Unsupported media at DVinfo.net

Daniel Ridicki · November 24th, 2013, 09:39 PM

After years of using EX3 without a glitch yesterday I could not shoot as I was getting 'Unsupported media' message with all 5 of my Sony SXS cards. tried factory reset, did not help.
Any idea what is wrong, please?

Daniel Ridicki · November 25th, 2013, 04:31 AM

Just discovered that my Mac will nor recognize the cards as well. The format option is greyed and cannot be executed both on the Mac as well as my WX3. It goes for all 5 cards I have. All original Sony SxS cards.
Please. any idea?

Rob Cantwell · November 25th, 2013, 05:16 AM

thats scary, i use SxS cards too and thought they were bullet proof!!

Might it be a virus?

George Odell · November 25th, 2013, 04:34 PM

Not likely all five cards are bad and the fact that your Mac will not see them means something else is going on, here.

Is the record lock tab ON by any chance?

Found this article which may be of some help... or not.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1847

Tim Kolb · November 25th, 2013, 09:34 PM

Is there a chance the media cards were affected by a magnet...or electricity? Or...?

Dave Sperling · November 25th, 2013, 11:24 PM

Try to analyze what happened to them since the last time they were (successfully working) in the camera. The mathematical probability for all 5 to malfunction at the same time without some other causative factor is extremely remote. Could they have gone into a reader that was somehow mis-wired and 'zapped' them? Did they go through an MRI? or experience an EMP? Did they all transfer their previous data successfully?

Tim Kolb · November 26th, 2013, 12:11 AM

You can never rule out alien probes I suppose...

Seriously though, with all of them going bad at once, it would seem that they had to have all been subjected to similar damage (I'm assuming they can't even be reformatted?)

Daniel Ridicki · November 26th, 2013, 02:10 AM

Thanks for replies.

No, nothing happened in terms of external influences. I prepared camera for the shoot, all good. Switch the camera off until the shoot is ready, I guess an hour. Shooting is ready, I switch the camera on and... as described. All five cards reports unsupported media.

My Mac(s) both of them recognize the card when inserted, but nothing can be done with them. I hoped to format them in XDCAM Browser, but format option is grayed. I am talking about MacBookPro, so I am not using any external reader.

So the camera must have get broken and messed up all the cards.

Funny thing is that I goggled the net and forums, no similar case. Nothing to learn about this issue.

So I guess gremlins must have invaded my camera.

I live in Sri Lanka now. There is one service centre here, have no idea how good are they. Will go there tomorrow. I will call a priest first to recommend me to the Big Boss. If this fails, will go to a voodoo shaman.

And then I see Americans can buy a new Canon 100 for 99 $ monthly installments. Boy, how do I become an American ;-)

Anyway, thank you all for your input.

Jack Zhang · November 26th, 2013, 09:58 AM

Check your contacts and your humidity. It may be necessary to clean your contacts on both your SxS and your camera. Sometimes the "Nintendo" trick is all you need.

Daniel Ridicki · November 27th, 2013, 01:33 AM

yes,you are right. humidity is high here, but it can hardly happen to the camera, cards and two laptops at the same time.

just to give an example how crazy this can be. at one time my main machine mac pro started to restart for number of times when i would switch it on in the morning, before starting to work normally. no one knew why. my 15 years old daughter told me to dust it if from inside. i thought it was nonsense, but she was actually right. a thin layer of dust was there, but the problem was that the dust drew humidity from the atmosphere and become wet. as such, it was causing some contacts and machine would automatically switch off and restarted. after several attempts, the machine would raise the temperature inside the chassis that dried off humidity. and then it would work flawlessly. i cleaned the dust and - problem solved. perhaps someone somewhere would find this story useful.

thanks for your input.

George Odell · November 27th, 2013, 08:41 AM

The best electrical contact cleaner there is is called Caig.

More than just a cleaner is restores the conductivity between connections. You might try spraying some on a Q tip and then drawing this wet across the end of each of the cards so that it drips down. Insert one so that the Caig reaches the fingers inside the camera. Do that part a few times pulling the card in and out..

Home of DeoxIT and HAND-E-GLOVE - CAIG Laboratories, Inc.

George Odell · November 27th, 2013, 09:02 AM

Another (remote) possibility is the cards have somehow become uninitialized. If something happened in the camera... firmware crash or corruption... during the last format you mentioned.

The FAT table may now be damaged. The cards themselves would still be fine, though.

Try this. BTW: I do not own a mac so I can only relate what to try on a PC.

