Mount me!

August 11, 2005 4:59 AM

Why won't my volumes mount? (OS X 10.4.2, USB 2.0)

Up until very recently, whenever I attached my camera with an SD card to my Mac, it would mount with no issue. Yesterday, however, it started acting up.

I plugged my camera in, and OS X told me that my disk was unreadable. I clicked "Initialize..." and it opened up Disk Utility. I Erased the disk to no avail.

Now whenever I attach the camera, nothing happens. The volume doesn't even show up in Disk Utility.

I recently installed a 200 GB USB 2.0 hard drive, but I don't know how that would adversely affect my mounting a camera.

Also, an Archive and Install of 10.4 did NOT fix the issue.

Does anyone have any idea as to what may be going on, or, more importantly, how I can fix it?

posted by Third to Computers & Internet (12 answers total)

The first thing to do is reformat that SD card using the camera rather than the computer--generally, those cards aren't meant to use a Mac's idea of a filesystem. (Assuming that it isn't already full of important photos, of course--if so, skip this step!)

What about creating a new user and mounting the drive with that account? Does it work then? Did you try repairing disk permissions with Disk Utility? The last time I had iPod mounting issues that cleared things up.

If you did an Archive & Install but chose the option to preserve Network & User settings, you might have carried over Some Crud Of Some Sort which is preventing the drive from mounting, hence the possible need for permissions repair or a fresh user account.
posted by bcwinters at 6:29 AM on August 11, 2005

Response by poster: I did reformat the card on the camera, but the issue persists.

After I formatted the card, re-attached it, and then turned on the camera again, the camera told me that there was a "Memorcy Card Error." No dice.

I'm at work now, so I can't try anything just yet. Your suggestion of a new user account seems as if it might work.

When the SD card was actually visible via Disk Utility, I didn't have the option of repairing permissions. Maybe the volume has to be OS X formatted in order to verify / repair permissions?

(As a side effect of the Archive and Install, Mail.app is acting quite funny by not showing all my messages but telling me they are there. I can deal with that if I can just fix this drive issue, but it's mighty annoying.)
posted by Third at 6:43 AM on August 11, 2005

Response by poster: Err... that's "Memory Card Error."
posted by Third at 6:44 AM on August 11, 2005

My camera is never in Disk Utility, I don't think. I use Apple's built in Image Capture program to access it. It allows you to add items to it.
posted by dobbs at 7:09 AM on August 11, 2005

I frequently have problems with my card reader, where every image on the card will show as corrupted. The solution has been to leave the card plugged in and reboot the machine.
posted by doctor_negative at 9:36 AM on August 11, 2005

Response by poster: Thanks for your suggestions, everyone.

I'll try to reboot with the camera plugged in first, and then I'll try the new User Account when I get home.
posted by Third at 9:58 AM on August 11, 2005

Also, try going to the /Volumes directory.
In the Finder, select "Go to Folder..." from the "Go" menu. Type "/Volumes" in the dialog that appears and see if it is in there (sometimes volumes that don't appear on the desktop will appear in this directory).

Good Luck!
posted by lrivers at 10:21 AM on August 11, 2005

Re: Disk Utility--I meant repair permissions on your boot drive, not on the SD card itself. If the permissions are incorrect for some application or process in your OS X system, it might be keeping some crucial utility from starting up that would make the drive available to the system. Sorry for being unclear.
posted by bcwinters at 12:03 PM on August 11, 2005

Response by poster: bcwinters - Ahh, yes, that makes a lot of sense, too. Hopefully one of these suggestions will work out. I'm at work for another two hours, and then I'll post the results of what I tried.

Thanks again!
posted by Third at 12:05 PM on August 11, 2005

Response by poster: Created new user account: Not a thing happened when I attached the camera with SD card.

Repaired permissions on the boot disk: No difference.

Rebooted with camera / SD card plugged in and turned on: Nothing happened.

I'm seeing a pattern here. I don't really think I need to do a full Erase and Install, but I'm running out of options. I really do need my computer to get my pictures off the camera.

I'll try installing the camera's drivers on my Windows machine and see how that goes. If I can attach it, I'll just back up my docs, photos, and music (a daunting task) and Erase and Install OS X.

Thanks for your help, guys. If anyone else knows anything, it'd be great to hear what ideas you might have.
posted by Third at 3:36 PM on August 11, 2005

Maybe it's just a bad SD card. Happens. Try it in an external card reader (they cost about $20 these days) and try a new card in the camera. Also, try a new cable. I assume you've tried different USB ports? May not be enough power if you're jacking into your keyboard, for example. (Assuming it's a desktop).
posted by realcountrymusic at 6:09 PM on August 11, 2005

Response by poster: I figured it out!

I unplugged my Microsoft Wireless Optical Mouse 2.0 from the other USB port on my Apple keyboard and attached the camera again. Magically, it worked.

I'm still stumped as to why this is, but it least I can use my camera to get photos on my computer again!
posted by Third at 9:12 AM on August 13, 2005