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I plug my ContourHD series camera into my PC and it is not recognized. What do I do?
My camera won't be recognized on my computer, what is wrong?
Promoted
Response
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1Our cameras are USB plug-and-play devices and do not require any additional drivers beyond the generic USB mass storage drive drivers that are included with every computer. Camera detection issues are almost always hardware related.
If the computer is not detecting the camera as a device drive when you click on "Computer" or "My Computer", conduct the following troubleshooting steps below to disgnose the problem.
1, Make certain you have recorded at least one video on the camera's microSD card. Some computers will not detect the camera if there are no video files stored on the camera's microSD card. The video file does not to be very big - simply record a video for 5 seconds, then plug the camera into the computer with the USB cable and see if it is recognized.
2. The microSD card must be properly seated in the camera before plugging the camera it into your computer with the USB cable. With the camera disconnected from the computer, remove and reinstall the microSD card in your camera, then re-plug the camera into your computer with the USB cable and see if it is recognized.
3. Connect the camera to a completely different USB port on the computer. USB ports can be bad or even have variations that can lead to compatibility issues with certain devices.
4. Use a different mini-USB cable to eliminate the possibility of a bad cable. The USB cable supplied with the ContourHD cameras is a standard USB cable used by many cameras, MP3 players, and cell phones.
5. Plug the camera into a completely different computer. This step will clarify if the issue is local to the camera or the computer.
6. If you have a microSD card reader, remove the microSD card from the camera and plug it into your computer with the card reader. If the card is readable, reformat the card (select FAT32 and "Quick Format), then reinstall the card into your camera and reconnect it to your PC. If the microSD card is still not readable through the card reader on your computer, either the card or your USB port on your computer is defective.
7. Attempt to read the microSD card on another computer with the card reader. If it is still not readable, you likely have a defective microSD card. If the card is the original 2GB SD card we shipped with the camera, please contact Twenty20 technical support so we can replace it.
Due to volume, only the
15
most recent replies are being displayed
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I’m
dissapointed, frustrated
2.by the way, I have also updated storyteller before -
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I’m
still dissapointed
My work around so far is to take out the SD card and read it by the SD Card Slot of the mac.
Reset of the camera didn't work. Also with a second iMAC. No connection possible. -
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Camera is not beeing recognized by the iMac after installing the storyteller update. There was no impact, just Software update.
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Putting the SD Card from the Camera into the SD Cardreader of the iMac works fine.
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Hi Wobisch,
Ok, this looks like there is an issue with Lion then , I will have the guys see if they can replicate it and find a solution for you.
Cheers,
Dave. -
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Taking out the card to transfer using sd card reader is definitely the way to go, especially if you have a fast card.
My average-max read speed from the camera is around 6Mbyte/sec, compared to 17Mbyte/sec when using a card reader. That's a lot of time saved when transfering large files. -
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I’m
Scott
Having similar difficulties. Opened the box last night. Intalled battery. Pushed the on button. Then NOTHING. Nothing would opperate. After about 20 minutes the self timer turned the cam off. Then all worked fine. I shot a couple segments around the house and tried to load on StoryTeller. NOTHING!!! Then today after morning reboot the two video segments loaded just fine. Soooo, Now let's get this baby on my Dirt Bike helmet at make some adjustments. Back from a 2 minute ride. plug into computer. NOTHING!!!! When I click on the Coutour Storyteller CountourGPS Icon nothing happens. I also will try fulling charging, removing Battery/SD card and try SD card reader. This is not fun. I have three other bike friends that have Contour Cams and I will talk with them this weekend on a ride. Hoping for the best.....Scott
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HI Scott,
You will find that charging the battery and then recording will make the difference. Let me know how you get on when its been fully charged. If the icon appears in storyteller then the camera has been recognised. If you have any further challenges let me know and I will assist you in getting through them.
Cheers,
Dave. -
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Just as all of you, I received my ContourGPS last night. Actually Contour donated the camera to us to help us record our event to raise money for a child with cancer.
