Music + Micro SD = FAIL

[xPhoenix777]

So, I am on my second D2G and my 5th MicroSD.

I can transfer music any way I want til about 3gb - once I hit that limit, the phone will lock up any music program and the micro SD will not stay mounted properly.

I have done everything from buying 2 other 8gb MicroSD cards (other than the 16gb class 10 I intend to use, both different brands from the 16 gb and each other - Kingmax, PNY, SanDisk), reformatting all 3 non-stock cards to various settings (including emulating the cluster size of the stock card that came with the phone). I have system restored and re-flashed the phone from an SBF file, tried other ROMs, etc.

The cards all check out 100% healthy in 2 different tests on PC and on the Mac disck utility and all work fine in my other android based phones. The stock card is the only one of the 4 total that works in the Droid 2 Global... Which baffles me and is the only reason I fear its not the phone.

On top of all the card tests, I have loaded music files to my cards via Airsync (Wifi), DoubleTwist (USB Connection), Direct dragging them to the mounted phone (USB Connection), and plugging the MicroSD into an adapter and directly copying over. This had been done mainly Mac, then the USB drag-n-drop and adapter drag-n-drop were done on a PC again (card formats and testing between to verify my Mac was not the culprit). All cards continued to test clean 100% working and all other Androids are happy with the cards.

The Droid 2 Global will still do the black screen thing once the phone has fully initialized the card(s). Once the screen "sleeps" it stays black, but a back light comes on like it tries when I try to resume it from sleep.

 

[xPhoenix777]

Switched out the phone. Same issues, except that this one doesn't have the messed up keyboard like my last phone. No more Droid 2s... Verizon is going Global.

So, more testing... I split my music in 2 parts (each less than 4gb. I know FAT32 has limitations on single files >4GB but I have heard rumor of file transfers >4GB having similar issues to FAT32). First part went on, songs played, seemed fine (about 3.4gb of music). Second part went on (about 2gb more). Phone has the issues.

Like I said, I am on a Mac (which seems to be a similar tone with the few other cases I could find). My other Android devices are completely fine with the cards themselves... The Droid 2 Global is just very finicky...

Any other ideas? It doesn't appear to be cluster size (tried both 4k and 8k again), but could be:

1. Corrupt file in latter half of playlist (except it doesn't bother other Androids)
2. Mac/FAT32 issues (again, doesn't affect other devices)
3. Card issues on phone, not liking something (Stock card was class 2 8gb, tried 2 class 4 8gbs and a class 10 16gb)
4. Combination of any?

 

[bmoney1229]

I'm having a similar issue, except I get a transfer error and disk read errors while the card is still plugged into the computer. Windows 7 with 16GB HCHD

Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL using DroidForums App

 

[TinMan09]

subscribing. same issue here. 2 gb of music max before phone starts locking up and having issues. sucks cause my blackberry played a solid 8gb of music no problem, same with my htc imagio.

 

[xPhoenix777]

I hope someone has an answer... I was hoping to retire my dying ipod... I have an extended battery for this phone on the way too...

I think I can max my cards out to 3gb before it does this lock up., but thats about 8gb shy of what I want to put on the 16gb card...

Glad (?) to know its not just me... no one else seems to have this issue, as far as I can tell, so I have had no luck. If I find anything, I will make sure to post it ASAP, since I know you are most likely as frustrated as me.

EDIT:

@TinMan09 - re-reading your post, seeing your other devices don't have issues, I am wondering if this is a sill kernel issue with the D2G. Since this happens on both my Mac and PC, I am not sure what to pinpoint. You have anything that you noticed, or is it coming down to my findings of a max amount of songs before it dies?

 

[Butch]

Just a thought, is your SD card formatted fat instead of fat32?

 

[xPhoenix777]

FAT32... I also used the "format SD card" option on my phone a couple times to be sure it wasn't a PC format and that did nothing different.

Good idea though, cause that could be the problem with such symptoms.

 

[miketoasty]

I have over 4.5gb on my Droid 2 and it all plays fine. I use the default music player and just put all the tracks in a folder called Music that is on the root of the SD Card.

 

[Backnblack]

I have over 4.5gb on my Droid 2 and it all plays fine. I use the default music player and just put all the tracks in a folder called Music that is on the root of the SD Card.

Same here, 6gb of music and 4gb of Movies....zero issues.

 

[xPhoenix777]

Ya... I have the same, it works in all but my Droid 2... I will give it another round of tests tonight, see if I can come up with anything.

Anyone have any issues with a certain file type or SD card speed?

 

[buttphunk]

i recommend trying the following if you haven't already done so...

1.) format the card using the phone itself and not using a pc/pc operating system.
2.) if you're creating additional directories, avoid creating and burying your files several directories "deep".
3.) create directory names without white spaces. if you really need a whitespace, use an underscore or dash in its place, e.g. white_space, white-space, or whitespace.
4.) make sure none of the directories or file names have any "weird" or non-standard/special characters in them.

class 2 or 4 speeds should be fine for this and any other mobile/smartphones out there. at least, with today's phones anyway. i'm sure this will all change as technology permits. until then, paying for anything faster is a waste of money. the "class" speed rating pertains to "sustained write" speeds. one would should only really be concerned w/ faster writes if the memory card was being used with, say, HD video recording like that done w/ an actual video camera. the option to record video on a phone is just a convenience and not meant to be used for production-quality recordings. microsd cards used w/ phones are typically meant primarily for "read" storage, e.g. viewing/listening to music, pictures, misc videos, etc. in addition, a faster card *does not* mean faster performance. performance is ultimately dictated by the slowest component. if the memory is fast but the phone is slow, then performance is slow, and vice-versa. so, if you buy a class 10 card, it doesn't mean that you'll get class 10 performance. especially, if the phone was designed and engineered to go only as fast as maybe class 2 or 4.

i have a moto d2g and i'm in the market for a 32gb microsd card myself. so, i just happened to stumble across this post during my search. i tried looking for the read/write specs of the phone but, i still haven't found it. they don't put this info in the spec sheet. i'm not sure if this is intentional or not.

in any case, manufacturers will have you believe that buying and using a faster card will mean faster performance. in fact, they're counting on it. otherwise, how else will they make money off of the uninformed?