SD Card stuck in GH1 card slot

L

Lpowell

Veteran
Anyone have experience freeing an SD card that is stuck in the GH1's card slot? I inserted an SD card with its write-protect tab engaged and it appears to play back properly in the camera. The push-activated card eject mechanism inside the camera is working as usual, however, the card hits some kind of block about a third of the way out when I pull on it. The blocked area feels like it's on the lower edge of the card. I can return it for warranty service, but would prefer to fix it myself if possible.
 
LOL, glad I didn't purchase an extended warranty. Panasonic provides no local warranty service in the entire San Francisco Bay Area. They recommend shipping it to their nearest Customer Service Center - in McAllen, Texas. And finally, "In accordance with the warranty, the product will be replaced with a reconditioned model."

No thanks, Panasonic...
 
I had the tab on one of my cards fall off today just after I pull it out of the cam. Perhaps your having the same problem. You may be able to serparate the layers of your card and remove one of them. carefull to make sure the tab doesn't fall into the camera.
 
You're right, rigs, I pulled the SD card out with a pair of pliers and the write-protect tab is gone. I guess this GH1's going back to the (glue) factory after all...
 
No, I have a back-up GH1 body I found on Ebay last summer. When the refurbed unit arrives, that's where it will likely end up as well.
 
Does anyone think it would be prudent to remove the tabs from all your SD cards. I never use that feature so it wouldn't bother me as long as the removal could be done safely.
 
Surely the camera is fine though, no?

This has affected me - the idea of LPowell's GH13 becoming a v1.34 GH1 crapp-o-cam and bunged on eBay for some holiday-snapper disturbs me greatly.
 
Little plastic tab stuck inside? Why not just turn that thing over and shake it? Vibrate it a bit.

As for CF cards, SDHC seem more weather resistant to me. I know for a fact they work after being submerged for long periods of time...CF has all those little holes, seems less airtight..I dunno.
 
fchris said:
Does anyone think it would be prudent to remove the tabs from all your SD cards. I never use that feature so it wouldn't bother me as long as the removal could be done safely.
Click to expand...
Don't even think about doing this. Removing the write-protect tab from an SD card will make it permanently locked and the camera will refuse to record to it.

What's worse is that a tab-less SD card is a lethal BOOBY TRAP for Panasonic G-series cameras!
The reason the SD card would not slide out of the slot in my GH1 is because Panasonic uses a spring-loaded latch to detect whether the card is write-protected. If the tab is missing, this latch will snap firmly into the gap on the side of the SD card and block it from sliding out. Since the card now appears to be write-protected, this will permanently disable the camera. Forcibly removing the card will damage the latch and break the SD card slot.
 
I've put in and removed cards that don't have the tabs with no problems. Stuck on write protect. Although this explains why one of my tabs went missing?
 
I was using a crappy SD card holder, which broke the tabs off two of my SDHC cards. They still worked perfectly fine in my GH1, but I think I do remember them getting "stuckish" when trying to remove them...I think it just took a little wigglin' or something. I still ended up throwing the cards away...pissing away about $200 because of broken tabs.

I trashed that cheap SD card holder, and got a Pelican SD card holder. Now my cards are holding up a lot better. SD cards are still garbage/disposable media, IMHO. But they're cheap, and you just gotta budget for replacing them as needed.
 
Looking at the Service Manual knockdown diagram, if you remove the rear case there's the SD slot. If you lost that tab and Left the cam on it's back, my guess is when you removed the rear case half it would fall out.

Someone on Ebay had the service manual in PDF form for $8 or best offer. He sent it to me for my offer of $4, well worth it IMO.
 
Hi people. Hi Ipowel, I've got a gh1 (not hacked) and a 16g sandisck class 6 card. The same problem has happened to me too and before pick up the pliers I've decided to make a research and fortunatly found this thread. lol
The first problem that happened some months ago was that when I wanted to film something the rec button didn't work. Gh1 was not alowing me to rec the moment I wanted. (not to mention when it was brand new you have to wait a couple of minutes to have this option alowed) Now the problem is worse when it finally starts to film when you stop the record session the camera gives a bug message on the screen and the only solution is to turn it off wait again. So in order to use it for every shot I have to turn it off and wait again. And finally I discovered that the sdhc card was stucked. I was wondering that the two problems have conecctions. Maybe the camera heat affect the sdhc card and cause it to be stucked and also the problems when recording. I live in Brazil and I bought my camera from BHPhoto as panasonic brasil didn't sell it here. Before I bought it I knew that the customer service was terrible but I my case I would be glad with a reconditioned one.
Sorry for my english. What do you suggest? Try to use the pliers or not? Cheers for all!

( I would be very glad if you share the service manual, thanks a lot.)
 
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solution for the problem

solution for the problem

A friend of mine fixed it for me. Fortunatly he has managed to pull it off with a peace of plastic from a x-ray result. The problem was the rubber of the sdhc card that made it be stucked. When I tested with another sdhc card the camera starts to film properly. I'm very happy. The sdhc card lost the rubber small part, and now can't delete the photos. I guess it is damaged and I'll have to buy another one. I would like to buy the 32 giga class 10 from panasonic...but I've heard that gh1 doesn't work with it despiste the manual say it works. Well, hope this statement help someone. I'm quite certain that the problem was cause by me when using the cards readers devices and not caused by the camera mechanism. Sorry for my poor english. Cheers!!
 
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