I have never liked pulling the card in and out compared to hooking my camera up USB, but now am doing such as I was having trouble DL'ing my camera software into my new XP computer. I have had that happen to me too to where I bought a new card etc. After use in my computer, when I turned my camera on after inserting the card, it would show No pictures or something to where I could not shoot until I fiddled around with it. So far, I am having luck as I slowly put it in and out, holding my breath hoping. I also found trouble occurred when thinking I had to use that Safely Remove Hardware from the taskbar which I don't do now. Sorry I can't help you but maybe the Photography forum may have run into that same incident if not solved here? Here is a link that might be useful: Photo forum

When you remove a memory card from a camera and put it into a reader, be very careful not to perform any operation that 'writes back' to the card. For example, you may have opened an image into photoshop or MicroSoft's photo viewer and made some minor adjustments. When you went to delete the image, the software asks, "Do you want to save?" If you answer, "Yes", the image gets written back to the card and this may spoil its propertiary format. When this happens, the only solution is to re-format the card and loose all images on it. You may have to, with the card in the camera, delete all images before it will re-format. If the card is so messed up that the camera's software will not touch it, try this: Put the card in the external card reader and delete all images, then see if the camera will re-format the card. Make sure there are no files ledt on the card set to 'read only'. Scrapeing the gold plated contacts is not recommended for two reason: Typical gold plating for this kind of application is about 5 microms thick. Any thinner, and you would be able to see through the plating. Scratching it rubs through the plating and may carry embedded comtaminants to the contacts in the camera. The secomd problem is static discharge. Minute static charges impressed on the contacts can ruin the card. The best policy is do not touch the contacts. By the way, I also use an external card reader to extract images from the card. I copy the images to a hard drive or other storage device and for the lack of a better term, call these my master copies. I do all my editing on copies from the 'master file', keeping the master copy intact and never witting back to it. Thus, if my edit gets messed up, I merely get another copy and play with it. You may want to consider setting the master copy to 'read only'.

I always try Amazon first. Bought my last three cameras from them. Newegg.com is another good possibility. I like B&H, but their prices aren't usually the lowest. Be careful of sites that offer prices too good to be true, because they usually are. When in doubt, check through ResellerRatings, linked below. Here is a link that might be useful: ResellerRatings

Yes, I can google it, but I posted here wondering if anyone had this happen to them and what their first hand experience was. It is a "PNY Optima S-something-or-other, HC 80x 60+ HD" card. I can't read the other figure next to the "S" it is worn off. I guess it is sort of lucky that this past weekend I downloaded about 2/3 of the photos onto my laptop because I wanted to do a little videoing. It's hard to believe it just went ptoooey like that. I wasn't doing anything unusual with it. I guess I need to come up with a good and reliable and easy way to save my photos. Even having them on my laptop is risky. I just lost my backup memory stick with all the stuff from my old broken laptop on it and if I don't find that, I am out a lot of memories too! Also I need the photos. Can I live without them, yes, but I was going to use them to illustrate a project for work. Also some rather priceless family stuff on there, although I also have a few copies saved of some of that stuff. Not sure how to go with the backup memory, lots of options with lots of pros and cons. A "cloud" solution would suit my lifestyle right now, but I'd really like a combo of methods. Don't really have room for an external hard drive and am going to be moving a lot in the future so don't want just one more thing to pack . . . Anyway this is moot until I recover what I lost . . . Post script: The "Recuva" didn't work. I still got the formatting message/window. Can't read drive, needs to be formatted. Oh bother! Post, post script: "RescuePro" in the "Evaluation" mode could read the photos, but the process for buying it online was too cumbersome. It wouldn't accept my laptop serial number. So I guess I am off to try the local computer repair shoppe.