Linux Mint compatibility with external SD card readers?

[Tharthan]

First of all, I wanted to thank athenian200, moonbat, and others for all of the help that they have been throughout my switchover from Windows 7 to Linux Mint GNU/Linux.

For the most part, everything is going smoothly. However, I noticed one thing which may be an issue in the future if there is no easy solution to it.

When I bought this new computer from Dell, I was given the option of having either a CD/DVD drive built in or an SD card reader built in. The CD/DVD drive was more important, thus I opted for that choice.

I had thought that an old SD card reader that I bought at RadioShack years back would do the trick, so I assumed that it wouldn't be a problem.

However, Linux Mint doesn't seem to be reading the SD card reader.

My question for GNU/Linux afficionados: does Linux Mint have known compatibility issues with SD card readers, or is this issue limited to the RadioShack SD card reader that I have? Either way, is there any easy solution to this?

[Night Wing]

If you can't get the information needed concerning external card readers and Mint on the Pale Moon site here, you will have to become a registered member of the Mint forums (if you're not a member already) and ask your question there.

[moonbat]

My HP laptop has an SD card slot, Mint easily recognizes and auto-mounts it. You should browse/ask on the Mint forums (likely someone has already asked about this).

[Pentium4User]

However, Linux Mint doesn't seem to be reading the SD card reader.

Run

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lsusb -t

[Night Wing]

I am going to take a guess on this.

Since you are now using Mint, there are three flavors of Mint based on Ubuntu. Cinnamon, Mate and Xfce. I use Xfce, but the program I am going to suggest should be in Cinnamon and Mate.

In your Mint menu, hover your cursor over "Settings". A context window will open up and see if there is a program in there named, "System Reports". Left click on that program. It should open up and scan your system which should include the "built in" SD card reader.

The scan might take a minute time wise so wait till it finishes. When the scan finishes, it might say you are missing some hardware drivers or something to that effect. I cannot recall the exact prompt. If so, left click on the hardware prompt to highlight it. Then follow the prompts and it should load the correct driver (hopefully).

If it is a driver, it will take a little time to load the driver. After the driver is loaded, then it will prompt you to reboot/restart Mint. Then try it to see if it works.

[Tharthan]

However, Linux Mint doesn't seem to be reading the SD card reader.

Run

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lsusb -t

All right, I just did so from my administrator account (not the one that I am logged into right now.)

System Reports

Although the System Reports program encouraged me to install something that I didn't have (it was GIMP-related,) and the Update Manager noted some things that needed to be updated (everything has now been updated,) none of it had anything to do with the SD card reader, unfortunately.

[Pentium4User]

Please post terminal output always as text in the codeblock.

For me, it looks like the card reader is being detected and a driver is being loaded.
Please insert a card and run

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lsblk
sudo dmesg

[moonbat]

All right, I just did so from my administrator account (not the one that I am logged into right now.)

You don't need to separately login to the root account to do so, it isn't advisable. From your user account, you will be prompted for the root password for running anything with elevated privileges, and from the commandline just prefix 'sudo' before running such a command.

[Tharthan]

For me, it looks like the card reader is being detected and a driver is being loaded.

If that is the case, then I don't understand why it doesn't seem to be showing up within Thunar. Does it have to do with the fact that a blank SD card is currently inserted?

In WIndows, a blank SD card would still show up as an inserted SD card. And, as you've noticed, that blank DVD-R disc is recognised as "Blank DVD-R Disc" by Thunar.

Please post terminal output always as text in the codeblock.

The output exceeds the number of characters that I can have in a post.

So I've attached the output as a plain text file.

You don't need to separately login to the root account to do so, it isn't advisable. From your user account, you will be prompted for the root password for running anything with elevated privileges, and from the commandline just prefix 'sudo' before running such a command.

I will remember that going forward. Though, my concern was that I noticed earlier that if my adminstrator account mounts an external drive, my standard user account cannot eject it on its own.

[Pentium4User]

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sda           8:0    1   3.8G  0 disk 
└─sda1        8:1    1   3.8G  0 part 
sdb           8:16   1     0B  0 disk 
sdc           8:32   1 494.6M  0 disk 
└─sdc1        8:33   1 494.6M  0 part 

Which one is it?

