Camera Memory Disk Problem

Anyone know anything about memory disks? I've got a Secure Digital Storage Device for my camera, which I always remove and put in my computer when I want to look at my pics. I did this last time, and all was fine. Now when I put it back in my camera, I get "Memory Disk Error" and I can't take photos or review them. Put it back in my computer and it won't let me open anything (or even acknowledge that there's content on it). It wants me to format the disk before I can use it. Well, formatting will delete all content, I know, and I'm not sure what's on it. Is there a way to fix it without formatting? Or will formatting even cure the problem?

HALP!!!

Is there a small tab/lever on the side of the card? Depending on the kind of card you have, there may be a write-protection tab on it. When you move the tab/lever over, it prevents you from writing/deleting anything from it.

Did you take out the card from the reader before you ejected it properly? And do you keep *all* your photos on the one card? Do you ever delete photos from the card and/or move them to your computer? I've seen a lot of people who will keep 2-3 years worth of photos on one card, and never bother transferring them to their hard drive.

You mean the lock tab? Yeah, I fiddled with that, but it in the unlocked position to begin with, so I don't think that was the problem.

No, I don't have anything too horribly important on the card--the only problem is I don't know what's on it to begin with! Certainly nothing I can't live without, though. I guess I'll go ahead and format it to see if that works, and if not, get a new card. Once I have a laptop of my own again to even do the formatting, that is, since all of my technology is breaking on me!

Do you think the fact that I don't always hit "safely remove hardware" before popping it out of my computer could be the problem? I thought that this only risked corrupting files, not screwing up the whole disk...

Thanks for the reply, though. ;)

Depending on how old the card is, it may have finally died on you.

But yes, if you don't use 'safely remove hardware' there is the chance that the card will need to be reformatted. Sometimes you can lose/corrupt individual files, but other times you can also corrupt the file tree which would make everything on the card go kaput. You might can see if there's any software out there that can help you recover your images. (I think I've seen some freeware apps around, but I'm not sure of how good they are.)