7D2 - Images with boxes

Hi. I was wondering if anyone has had issues similar to mine (see picture below). This issue appeared last week and again today. Both happened using different memory cards. Sensor problem? Thanks.

No bot sensor. Most likely a bad USB port, cable or card reader. The chances are if you still have the images on card then changing the method of reading the card will allow you to download a "good" image. If it's doing it with more than one card it pretty much rules out the card.

Alan

Thanks for the quick reply, Alan. I will use my PC's card reader this week and see if it solves the problem.

I had the same problem. It was my card reader.

If the images are Ok on your camera's display, it is not the camera that causes that.

If they show up like that on the camera LCD then it is sensor or card.
If they look ok on the camera LCD but look like that after transfer then it is most likely the card reader or possibly a hard drive fault. Obviously cheaper to check for the former by using a different card reader.

Yes, or transfer the image via cable to see if it makes a difference.

The good news is that it's unlikely to be a camera sensor or processor fault. Those don't normally look like this. This is a truncated image, meaning that some of the captured data wasn't saved properly for some reason.

One time I had this sort of thing happening to some images, it turned out to be a USB hub at fault. I was using a card reader to copy over files, but it was attached via a hub so that the USB port could be used by a couple other devices. Reconnecting the card reader directly to the computer (removing the hub), solved the problem.

A few other times it was...

- A card fault caused by me removing the card from the camera too quickly, while the camera was still writing to it (an older model camera that was slower writing.... this is unlikely with a 7DII).

- Hard drive data corruption.

It also could be a bad USB cable or socket (either with the reader or connecting the camera directly). This is a key reason I don't like connecting the camera directly for downloads (use a card reader instead). While the cable itself and USB socket at the computer would be fairly inexpensive and easily replaced, if the mini-USB socket on the camera gets worn out or damaged from frequent use that would typically be an expensive repair. I don't know about the 7DII in particular, but many cameras have their USB socket as an integral part of the main board, which would probably need to be replaced entirely if that socket fails for any reason, making for a pricey repair!

It might be a card failure, but those are relatively rare (usually a faulty card will show up immediately when new... or after a card has been used a lot).

This type fault usually isn't caused by damage or obstructions to the card socket connection in the camera. But those should be carefully inspected anyway. Look for a bent or broken pin in the CompactFlash slot, or for any sort of obstruction in the SD card slot.

It also might be a card hasn't been regularly formatted in-camera or was formatted in another camera or in-computer, creating an incorrect files structure and/or leaving extraneous data on the card that's fouling things up.