not the first song, and you just want to be able to load the other songs, you can do this easily by going to the ROLAND > BR0 folder and deleting the CARDPRM.BR1 and DISKINF2.BR0 files. This makes the Micro BR "forget" the last loaded song and will load the first song instead on power up. I've been OK with this technique to recover my other songs, when I don't care about the corrupted song. Just remember not to go back to the corrupted song or you'll get stuck again. If the corrupted song is the first song, or you want to try to recover the corrupted song, you'll have no choice to but to follow the procedure below

Now to fix the card altogether is a bit more complicated. First, you'll need to download the Roland BR Wave Converter 2.0 software for PC. You can download it at: http://www.rolandus.com/products/produc ... jectId=699.

This software was designed to allow you to export WAV files from the proprietary Roland format and import WAV files into the Roland format. Fortunately, it seems to be able to read the Micro BR files even when they have a corrupted track. You can export all the audio except for the specific tracks that got corrupted. Since many of the problems seem to occur during a bounce or mastering operation, you can usually recover your original recordings so you can re-bounce or re-master them.

Following the instructions in the PDF file that comes with the BR Wave Coverter 2.0, set the drive to the SD Card on your computer. You'll be able to see and export all the audio from your songs. When you export, you may come upon an "unable to read track" error. When this happens you'll know which tracks are corrupted. In my case, I've had two corrupted cards which I fortunately had backed up. In both cases, only the RIGHT side of a stereo track was corrupted - and it was a bounced track. So I really lost nothing. In both cases it was Track 4/VTrack 2 - don't know if that's a concidence or if the problem occurs more often on that Vtrack (hopefully someone in Roland support is reading this).

Export as much as you can, just in case. When you've found the corrupted tracks, there's no way to delete them, but you can write over them. What I did was take the left Vtrack (T3/V2) that I exported as a mono WAV file, and imported it back into the right Vtrack (T4/V2). Voila! The file was now fixed. I closed the BR Wave Converter 2.0 application, ejected my SD Card, inserted it back into my Micro BR and the problem was resolved!

Again I hope this helps others in my predicament. And I hope Roland support is listening and addresses the underlying flaw in their product. This was comparable to coming back from a vacation and having my digital camera lose all my photos - totally unacceptable.

Cheers,
Anthony

P.S. One more thing while I'm here - I discovered a cool "feature". I've often wanted to compile several recordings I've made on the Micro BR from multiple "sessions" meaning I've reformatted the SD Card in between sessions. To do this, (after backing up your current SD Card) copy the song folders you want onto the SD Card into the BR0 folder, making sure each folder is sequentially numbered - so if you have two SONG0000.BR0 folders from two SD Cards, for example, rename one SONG0001.BR0. You must also delete the CARDPRM.BR1 and DISKINF2.BR0 files, so the Micro BR "forgets" how many songs are on the card. When you next power up, the Micro BR will find all the songs and rebuild the CARDPRM.BR1 and DISKINF2.BR0 files, and will see all the songs you've compiled on the card.
Deepdp
Posts: 1
Joined: 11:49, 15 May 2010

Re: Recovering From Card Errors

Post by Deepdp »

The simplest way to recover Images from SD card is to use the most powerful photo recovery software called Remo Recover Photo (Windows).
pmoghaddas
Posts: 1
Joined: 14:21, 26 January 2013

Re: Recovering From Card Errors

Post by pmoghaddas »

I kept getting the write errors on one of my songs no matter what track I was using to record. I tried everything such as using a different SD card, song optimization, card initialization, etc. but nothing worked. What did work for me is exporting all of the tracks in the song (exporting as a WAV file) and then importing them into a NEW song. I just had to redo my drum patterns but that was no big deal. Hope this helps someone with the same type of problem.
Cheayol
Posts: 2
Joined: 07:36, 20 September 2019

Re: Recovering From Card Errors

Post by Cheayol »

Sometimes, recovery programs are the best choice for recovering from Card errors, such as "SD Card Deleting Files by Itself" error. They can recover photos, videos, document files, etc. from various devices in different situations.
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