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[  382.277244] sd 9:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk

That looks strange because it has 0 Bytes. Does that apply too when using it in other systems?

[Tharthan]

Which one is it?

If the SD card reader is in fact actually being picked up by Linux Mint, then it might be sdc1. Maybe.

I apologise for not being familiar with the technical names that Linux Mint uses internally for the drives.

But going into Thunar, I see that:

"Blank DVD-R Disc" (my CD/DVD drive, in other words) is considered "sr0".

"MY STUFF" (a flash drive) is "sda1".

"SANSA_E130" (an MP3 player) is "sdb1".

On my computer tower, there are four USB slots in the front (the fourth of the four——the bottom right slot, empty right now——is one of those tiny "micro-USB" slots that I have seen some things use in recent years).

The bottom left USB slot has the MP3 player (SANSA_E130) plugged into it. In the USB slot directly above it, the RadioShack Dazzle SD Card Reader (I just went to double check what its name was, just in case that mattered) is plugged in.

There are also USB slots on the back of the computer tower. There are six in total, four above and two beneath. I have my mouse and keyboard plugged into the two USB slots beneath, and the flash drive ("MY STUFF") is plugged into the very first slot on the left of the slots above.

That looks strange because it has 0 Bytes. Does that apply too when using it in other systems?

I can assure you that SANSA_E130 ("sdb1") is working fine.

Off-topic:
Some time back, it actually was having some problems (I believe that I discussed them in a thread), but eventually it kind of just... stopped having any problems. All of the problems that it was having just stopped occurring, and it works just fine for being a simple podcast player and hasn't been acting up at all in quite some time.

The only "remedy" that I attempted for the problems that my MP3 player was having at the time was leaving it connected to my computer (at that time, a Windows 7 PC) at all times when I wasn't using it to listen to something, and not turning my PC off when the MP3 player was connected to it.

After a month to a month and a half, I tried using my MP3 player normally and allowing it to be shut off and left off normally. I tried leaving it off for hours and days. Suddenly, it was having no problems at all and could be left off without anything going wrong and turned back on whenever I needed to use it.

I dunno how my MP3 player suddenly got better, but I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. SANSA_E130 only requires a single triple A battery, and the battery life it gets from that battery is perfectly acceptable. I've actually been meaning to consider seeing if it would take a rechargeable triple A battery. If it does, that'll be awesome.

[Pentium4User]

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sudo mount sdc1 /mnt

And then look at the content in /mnt.

[moonbat]

if my adminstrator account mounts an external drive, my standard user account cannot eject it on its own.

Yes, same reason - what the root user mounts can only be unmounted by root due to elevated privileges. That's why you never need to login to the desktop as the root user - it also exposes your system to any remote vulnerabilities since the root account can write everywhere (a limited user account won't be able to access the system partitions).
What I do is open 2 tabs in Terminal - and login as root in one of them using su root. If I need to do something with elevated privileges (usually checking for updates using apt update), I type it in the root console.

I guess you're used to using an administrator account on Windows and thought of doing the same thing here
Though Windows post 7 doesn't even allow the administrator account to do certain things

[Tharthan]

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sudo mount sdc1 /mnt

And then look at the content in /mnt.

...Hmm.



Maybe i accidentally messed up the order of "sd_" assignments or something when I was checking where everything was plugged into earlier (I did unplug and then plug back in the MP3 player and the SD card reader when I was checking).

The reason why I say that is that, when I ran sudo mount sdc1 /mnt as you asked, the terminal responded:

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mount: /mnt: special device sdc1 does not exist.

So, on a hunch, I ran lsblk again. And I did so from my standard user account. This time, the result was:

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NAME        MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINTS
sda           8:0    1   3.8G  0 disk 
└─sda1        8:1    1   3.8G  0 part /media/［ｒｅｄａｃｔｅｄ］/MY STUFF
sdb           8:16   1 494.6M  0 disk 
└─sdb1        8:17   1 494.6M  0 part /media/［ｒｅｄａｃｔｅｄ］/SANSA_E130
sdc           8:32   1     0B  0 disk 
sdd           8:48   1     0B  0 disk 
sr0          11:0    1     0B  0 rom  
nvme0n1     259:0    0 476.9G  0 disk 
├─nvme0n1p1 259:1    0   512M  0 part /boot/efi
└─nvme0n1p2 259:2    0 476.4G  0 part /

So now I am perplexed.

