Steam Deck has now killed 4 different micro SD cards

[ba0701]

**TLDR**
My Deck absolutely has issues regarding it's internal micro SD card slot. It has killed off 4 different cards, including some brand new ones, from different manufacturers, while cards connected to my Deck via external USB readers have not had any issues at all.

Yep, 4, and all four of them were plugged directly into the Deck's sd card slot at the time of their deaths. 3 of them were Sandisk Extreme 1TB cards, and one was was a Samsung Evo Select 512GB card. The first one that died, a Sandisk Extreme 1TB, died when attempting to format it for the first time with KDE in Desktop Mode, that card had been used for almost a year in a Switch, and never had an issue. The next two 1TB Extreme cards were brand new, specifically for the Deck directly from WD's website, one of those was an RMA replacement for the first card that was killed, the other was purchased when I saw how well they stood behind their products on the RMA for the first card. The RMA card died 32 days after I received it, with a 30 day warranty on RMA cards. I don't know, haven't tried, but I doubt Sandisk will send me another RMA card for the brand new card I purchased from them, when something clearly seems to not be functioning optimally. The second two 1TB cards both died while simply being plugged into the Deck's slot, and the same goes for the 512 card.

All 3 of those cards started exhibiting strange behavior, like games that were installed on them would simply disappear from being installed, though the folders still existed on the drives and contained all of the files. Then when I would try to "reinstall" them, the download phase would hang, and I would eventually get a disk write error. Once that happens, there is no saving the cards. I tried to recover the partitions and reformat them, both on the Deck and on my Windows PC, and they could not be formatted. Other odd behavior was when I would delete the folders of the games no longer being listed as installed, and when I would reboot the Deck, the folders I just deleted would return, with all files still within them, and a verification/download would begin.

So, I have figured out how to use an External USB hard drive, after following the steps outlined in a Youtube video (I can gladly link the video if anyone is interested, as the process works 100%, including getting the drives to auto-mount when plugged in, which means whenever you reboot your system you don't have to go to Desktop mode to mount your drives connected via USB). I have a Seagate 8TB external USB 3.0 drive, and decided to plug it into the Deck using this process. Thanks to another thread on these boards, regarding slow SD cards that are formatted via the Deck, I have developed a process for formatting any cards/drives that are going to be used on the Deck, formatting them on my Windows PC instead of the Deck. However, even though the app used for doing this formatting shows the process completing successfully, after running for more than 12 hours, that program nor the Deck are able to recognize the EXT4 partition. However, I am able to format the drive using the Deck, a process that takes less than 3 minutes, and the Deck is able to use this drive, but then the incredibly slow download issue that caused me to partition/format my drives in Windows to begin with returns. We're talking low single digit MB/s speeds on a 1Gb/s internet connection slow, where I have typically been able to maintain >60-74MB/s download speeds when the drive has been formatted in Windows.

I am at a total loss. I have one more option I can try, which is a portable (no external power needed, powered from the USB port) 4TB drive I have, that I can try to see if that program will partition/format it. I also have a couple more micro SD cards I can use through an external USB reader, but I am certainly hesitant to plug those into the Deck's slot. If I can find a Windows program, currently using the Mini-Tool Partition Wizard (Free version), that can properly format this 8TB drive, then I can simply buy a 1TB internal drive for the Deck, and keep any games I might wish to play on the go, on it, and everything else, like games I use K&M on, I can keep on the 8TB drive. I'd be more than happy to pay for the full version of such a program, but only after I verified that it could properly format my 8TB drives via a freeware/shareware version of the program first.

I know I have seen a lot of SD card issues, especially problems involving formatting them directly on the Deck, in these forums, so I know I am not the only one with some issues with the Deck and SD cards. How many, if any at all, have been completely killed by the Deck I have no idea, but there is no doubt that something is going on there. I don't know if there is an issue with the Deck's drive, perhaps misaligned heads, perhaps some sort of a grounding issue, I can't speak to any of that, but there is most certainly an issue of some sort. I have used micro-sd cards for years, and the only two I had problems with resulted from my phones being dropped, short of that I have not had a single problem. I also have two separate external card readers connected to my Deck, and none of the cards plugged into those has failed or given me any problems at all, only cards plugged directly into my Deck, and once those cards begin suffering from problems on the Deck they are entirely unable to recover from them, those cards are DOA.