I do not mind having to take the card out and use a card reader. the problem I have with is that I cannot configure the camera to the setting I wish because the PC will not recognize it.- view 20 more comments
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ok newest news.......battery still very hard to come out of camera.......but Windows Vista laptop.......installed driver for Windows Media Extender and it sees camera on laptop..........Windows XP.....cannot find a way to install that..... not working with XP..............Vista Works with camera....as far as the battery needing pliers to remove...is it a camera release issue or the battery thickness itself....if I keep removing this battery with pliers one or the other will be destroyed
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New news again......was going to test run it applied to my motorcycle.......got ready to go....turned it on...green light.....switched to record......it did nothing......had to take out the battery ...you know what a pain I have been having with the battery removal......reinstalled battery then it recorded.......
Please send a new camera full setup ....battery and camera tested from you please...I do not care if box is opened......If the next camera works I will have to get more memory and batteries for our ride for Life Vegas is a full day event to help a child with cancer. -
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I’m
frustrated
I am about to drop the camera into the trash can. What a waste of money. I down loaded the software as indicted and followed the instructions to the letter and now the camera will not start up, the computers - and I five differnet computers and four different USB cables and untold USB ports will not acknowledge the camera. The initial time I used the camera it worked, but the picture quality was very poor. Now with downloads and the lack of editing cabilitity I am really sorry that I did not go with the "other" brand. After reading all of the comments on this and other topics I am really sorry to see that your product is not worth the cost and time to fix.
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Hi Duckman,
Can you tell me what camera you have? This will assist me in helping you out with this. If you could also let me know what the primary computer is that you will be using the camera with will also assist me. Let me know.
Cheers,
Dave. -
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Totally agree Duckman! I bought a Contour HD this time last year with a mate. I’ve filmed 2 ski trips last winter. Apart from a couple of clips converted into different formats & then finally uploaded to U-Tube (hours of messing about) we basically can watch or edit anything with ease. Despite the guys from Contour customer support being quick & helpful & suggesting endless solutions, some simple, some requiring an IT Degree. None have worked & the long & short of is I apparently need to buy a new laptop !!! Wish I’d known this upfront. I basically gave up & left the camera in a drawer since February. Thought I'd give it another chance, replaced the battery charged it & now al new problem now I have real difficulty turning it on. Press the on button, 30" to 1' later it suddenly lights up but gets stuck in the red laser lens alignment mode & the only way to turn it off is to remove the battery. With the battery replaced same story. Seamed to be resolved by again removing the battery along with the SD card. Next I recorded a short test film. Connected to computer...camera not recognized & doesn’t appear on ‘My Computer’, although the laptop beeps when the USB is plugged in or removed! Updated Storyteller...still nothing. Very very very disappointed & fedup!!!! It's a real shame as the size & shape of the camera is great & I love the way it mounts discreetly on the side of a ski mask or my bike helmet...it just it a complete pile of ‘shit’ to use (apologies for the bad language but I've been more the patient with this, but now I've had enough). It's clear by the mountain of messages on the Contour site & the diversity of problems that there are all kinds of issues with this kit. Finally this time a hardware issue, we noticed from the outset that the lens was loose when in the normal horizontal position i.e. it could be rotated a degree or so clockwise / anti-clockwise which doesn't strike me as normal & not exactly compatible with steady shooting. You have to turn lens either way to remove the play. I’m this close to asking for my money back. Haven’t checked the guarantee yet but even if no longer covered, Contour better not try & refuse!!!!
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My ContourHD stopped being recognized by my Windows 7 laptop for no apparent reason...just stopped.
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Same thing with my cam. Piece of crap. So tired of buying what is to be the good stuff and it is junk
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Hi miked56,
What steps have you taken in trying to resolve this? If you can let me know then I should be able to assist you.