I guess you're used to using an administrator account on Windows and thought of doing the same thing here

I was thinking of doing so for any "administrative" tasks. Thus, avoiding running anything as "root" on my standard user account.

If that's not recommended, then I won't do that.

[moonbat]

Thus, avoiding running anything as "root" on my standard user account.

You anyway cannot do that - you will get a permission denied error if you say, try to create a file in one of the system partitions. It's best to stick to your user account and enter the root password when prompted, when you're installing something or changing system configurations. Even Windows works the same way, in (what's left of) Control Panel, functions that require admin privileges are highlighted with a shield icon and modifying them will show a credential prompt.

[Tharthan]

Well, I seem to have discovered the problem.

So, I had been using a 4 GB SanDisk SDHC card with my Windows 7 computer (which, for the record, I had gotten in 2010 or late 2009) to the very day that I switched over to Linux Mint. I also occasionally utilised a standard-sized SD Card adapter to make MicroSD cards function with the Windows 7 built-in SD card reader. Everything worked like a charm.

The SD card reader that I am using now, the RadioShack Dazzle, had been sitting in a drawer for years now. But nevertheless, I don't remember my purchase of it being all too long before I purchased that Windows 7 computer. I remember using the Dazzle with the Vista computer that I had had before that, and it worked just fine for my purposes.

Therefore, I had assumed that there wouldn't be a substantial difference in usage ability between my 2009-or-so Windows 7 computer's built-in SD card reader, and the RadioShack Dazzle that I had previously used with the Vista computer that I had had before my Windows 7 computer.

But if what I am seeing right now is correct, it would seem that the Dazzle is not able to read SDHC-type cards or SD card adaptors for MicroSD cards. I am able to get it to read anything else just fine in Linux Mint.

I don't really understand why this is, but in any case if this is the issue, then it would be an issue with the reader rather than with Linux Mint. I'll need to buy a new SD card reader in the long term that doesn't have these limitations, because I need something that at the very least will also accept a standard-sized SD card adaptor for MicroSD cards.

Sorry for the inconvenience, Pentium4User, Night WIng, and moonbat.

[Night Wing]

Sorry for the inconvenience, Pentium4User, Night WIng, and moonbat.

There was no inconvenience. You're trying to learn Mint after coming over from Windows. You should be commended for that.

It takes time to learn a linux distro. It is not an "overnight thing". It takes a little bit of patience.

I had similar problems when I switched over from Windows 7 to Linux Mint in January of 2013. For me it was a case of "trial and error". In time I learned Mint Xfce and now I would never consider going back to Windows. And last year I wanted to learn another linux distro and settled on MX Linux Xfce.

It was different than Mint in some ways, but in other ways, similar. So the learning curve coming over from Mint to MX was faster than it was for me coming over from Windows to Mint.

What made the learning curve faster was because I was already familiar with the Xfce desktop environment which Mint and MX both offer.

[athenian200]

But if what I am seeing right now is correct, it would seem that the Dazzle is not able to read SDHC-type cards or SD card adaptors for MicroSD cards. I am able to get it to read anything else just fine in Linux Mint.

I don't really understand why this is, but in any case if this is the issue, then it would be an issue with the reader rather than with Linux Mint. I'll need to buy a new SD card reader in the long term that doesn't have these limitations, because I need something that at the very least will also accept a standard-sized SD card adaptor for MicroSD cards.

I believe the SD card reader on the Nintendo Wii (released in 2006, similar era to Vista) actually has a similar limitation out of the box... though with the Wii I think you can actually bypass this by hacking the Wii and flashing different firmware.

So more than likely you are out of luck, but it's possible that in theory a firmware update could fix it, though since that SD card reader isn't as popular as the Wii, that likely isn't forthcoming...