Load one of the cards into the SxS reader and connect to the PC.

Go to Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management

See if the card shows up and how it's being seen. Is it asking the card be initialized? If so, do it and then do a format from the PC using Clip Browser.

If it works it means the cards are OK, but there is still an issue with the camera. Try installing the current firmware for your model or at least re-install what you have now from a new file off the Sony site.

Then try a card format with the newly installed firmware.

Les Wilson · November 27th, 2013, 09:51 AM

@George ... On the Mac, if the low level disk volume system won't recognize it, the OS puts up a dialog box that lets you eject or initialize. Also, the OP said that the Mac in fact accepts it and mounts it and was going to format it using XDCAM Browser but that the Browser would not allow it.

It does sound exactly like the media is write protected.

Daniel Ridicki · November 27th, 2013, 10:30 AM

Now this is totally crazy. I put the card in my Mac. Recognized by computer but not XDCAM Browser. I copied to the card some old BPAV files. Copying went with no problem. open XDCAM Browser. It reads the card, I can play clips from it. But can not format it.

Put the same card to camera - unsupported media. What about this?

I am clueless. Why the browser reads the card, I can delete selected file from it, copy another file to it, but can not reformat it?

Oh boy, am I frustrated.

George Odell · November 27th, 2013, 10:40 AM

Update or replace the camera's firmware as I suggested and see if that helps.

I'd also remove and re-install Clip Browser from scratch.

November 24th, 2013, 09:39 PM	#1
Daniel Ridicki Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Zagreb, Croatia Posts: 124	Unsupported media After years of using EX3 without a glitch yesterday I could not shoot as I was getting 'Unsupported media' message with all 5 of my Sony SXS cards. tried factory reset, did not help. Any idea what is wrong, please?

November 25th, 2013, 04:31 AM	#2
Daniel Ridicki Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Zagreb, Croatia Posts: 124	Re: Unsupported media Just discovered that my Mac will nor recognize the cards as well. The format option is greyed and cannot be executed both on the Mac as well as my WX3. It goes for all 5 cards I have. All original Sony SxS cards. Please. any idea?

November 25th, 2013, 05:16 AM	#3
Rob Cantwell Major Player Join Date: Oct 2011 Location: Tipperary, Ireland Posts: 624	Re: Unsupported media thats scary, i use SxS cards too and thought they were bullet proof!! Might it be a virus? __________________ http://www.robertcantwell.com

November 25th, 2013, 04:34 PM	#4
George Odell Major Player Join Date: Jun 2005 Posts: 270	Re: Unsupported media Not likely all five cards are bad and the fact that your Mac will not see them means something else is going on, here. Is the record lock tab ON by any chance? Found this article which may be of some help... or not. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1847 __________________ "the difference between an amateur photographer and a professional is the amateur shows you all his pictures"

November 25th, 2013, 09:34 PM	#5
Tim Kolb Major Player Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Neenah, WI Posts: 547	Re: Unsupported media Is there a chance the media cards were affected by a magnet...or electricity? Or...? __________________ TimK Kolb Productions

November 25th, 2013, 11:24 PM	#6
Dave Sperling Major Player Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Tinton Falls, NJ Posts: 780	Re: Unsupported media Try to analyze what happened to them since the last time they were (successfully working) in the camera. The mathematical probability for all 5 to malfunction at the same time without some other causative factor is extremely remote. Could they have gone into a reader that was somehow mis-wired and 'zapped' them? Did they go through an MRI? or experience an EMP? Did they all transfer their previous data successfully?

November 26th, 2013, 12:11 AM	#7
Tim Kolb Major Player Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Neenah, WI Posts: 547	Re: Unsupported media You can never rule out alien probes I suppose... Seriously though, with all of them going bad at once, it would seem that they had to have all been subjected to similar damage (I'm assuming they can't even be reformatted?) __________________ TimK Kolb Productions

November 26th, 2013, 02:10 AM	#8
Daniel Ridicki Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Zagreb, Croatia Posts: 124	Re: Unsupported media Thanks for replies. No, nothing happened in terms of external influences. I prepared camera for the shoot, all good. Switch the camera off until the shoot is ready, I guess an hour. Shooting is ready, I switch the camera on and... as described. All five cards reports unsupported media. My Mac(s) both of them recognize the card when inserted, but nothing can be done with them. I hoped to format them in XDCAM Browser, but format option is grayed. I am talking about MacBookPro, so I am not using any external reader. So the camera must have get broken and messed up all the cards. Funny thing is that I goggled the net and forums, no similar case. Nothing to learn about this issue. So I guess gremlins must have invaded my camera. I live in Sri Lanka now. There is one service centre here, have no idea how good are they. Will go there tomorrow. I will call a priest first to recommend me to the Big Boss. If this fails, will go to a voodoo shaman. And then I see Americans can buy a new Canon 100 for 99 $ monthly installments. Boy, how do I become an American ;-) Anyway, thank you all for your input.