Cheers,
Dave. -
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Just got my contour roam. Oct 15 2011. Same issue. My windows vista laptop does not see the camera. Also, cannot get "Story teller" to initialize the movie player????
Should I send it back. Has anyone gotten any saitsfaction?-
Hi Boconn,
With Storyteller, make sure that you have Quicktime installed on your computer, as storyteller uses this as the default player. With eth lap top not seeing the camera, remove the battery and power source from the laptop for five minutes and then try again , this should work for you. Let me know what you find.
Cheers,
Dave. -
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I’m
frustrated
Mine (1080p HD Model 1300) also has the same issue. I think I know the issue, for some reason the camera kills the cheap 2gb card it comes with maybe? or just kills cards in general?
I found that if I change the configuration to anything other than the default (I like to use med quality over low and 720p 30fps for Low switch and 720 60fps for Hi switch) when I go to record the camera turns on fine, then I turn it to record and it acts like its recording for a moment, then makes a series of beeps and is no longer recording...but appears to be recording, and still on. So I turn it off and turned it back on once before and it recorded default low quality 1080p.
I tried it again today and same thing but this time I could not get it to recover, it turned back on once with a solid amber LED up front and no other leds. The amber LED stayed solid up front, with no leds in the back. So I held the power button to turn it off, no luck...I had to remove the battery to turn it off. Then tried it again and it would not turn back on at all.
So I removed the cover and pressed directly on the button behind the cover, still would not turn on. So then I removed the battery and then put it back in, and used another known good working micro sd card, same thing would not turn on at all. So I hooked it to my computer and it said it could not recognize the USB device hooked to my system. So I grabbed my other micro sd card I have used in the camera before, after unplugging it, and the same story, could not recgonize the USB device again(the camera).
So I tried each card in my computers card reader, and it saw and read both cards with no issues at all. So then I followed the above reformatting the card and removing the battery, then hooking the camera back to the computer with no battery in it, this worked and it saw it....but, the camera went back to the defaults I do not want to use.
I then removed the camera from the computer and tried a test record, it acted like it recorded but the video cannot be played back and acts corrupted. So then I unplugged it from the system and tried it again, now this time back to solid amber LED in the front and no LEDs on anywhere else. So then I put in my other micro sd card, and turned it on and it recorded at the defaults.
Now if I cannot configure it without screwing it up, I now have a "brick" of a camera that to me is useless since I cannot configure it without killing it or SD cards.
Sad thing is I was looking at a GoPro for many months before deciding to buy the Contour instead. I read some of the reviews, but decided to take my chances with the Contour over the GoPro, and it worked for the last couple months recording about 10 videos so far, and now I have serious regrets "not" going with the GoPro.
Should I install the firmware 1.17 again from the download here, even though my camera is a year newer than the firmware release?
Or should I cut my looses and buy the GoPro for now about $180 over what I would have paid considering I dropped that +accessories on the Contour?
Thanks.- view 4 more comments
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So with the battery fully charged today, I used the camera and made 10 movies in one day..the catch, with my 16gb card that has not had the issue like the 2gb, but has had at least one issue recently since this all started. The 16 with a clean format, and I did it several times to be sure, acted like it recorded the first video, and then beeped like there was some issue. I stopped the recording, started it again for about 30 seconds, then stopped it and turned it off. Then I waited about 30 seconds, powered it back on and started to record again and managed to catch about the last 40 seconds of what I was in the middle of doing. But once again that first movie...corrupted...350mb of corrupted mov
It did seem to save the configuration and not revert to default this time, but we shall see, only time will tell. -
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I grabbed another 16gb micro sd I have not used yet, and used sdformatter to format it. My next day off I will test this one and see what the end result is
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I’m
frustrated
Hi there! got the camera yesterday (contour hd 1080p), did 2 short videos and downloaded to a compuer. Everything looked ok until now, Camera does not connect anymore, tryed everyting i read here with no luck. What sould I do?
