Fix and Recover Data from Damage SD Card without Formatting

A corrupted or damaged SD card prevents you from accessing your precious files on it. Meanwhile, you may receive multiple sorts of error messages from your connecting device that indicate the SD card is corrupted or damaged. For example, you need to format the disk before you can use it.

Since formatting the SD card will take away all your data, is there a way to fix corrupted SD card without formatting? Luckily for you, this post will put together working solutions to repair the damaged SD card without formatting, along with an effective method to recover data from the corrupted SD card.

Table of Contents:

• 1. Signs of a corrupted/damaged SD card
• 2. How to recover data from corrupted SD card without formatting
• 3. Fix corrupted SD card by checking the hardware
• 4. Fix corrupted SD card by using CMD on Windows
• 5. Fix corrupted SD card by assigning new drive letter
• 6. Fix corrupted SD card by using Windows Repair Tool
• 7. Fix corrupted SD card by showing hidden files
• 8. Fix corrupted SD card by updating the driver
• 9. Fix corrupted SD card with the help of a disk repair specialist
• 10. FAQs about how to fix corrupted SD card without formatting

Signs of a corrupted/damaged SD card

Before the SD card completely shuts down and stops working, in most cases, there are some common signs and error messages that indicate your SD card is corrupted or damaged. When seeing these signs, you should back up your data as much as you can and start fixing the corrupted SD card before it's too late.

Additionally, you may encounter wrong SD card capacity, unknown files, slow/stuck SD card performance, and read-only SD cards when an SD card is corrupted or damaged.

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How to recover data from corrupted SD card without formatting

SD card corruption can cause severe data loss. Before attempting to fix your corrupted SD card, you should recover data from it to rescue your precious photos and videos before things get worse.

iBoysoft Data Recovery is reliable SD card data recovery software that's able to recover data from corrupted, formatted, and inaccessible SD card/microSD card/SDHC/SDXC. Additionally, this tool can fix RAW drives with its RAW drive repair feature.

How to use iBoysoft Data Recovery to recover data from corrupted SD card

Step 1. Click on the button below to free download iBoysoft Data Recovery and install it on your computer.

Step 2. Insert the corrupted/damaged SD card into your PC.

Step 3. To recover files from the faulty SD card, launch this SD card data recovery tool and select the Data Recovery Module.

Step 4. Click Next after selecting your SD card to begin searching for images, documents, and video files.

Step 5. When the scanning is complete, you can choose to view the desired data by clicking on the Preview button before recovery.

Step 6. Click the Recover button after checking the box next to the files you want to recover. Remember to save the findings of the recovery to a different drive just in case the data is corrupted again or overwritten.

For a RAW SD card, you should check the Raw Drive Recovery in step three and follow the onscreen instructions to recover data from the RAW drive.

iBoysoft Data Recovery is also available in macOS. Click the button below to download iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac and start recovering data from your corrupted SD card.

With files on the damaged SD card settled down, you can proceed with corrupted SD card repair in the following ways.  

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Fix corrupted SD card by checking the hardware

You should always check all your hardware before trying more advanced methods to fix a corrupted or damaged SD card, including theSD card reader, USB port, SD card adapter, and your computer/tablet/phone.

If your Windows/Mac/Android has a built-in SD card reader, it's advised to try an external card reader and different USB ports on more than one computer.

Fix corrupted SD card by using CMD on Windows

Running command lines may sound complicated, but the process is actually not as difficult as you expect. There are two ways you can try to fix the corrupted SD card by running CMD on Windows, including using CHKDSK and Diskpart commands. You can see detailed tutorials in the following article.

Fix corrupted SD card by assigning new drive letter

Surprisingly, many corrupted SD cases are fixed by assigning a new drive letter to it. To give an SD card a new drive letter, follow the guides below.

Step 1. In the search box on the taskbar, type in disk management and enter it.

Step 2. Click the Create and format hard disk partitions option.

Step 3. Right-click on your SD card from the list and choose Change Drive Letter and Paths from the menu.

Step 4. Choose Change and select a new drive letter for your SD card in the pop-up dialog. Click OK to apply this change.

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Fix corrupted SD card by using Windows Repair Tool

Windows has a graphical tool known as the Windows Repair Tool that's capable of checking disks for file system issues. When you inserted the corrupted SD card, Windows can automatically launch it sometimes.

Step 1. Go to This PC and select your corrupted SD card under Devices and drives.

Step 2. Right-click on the memory card and choose Properties in the context menu.

Step 3. In the Properties panel, go to Tools > Check and click on the Scan and repair drive.

Wait for Windows Repair Tool to finish the repair process.

Fix corrupted SD card by showing hidden files

Sometimes your SD shows empty but there are actually hidden files on it. To unhide files on a corrupted SD card:

Step 1. Press Windows + E to bring up Windows Explorer.

Step 2. Follow Tools > Folder options > View.

Step 3. Click Show hidden files, folders, and drives and click Apply > OK.

Fix corrupted SD card by updating the driver

Drivers are automatically updated and installed by Windows. Nevertheless, things can still go wrong. You can manually update the driver in the following steps.

Step 1. Type in device manager in the search box to bring up Device Manager.

Step 2. Under Portable devices, look for your corrupted SD card.

Step 3. Right-click on it and go to Update Driver.

Step 4. In the pop-up window, Select Search automatically for updated driver software and choose Update Driver.

Fix corrupted SD card with the help of a disk repair specialist

The worst situation is none of these fix work after giving multiple tries. In such as case, your final chance is to go to the local disk repair store and ask the professional for help.

Conclusion

This post covers comprehensive solutions to fix the corrupted SD card without formatting, including checking the hardware, running command lines, using Windows Repair Tool, etc. But before moving any further, it's always suggested to use iBoysoft Data Recovery to restore data from corrupted drives first. 

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FAQs about how to fix corrupted SD card without formatting