Thanks everyone. I too would like to know why someone said not to use the camera's transfer ability; my camera came with a utility program & cable specifically for transferring photos. It has worked fine, knock on wood. As for the cards, I bought the same cards I always buy, but maybe they are making them differently now? not sure. Or maybe my card reader is malfunctioning. not sure. So I'll just keep transferring via EOS Utility for now. (which does not use up the battery that much, BTW--the transfer is fairly fast and the camera shuts itself off after it's done, if I have to let it go awhile/walk away from it)

that should do it

that should do it

You might check out the recovery utilities at the link below. Scroll down for a big list of free ones. HTH. Terry Here is a link that might be useful: Freeware - System Utilities - Recovery