This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled
Camera does not longer connect to a PC.- view 6 more comments
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David,
I'm running on Windows 7 and if I try to update drivers, i get a message saying
"the driver software for your device is up to date". I got the camera last Friday night and Saturday afternoon it quit connecting after two short videos. I don't think my computer did any update during that short period of time, but anyway, I did a system restore to last Saturday (just in case) and nothing happens, no connection.
Any suggestions?
Thanks
Gabriel -
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Hi Gabriel,
OK, as that hasn't worked if you can contact support via the form on the support home page , they will be able to assist you from there. Let me know how you get on.
Cheers,
Dave. -
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I’m
gettin' pissed
Seems like this is happening to many many users...
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may i say Dave does a sterling job replying promptly to these posts. Support have sorted my camera. Many thanks for your help and the supports guys
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Hi cheekymonkey888,
Thank you for the kind words. We do try our best for folk and I am pleased that everything has worked out for you.
Cheers,
Dave -
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I’m
upset, sad, full of regret, tired and out of hope
So much hate for this camera right now....
So yep, even with a new 16gb card straight out of the box. same thing, turn camera on, record video about 3 minutes in it beeps like card is full or corrupted. Switch record switch off, power camera off. Power back on after waiting a bit, the rest of the videos I record are fine. So after moving the files off the 16gb card I used sdformatter on it and formatted it. The other 16gb card I used windows to format. Then the 2gb card that came with it I formatted using sdformatter. Then the other 2gb card I bought, I formatted it with windows format.
So going out today with all those freshly formatted cards, the opposite. ......
1.Turn camera on, it beeps.
2. Wait 10 seconds
3. Slide to record, its recording.
4. After X amount of minutes, slide record off, it beeps that the video stopped.
5. Go to record again, it beeps to indicate recording started
6. After X amount of minutes, slide record off, it does "not" beep, so will not stop recording.
7. Hold power button 30 seconds, nothing, still on.
8. Pull battery to power off.
9. Power back on
10. Slide to record, its recording.
11.After X amount of minutes, slide record off, it does "not" beep, so will not stop recording.
12. Cannot turn camera off.
With every card I put in the camera, same dumb thing. 1,2,3,4 and then go to record another video...nope...can I turn it off? Nope.... whoops camera killing the way it sees the cards...yaaah.
So I go home and check the 16gb card and find FILE0001 679, 224 so roughly 660mb and FILE0002 0 kb.
Try to open FILE0001, nope corrupted.
So I take the card, exactly how it was removed from the Contour HD 1080p camera, Model 1300 and locate a SD card adapter and put the micro SD card into that, then I put the SD card into an old Canon PowerShot A630(this camera has sand in it in areas, has been wet, and the shutter will not fully close right, or open half the time due to sand getting in it from being to the beach multiple times)
Guess what that same 16gb card I did nothing to but removed from the Contour camera, I recorded 4 videos running about 5 minutes each. They all opened and played back fine without any issues.
The Contour HD 1080p camera model 1300 I have has major issues. I got maybe 20 videos out of it total that had no issues. It has been stored indoors, in the original plastic case still on the clear plastic mount that slides into the clear box, in a temperature controlled area. Never been exposed to extreme heat or sat in the sun. Never been wet or even rained on. Never dropped, no sand or dirt in it or on it, ever. I used it on the front 9 o'clock picitanny rail of a .22lr Sig Sauer rifle, 16" from the bolt carrier, about 3 times, meaning it took recoil lighter than a sneeze or a breeze. I have took extremely good care of this camera and the largest jolt it ever took was probably during shipping.
I have old digital cameras that are 1mp, and at the time that was alot, that have low capacity SD cards with probably every trace burned up inside, that has been dropped and played with by a 6 year old like a toy, that still work, and this camera I bought in August cannot even make it 90 days since I started having issues with it?
So far Contour has "not" made a believer out of me.-
And the icing on the cake....I just called tech support, open Mon-Fri 8am-5pm PST, it was 6:22PM CST when I called, so 4:22PM PST. Its 6:33 CST now, so 4:33 PST, and made me leave a message....seriously??