[ba0701]

Originally posted by PopinFRESH:

you'll need to do sudo ps otherwise you'll only see the process list for the deck user.

sudo ps | grep dd

where that | is a vertical pipe like the / and \ but stright up and down.

With the grep dd, it literally returns nothing, simply returns to the prompt as if nothing was entered, and when I simply run sudo ps, this is the result:

(1)(deck@steamdeck ~)$ sudo ps | grep dd
(1)(deck@steamdeck ~)$ sudo ps
PID TTY TIME CMD
23581 pts/2 00:00:00 sudo
23587 pts/2 00:00:00 ps

[PopinFRESH]

Hmm weird, gotta be something with their sandboxing and the other terminal being another session.

You have a keyboard hooked up to it? If so on the terminal that is running the dd try to press ALT+F1-F6 to switch between the different TTYs. Usually TTY 4 isn't used so try ALT+F4

Then try to run the sudo ps and see if it still only shows you that output.

Otherwise I guess just try to let the dd finish.

If it fails again you can try to nuke the partition table and create a new empty GPT one with parted

sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt

Then check parted -l again and if should show an empty GPT partition table

Then create a new partition

sudo parted -a optimal /dev/mmcblk0 mkpart primary 0% 100%

and then finally try to manually create a filesystem on the new partition

mkfs.ext4 /dev/mmcblk0p1

Then try to re-run f3probe

[ba0701]

Originally posted by PopinFRESH:

Hmm weird, gotta be something with their sandboxing and the other terminal being another session.

You have a keyboard hooked up to it? If so on the terminal that is running the dd try to press ALT+F1-F6 to switch between the different TTYs. Usually TTY 4 isn't used so try ALT+F4

Then try to run the sudo ps and see if it still only shows you that output.

Otherwise I guess just try to let the dd finish.

If it fails again you can try to nuke the partition table and create a new empty GPT one with parted

sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt

Then check parted -l again and if should show an empty GPT partition table

Then create a new partition

sudo parted -a optimal /dev/mmcblk0 mkpart primary 0% 100%

and then finally try to manually create a filesystem on the new partition

mkfs.ext4 /dev/mmcblk0p1

Then try to re-run f3probe

Yes, I have a wireless Corsair K63 connected (works fabulously for anyone interested, Razer Turret not so much). I tried the ALT+F1-F6 did a bunch of other things, like bring up the search bar, open the Start Menu, etc.. but none of them switch between terminals. I will just let it run for a few hours, and see where that gets us. Then I will follow your other suggestions, and report back. Thank you again!

[ba0701]

Originally posted by PopinFRESH:

Hmm weird, gotta be something with their sandboxing and the other terminal being another session.

You have a keyboard hooked up to it? If so on the terminal that is running the dd try to press ALT+F1-F6 to switch between the different TTYs. Usually TTY 4 isn't used so try ALT+F4

Then try to run the sudo ps and see if it still only shows you that output.

Otherwise I guess just try to let the dd finish.

If it fails again you can try to nuke the partition table and create a new empty GPT one with parted

sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt

Then check parted -l again and if should show an empty GPT partition table

Then create a new partition

sudo parted -a optimal /dev/mmcblk0 mkpart primary 0% 100%

and then finally try to manually create a filesystem on the new partition

mkfs.ext4 /dev/mmcblk0p1

Then try to re-run f3probe

So, dd ran for several hours, but everything still remained accessible on the card, all the original folders and files are still present. So, I stopped the process, and decided to try the sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt, it has been running for about 45 minutes now, and since it is the nuclear option, I would expect the card to at least be inaccessible currently, but that is not the case, all of the directories and files still remain untouched. I can gladly leave it running for a few more hours as well, but after everything that has been thrown at this card, I would expect to at least not be able to open it in Dolphin.

This is the exact same behavior that has happened with all the cards that have been wrecked, including the first one I got RMA'd from Sandisk. Once they get to this point, the cards appear locked at some level making them entirely unusable, can't write to them, can't repartition or format them, with any tools I have tried so far.

[ba0701]

Originally posted by PopinFRESH:

Hmm weird, gotta be something with their sandboxing and the other terminal being another session.

You have a keyboard hooked up to it? If so on the terminal that is running the dd try to press ALT+F1-F6 to switch between the different TTYs. Usually TTY 4 isn't used so try ALT+F4

Then try to run the sudo ps and see if it still only shows you that output.