November 26th, 2013, 09:58 AM	#9
Jack Zhang Inner Circle Join Date: May 2005 Location: Burnaby, BC, Canada Posts: 3,053	Re: Unsupported media Check your contacts and your humidity. It may be necessary to clean your contacts on both your SxS and your camera. Sometimes the "Nintendo" trick is all you need.

November 27th, 2013, 01:33 AM	#10
Daniel Ridicki Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Zagreb, Croatia Posts: 124	Re: Unsupported media yes,you are right. humidity is high here, but it can hardly happen to the camera, cards and two laptops at the same time. just to give an example how crazy this can be. at one time my main machine mac pro started to restart for number of times when i would switch it on in the morning, before starting to work normally. no one knew why. my 15 years old daughter told me to dust it if from inside. i thought it was nonsense, but she was actually right. a thin layer of dust was there, but the problem was that the dust drew humidity from the atmosphere and become wet. as such, it was causing some contacts and machine would automatically switch off and restarted. after several attempts, the machine would raise the temperature inside the chassis that dried off humidity. and then it would work flawlessly. i cleaned the dust and - problem solved. perhaps someone somewhere would find this story useful. thanks for your input.

November 27th, 2013, 08:41 AM	#11
George Odell Major Player Join Date: Jun 2005 Posts: 270	Re: Unsupported media The best electrical contact cleaner there is is called Caig. More than just a cleaner is restores the conductivity between connections. You might try spraying some on a Q tip and then drawing this wet across the end of each of the cards so that it drips down. Insert one so that the Caig reaches the fingers inside the camera. Do that part a few times pulling the card in and out.. Home of DeoxIT and HAND-E-GLOVE - CAIG Laboratories, Inc. __________________ "the difference between an amateur photographer and a professional is the amateur shows you all his pictures"

November 27th, 2013, 09:02 AM	#12
George Odell Major Player Join Date: Jun 2005 Posts: 270	Re: Unsupported media Another (remote) possibility is the cards have somehow become uninitialized. If something happened in the camera... firmware crash or corruption... during the last format you mentioned. The FAT table may now be damaged. The cards themselves would still be fine, though. Try this. BTW: I do not own a mac so I can only relate what to try on a PC. Load one of the cards into the SxS reader and connect to the PC. Go to Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Disk Management See if the card shows up and how it's being seen. Is it asking the card be initialized? If so, do it and then do a format from the PC using Clip Browser. If it works it means the cards are OK, but there is still an issue with the camera. Try installing the current firmware for your model or at least re-install what you have now from a new file off the Sony site. Then try a card format with the newly installed firmware. __________________ "the difference between an amateur photographer and a professional is the amateur shows you all his pictures"

November 27th, 2013, 09:51 AM	#13
Les Wilson Inner Circle Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Boca Raton, FL Posts: 3,014	Re: Unsupported media @George ... On the Mac, if the low level disk volume system won't recognize it, the OS puts up a dialog box that lets you eject or initialize. Also, the OP said that the Mac in fact accepts it and mounts it and was going to format it using XDCAM Browser but that the Browser would not allow it. It does sound exactly like the media is write protected.

November 27th, 2013, 10:30 AM	#14
Daniel Ridicki Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Zagreb, Croatia Posts: 124	Re: Unsupported media Now this is totally crazy. I put the card in my Mac. Recognized by computer but not XDCAM Browser. I copied to the card some old BPAV files. Copying went with no problem. open XDCAM Browser. It reads the card, I can play clips from it. But can not format it. Put the same card to camera - unsupported media. What about this? I am clueless. Why the browser reads the card, I can delete selected file from it, copy another file to it, but can not reformat it? Oh boy, am I frustrated.

November 27th, 2013, 10:40 AM	#15
George Odell Major Player Join Date: Jun 2005 Posts: 270	Re: Unsupported media Update or replace the camera's firmware as I suggested and see if that helps. I'd also remove and re-install Clip Browser from scratch. __________________ "the difference between an amateur photographer and a professional is the amateur shows you all his pictures"