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Hi b0xcrash,
Support will call you back within 24 hours. If you contact them via the form on the support home page they will also respond to you with in 24 hours, if you do that, then I guarantee that you will be sorted out.
Cheers,
Dave. -
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I’m
frustrated
Mine is not recognized as a mounted disk when I attach it to my computer, and it won't turn on. The only sign of activity it offers is a red led next to the USB port, if I connect it via USB cable to my laptop, and if the battery is inserted. Eventually the red LED turns off, as if the battery is charged. It is a Contour HD 1080p, purchased April 2010. I have tried several computers, both Contour batteries, several USB cables, two different SD cards (the 2GB it came with and the 16GB I've been using for over a year) and nothing seems to work. I have followed the instructions for resetting it - removing battery & card, pressing power for 10s+ until I am supposed to hear three beeps, but never do, inserting battery, attempting to power on, etc - to no avail. I dialogued with Jeremy in support and he tells me I am SOL. I am very frustrated with this camera, and the company.
Tempted to take it apart and look for burnt solder. What a PITA.
If any of you have recovered the camera from this not-responding state, please reply with your steps. I hate to throw this thing away.
Morgan- view 5 more comments
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Yeah, Jeremy helped me. I'm onto my next Contour camera. Thanks. My son took the old HD apart, we didn't see anything wrong. He put it back together and it is still not working, but now we learned a little about the insides. I'm guessing somehow the firmware got zapped.
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Hi Morgan,
Thanks for the update, I appreciate it .
Chers,
Dave. -
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I have the same problem.
I have had problems with my ContourHD the charge indicator rarely, if ever, comes on when plugged in and when connected to a computer (I have tried a Mac, a PC, and my PC based laptop) I receive an error, "USB Device Not Recognized". I have removed the SD card and it seems to work fine. I have tried the several steps located on the forum to remedy the fault with the lack of a charge indicator, and it seems to be working now. However, I still receive an error when connecting the camera to the computer.
- Kevin- view 3 more comments
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Dave,
Thanks for the suggestion. I removed the battery, then the card, pressed and held the power button. After about 10-15 sec, I let go of the button and reinstalled the battery. I powered the unit on, using the power button, and heard three beeps. I then installed the card. I then plug the unit into the USB cable (already attached to the PC), the red light on the back and the green light on the front flashed, and ...nothing... waited 30 sec and unplugged unit from cable. Powered unit on with button and plugged in again, this time all the lights shut off and I received the same error message as before, "USB Device Not Recognized".
Please, tell me what I should try to do next.
- Kevin -
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Hi Kevin,
As you have tried all of that to no avail, then i think its time for a replacement camera. If you purchased from the USA, then contact support http://help.contour.com/customer/port... and they will be able to assist from there. If you purchased from outside of the USA, then return the camera to the retailer and they will be able to exchange it for you under the warranty. Let me know how you get on.
Cheers,
Dave. -
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I'm struggling to understand here, is the camera not seen by your computer after the camera has received an impact , or has it stopped working altogether? Can you tell me more on what sort of impact the camera received.
Cheers,
Dave.
- I (and countless others seen online) am also having the same problem of not being able to connect easily.
- neither my new 16g microsd or the stock 2g sd will be recognized on the computer. recognition does not happen on 3 different computers, or with different cords.
- all trouble shooting tips have been tried.
this happened to me a couple months ago and then a 'memory card trick' worked. but will not work this time. this happened to me this time while skiing in the mountains. a foot and a half of snow and the camera craps out on me!!!
- your trouble shooting guide doesnt say that anything could possibly be wrong with the camera, which seems very unlikely since so many people are having the same problem. my friends new Roam seems to work fine AND was cheaper. Send us one of those to make up for this crap!
If you contact support via http://help.contour.com/customer/port... they will be able to assist you with a solution.
Cheers,
Dave.