Otherwise I guess just try to let the dd finish.

If it fails again you can try to nuke the partition table and create a new empty GPT one with parted

sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt

Then check parted -l again and if should show an empty GPT partition table

Then create a new partition

sudo parted -a optimal /dev/mmcblk0 mkpart primary 0% 100%

and then finally try to manually create a filesystem on the new partition

mkfs.ext4 /dev/mmcblk0p1

Then try to re-run f3probe

Ok, it finally finished, but with some caveats. I will post the message below, but want to stress absolutely nothing should have been accessing that card, it only contains games and I have not had a game running on the Deck since I began this process yesterday. I only opened Dolphin one time, at around the 40minute mark, but closed it as soon as I saw the files still existed. I rebooted as it asked, and the directories and files still exist.

Results of the parted gpt:

Warning: Partition(s) on /dev/mmcblk0 are being used.
Ignore/Cancel? I
Warning: The existing disk label on /dev/mmcblk0 will be destroyed and all data on this disk will be lost. Do you want to continue?
Yes/No? Yes
Error: Partition(s) 1 on /dev/mmcblk0 have been written, but we have been unable to inform the kernel of the change, probably because it/they are in use.
As a result, the old partition(s) will remain in use. You should reboot now before making further changes.
Ignore/Cancel? I
Information: You may need to update /etc/fstab.

...and the results from sudo parted -l:

Model: SD SN01T (sd/mmc)
Disk /dev/mmcblk0: 1024GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos
Disk Flags:

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
1 67.1MB 1024GB 1024GB primary ext4


...and the f3probe results:

(deck@steamdeck ~)$ sudo f3probe /dev/mmcblk0
F3 probe 8.0
Copyright (C) 2010 Digirati Internet LTDA.
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.

WARNING: Probing normally takes from a few seconds to 15 minutes, but
it can take longer. Please be patient.

Probe finished, recovering blocks... Done

Bad news: The device `/dev/mmcblk0' is damaged

Device geometry:
*Usable* size: 0.00 Byte (0 blocks)
Announced size: 953.55 GB (1999749120 blocks)
Module: 1.00 TB (2^40 Bytes)
Approximate cache size: 0.00 Byte (0 blocks), need-reset=no
Physical block size: 512.00 Byte (2^9 Bytes)

Probe time: 54.7ms

[ba0701]

Originally posted by xep:

I had a similar experience. My Steam Deck failed to format the micro SD card and didn't mount it, but luckily it did not kill the card. I could re-partition it on my desktop in Windows, but no matter what I did I could not get the Steam Deck's "format" button to successfully format and recognize the card. Prior to this the card had been used in my NIntendo Switch.

The Steam Deck sees that there is a 2.9 gb External Drive attached to it even without the micro SD being inserted. At this point I ran h2testw on the card, which tested fine at full capacity.

What fixed it for me was going to Desktop mode removing it there: Steam > Settings > Downloads > Library > Select the External Drive, click the 3 dots, Remove Drive.

In the Sep 22, 2022 OS beta update:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1675200/eventcomments/3362523432278165018
Fixed a scenario where an SD Card format operation could fail

Maybe Valve's fixing it.

I do hope you are right, that Valve's fixing the issue. Sorry you had troubles with yours, maybe, I'm hoping, we can get it figured out so more people don't suffer the same issues.

[ba0701]

Originally posted by Stupid.Sexy.Flanders:

Given this is not a widespread issue you obviously have a defect with your particular Deck. Why not just contact Valve for an RMA?

Perhaps this thread might change your opinion on how widespread this issue actually is. Exact same problems I have been suffering, being suffered by 10 pages worth of other members posts.

I just found this thread, looking at new threads, and it is identical to my issues. However, oddly enough, some of these folks have had some luck getting their bad cards to format on the Switch, and then one person found a different Windows app that was able to partition/format his bad card. So, we are not done trying to find a solution yet.

Here's the thread:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1675200/discussions/0/3269059787443854260/

[ba0701]

Originally posted by ba0701:

Originally posted by Stupid.Sexy.Flanders:

Given this is not a widespread issue you obviously have a defect with your particular Deck. Why not just contact Valve for an RMA?

Perhaps this thread might change your opinion on how widespread this issue actually is. Exact same problems I have been suffering, being suffered by 10 pages worth of other members posts.

