Fixed: SD Card Copy Hangs While Copying Files to Computer

Find SD card copy hangs when you try to copy files from SD card to computer or another SD card? Don’t worry! This page offers quick fixes to help you out.

By @Delia Last Updated December 16, 2022

The Issue: SD Card Copy Hangs

SD cards are great storage devices for small amount of data transferring among computers and QNAP NAS, Synology NAS, Tablets, Smart Phones, or Play Stations. Many SD card brands like Samsung SD card and SanDisk SD card are popular due to their high performance. Therefore, it is quite inconvenient when you cannot transfer files from SD card to another place as expected.

Copying photos, music or videos from SD card device is common operations in our daily life. However, many users complain that their SD card won’t copy to computer, hanging or just not working. Here is a user case:

“When I copy files from SD card to my computer, the copy progress hangs for a long time. I clicked Cancel about 10 minutes later but the window cannot close. I have to close the File Explorer program in Task Manager. What’s wrong? What should I do to move files to my computer successfully? Ideas?”

Before learning how to fix the SD card copy problem, you may want to have a brief understanding about the reasons.

Possible Reasons and Fixes for SD Card Stops Copying

In general, there are several reasons that may account for SD card copy not working issue. Corresponding fix measures will be illustrated after as well.

  • 0 byte file. If there is corrupted file, damaged file or 0 byte file on the SD card, it is possible that the copying progress will fail. To fix it, please right click the SD card drive in Windows File Explorer and select “Properties” > “Tools” > “Error-checking”. It may scan and fix the error.

  • Improper file system. When you copy large files which larger than 4GB to a drive formatted with FAT32, the progress is possible to fail. To fix it, you can format the destination partition to NTFS file system or convert FAT32 to NTFS without data loss.

  • SD card device error. Bad sectors may also affect the file copying. To fix it, you can check disk for errors with the help of CHKDSK.EXE.

  • SD card write-protected protection. If you’re in this situation, usually you’ll receive the “Write-protected” message while trying to copy files. The way for SD card copy protection removing is a little bit complicated, so you can refer to remove write protection on SD card for help.

  • Reformat the SD card. If the re-use of the SD card is more important than the stored data, you can format the SD card device in Disk Management or Diskpart.

If all those methods cannot solve the problem in your situation, you may want to copy files from SD card to another or computer with professional file copy software, instead of using Windows Copy&Paste.

Quick Fix: Copy Files with the Best Free SD Card Copy Tool

AOMEI Backupper Standard is free file sync software that will help you copy files from one location to another easily and smoothly.

✪ The “Basic Sync” feature allows you to sync files from SD card to your computer and vice versa. You can also sync files between other locations, such as sync local folders to OneDrive. ✪ The embedded “Schedule” feature enables you to run a sync task in daily, weekly, or monthly mode. ✪ For advanced users, it provides the “Mirror Sync”, “Two-Way Sync” and “Real-Time Sync” options in its Professional edition.

Surely, you can realize data migration with “Disk Clone” or “Partition Clone” features in AOMEI Backupper. It is useful when there are applications or programs installed on the SD card, especially in cloning bootable SD card to another. It is supported by Windows 11/10/8/7/XP/Vista. Free and clean, so download it and have a try.

Download Freeware Win 11/10/8.1/8/7/XP
Secure Download

To fix SD card copy hangs in another way (take copy SD card to computer for example):

1. Install and run AOMEI Backupper on your computer. Connect the SD card via SD card slot or SD card adaptor.

2. In AOMEI Backupper, click “Sync”, and then click “Basic Sync”.

3. Edit the task name if you want to. Click “Add Folder” and then select those files you’d like to copy from SD card.

4. Choose a destination path on your computer to hold the synchronized files.

5. Finally, click “Start Sync” to execute the task.

Tips:

  • Options: supports writing a comment for current task to distinguish it from other tasks. You can also enable email notification to inform you of sync results.

  • Schedule: supports syncing files in daily, weekly, or monthly mode. To sync files in other modes such as event-trigger, and USB plug in, please upgrade to Professional or higher editions.

  • Besides the ability to sync the contents of your SD card, this software also offers cloud backup. AOMEI Backupper provides users with their own cloud drive - AOMEI Cloud. when you sign up for an AOMEI account, it will give you 1TB of free storage space for 15 days.

Verdict

When you get in the trouble SD card copy hangs in copying files to computer, you can try error-checking, formatting, chkdsk, or remove write protection to troubleshoot. If these methods do not work in your situation, it is recommended to try free SD card copy software AOMEI Backupper Standard.

As a matter of fact, this software offers robust backup solution in protecting Windows as well. As you can see from the screenshots, it provides you with System Backup, Disk Backup, File Backup and Partition Backup features. Other background technology like incremental backup, differential backup and 3-2-1 backup strategy are also embedded. Keep it installed to protect your world.