I just found this thread, looking at new threads, and it is identical to my issues. However, oddly enough, some of these folks have had some luck getting their bad cards to format on the Switch, and then one person found a different Windows app that was able to partition/format his bad card. So, we are not done trying to find a solution yet.

Here's the thread:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1675200/discussions/0/3269059787443854260/

No joy, neither card could be formatted on the Switch either. Given our efforts to this point, I can't say I felt positive about it, but it was certainly worth a shot, we're still clinging to a fading hope.

[PopinFRESH]

Did you reboot the deck after running those parted commands to create the partition table?

I forgot it is automatically mounting it upon insert. Try to give those another go but before doing so try to unmount the filesystem first.

Should be like

sudo umount /run/media/mmcblk0p1

then retry the partition table creation

sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt

Also, the dd is really the nuke option, nuking the partition table with parted is just like tearing down the walls of a cubicle. The desk and stuff (data) is still there but the partitions are gone. The dd on the other hand should be like driving a bulldozer and a steamroller through the office leaving nothing behind it. I'm not sure what witchcraft Valve has done that running a dd directly on the block device isn't nuking it, even if the filesystem is mounted it should get nuked and will become read-only and the data should be gone if you try to remove and then re-insert the microSD card.

I just double checked my 1TB microSD card I'm using in my Steam Deck and it is partitioned with a GUID Partition Table (GPT) with a single partition containing an ext4 filesystem. I'm not sure why yours got partitioned with an msdos (MBR) partition table but that could be part of the software issue they've identified and seem to have resolved in the most recent test builds

[ba0701]

Originally posted by PopinFRESH:

Did you reboot the deck after running those parted commands to create the partition table?

I forgot it is automatically mounting it upon insert. Try to give those another go but before doing so try to unmount the filesystem first.

Should be like

sudo umount /run/media/mmcblk0p1

then retry the partition table creation

sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt

Also, the dd is really the nuke option, nuking the partition table with parted is just like tearing down the walls of a cubicle. The desk and stuff (data) is still there but the partitions are gone. The dd on the other hand should be like driving a bulldozer and a steamroller through the office leaving nothing behind it. I'm not sure what witchcraft Valve has done that running a dd directly on the block device isn't nuking it, even if the filesystem is mounted it should get nuked and will become read-only and the data should be gone if you try to remove and then re-insert the microSD card.

I just double checked my 1TB microSD card I'm using in my Steam Deck and it is partitioned with a GUID Partition Table (GPT) with a single partition containing an ext4 filesystem. I'm not sure why yours got partitioned with an msdos (MBR) partition table but that could be part of the software issue they've identified and seem to have resolved in the most recent test builds

Yeah, I not only rebooted, but I pulled and reseated the card, and I held the power button in until the light went bright, which should, from my understanding, clear any residuals remaining in memory. It still shows up as having all directories and files on the disk. I am not sure why the Deck does this to sd cards, but clearly there is something happening. I hope you are right, and that Valve has fixed the issue in recent updates.

I will try unmounting the file system, followed by another round of parted, and allow that to run over night, or should I say for as long as I am able to force the Deck to remain awake before going to sleep. That is another thing I do hope Valve fixes soon, giving us the ability to configure the Deck to not shut off or go to sleep. It goes to sleep, right in the middle of downloads, and when it does it kills the NIC, and you have to manually reconnect to your wifi when it wakes up. I currently have mine set at "Never shut down the computer or let it go to sleep", and as we found last night it did not follow that rule.

Thank you again my friend, very much, for all of your help!!!

[PopinFRESH]

Parted shouldn't take a long time to complete creating the partition table. It should be very quick. I'm guessing that it was hanging and took a while because the filesystem was mounted and it was waiting for the file handle to be released.

[PopinFRESH]

If you have a spare USB Flash Drive (UFD) that you can use to create a bootable Linux Live environment you could try to boot your desktop to a desktop Linux environment and we can try to do these steps from there to try to rule out any oddities from how SteamOS handles things.

https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/try-ubuntu-before-you-install#1-getting-started

Its pretty easy to setup an Ubuntu Live UFD and from there you should be able to connect your microSD card and try to repartition it. Just make sure to be extra careful not to accidentally mess with your desktops disk with Windows on it :) As a precaution if its a SATA disk I'd recommend just unplugging it while you work in the live environment (if your comfortable with messing with your hardware that is).

[ba0701]

Originally posted by PopinFRESH:

If you have a spare USB Flash Drive (UFD) that you can use to create a bootable Linux Live environment you could try to boot your desktop to a desktop Linux environment and we can try to do these steps from there to try to rule out any oddities from how SteamOS handles things.

https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/try-ubuntu-before-you-install#1-getting-started

Its pretty easy to setup an Ubuntu Live UFD and from there you should be able to connect your microSD card and try to repartition it. Just make sure to be extra careful not to accidentally mess with your desktops disk with Windows on it :) As a precaution if its a SATA disk I'd recommend just unplugging it while you work in the live environment (if your comfortable with messing with your hardware that is).

You are correct, I just ran it, and instead of the hours it previously took, it was near instantaneous. It implied it was successful, and didn't even mention the reboot this time, it only said an edit of fstab might be needed. However, I went ahead and reboot anyhow, just to be safe, and all files are still present, nothing changed. I will try to build that bootable flashdrive tomorrow, and we will go from there. Cheers my friend!

The output of this last run:

(deck@steamdeck ~)$ sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt
Warning: The existing disk label on /dev/mmcblk0 will be destroyed and all data on this disk will be lost. Do you want to continue?
Yes/No? Yes
Information: You may need to update /etc/fstab.

[PopinFRESH]

Originally posted by ba0701:

Originally posted by PopinFRESH:

If you have a spare USB Flash Drive (UFD) that you can use to create a bootable Linux Live environment you could try to boot your desktop to a desktop Linux environment and we can try to do these steps from there to try to rule out any oddities from how SteamOS handles things.

https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/try-ubuntu-before-you-install#1-getting-started

Its pretty easy to setup an Ubuntu Live UFD and from there you should be able to connect your microSD card and try to repartition it. Just make sure to be extra careful not to accidentally mess with your desktops disk with Windows on it :) As a precaution if its a SATA disk I'd recommend just unplugging it while you work in the live environment (if your comfortable with messing with your hardware that is).

You are correct, I just ran it, and instead of the hours it previously took, it was near instantaneous. It implied it was successful, and didn't even mention the reboot this time, it only said an edit of fstab might be needed. However, I went ahead and reboot anyhow, just to be safe, and all files are still present, nothing changed. I will try to build that bootable flashdrive tomorrow, and we will go from there. Cheers my friend!

The output of this last run:

(deck@steamdeck ~)$ sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt
Warning: The existing disk label on /dev/mmcblk0 will be destroyed and all data on this disk will be lost. Do you want to continue?
Yes/No? Yes
Information: You may need to update /etc/fstab.

If you want before you head to bed try to reformat it after unmounting the filesystem.

sudo umount /run/media/mmcblk0p1

(that might error? if the filesystem isn't mounted but it might still be mounting by uuid

then redo wiping the partition table

sudo parted /dev/mmcblk0 mklabel gpt

Then check to see if it actually updated the partition table

sudo parted -l

It should show like before but it shouldn't list a partition and it should be the type GPT instead of msdos

then create a new partition

sudo parted -a optimal /dev/mmcblk0 mkpart primary 0% 100%

Then check to see if it is showing the new partition again with

sudo parted -l

Then try to create a new filesystem (just default ext4 for now without case folding)

sudo mkfs.ext4 /dev/mmcblk0p1

Then try to manually mount that filesystem to its expected location

sudo mount /dev/mmcblk0p1 /run/media/mmcblk0p1

Then see if there is anything on the filesystem now

sudo ls -lah /run/media/mmcblk0p1/

[PopinFRESH]

also I just noticed when you were running ps you weren't including the options to output the full process list.

sudo ps faux

The vertical pipe is "piping" the standard output (stdout) from the command on the left of the pipe into the standard input (stdin) for the command on the right of the pipe.

so

sudo ps faux | grep "dd"

That will take the output that you'd get from running just the `sudo ps faux` which should be the full process list, and it will send that into the input for the `grep` command which is a pattern searching command, and the above is searching for the term "dd"

I forgot to write down my sudoers password I created for my deck user so I haven't been able to double check things on my deck. But I just figured out what I set the password to and I've verified how my microSD card is partitioned and formatted, and I also tested partitioning and formatting a spare UFD I have like the Steam Deck should be partitioning the microSD card and it worked.

I'll have my fingers crossed that if you do the steps in my previous post it finishes formatting successfully