How can I create a mountable image or backup of an SD card on Windows 7?

Asked 5/4/2012

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I’d like to add a safety step to my workflow by making a copy of each SD card as soon as I ingest it, so I can erase the card and reuse it right away. On macOS this can be done by creating a mountable disk image. Is there a similar way to do this in Windows 7, ideally as a read-only image I can mount later and browse like an external drive? If not, what Windows tool is a practical alternative for backing up the card contents first?

Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

14y ago

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It sounds like MacOS is just creating a disk image file (.dmg I would guess) for the USB drive, which can then be mounted. I'm curious if you can actually clone an SD card, or just USB drives...SD/CF cards are usually treated differently than USB drives, and the MacOS clone feature is usually intended as a means of backing up literal external USB drives.

Windows 7 actually does have direct support for mountable drive images in .vhd (Virtual Hard Disk) format. You could create a VHD via the Windows 7 Disk Management tool, mount it, and copy the files from the memory card to your VHD (which, being a file, can be mounted, unmounted, copied for backup, etc.), and delete the VHD when you no longer need it. This would not be a 100% exact clone (although I suspect neither is the MacOS clone...its probably a new disk image with the contents of the external drive.) You could also use a backup tool like Acronis True Image to create USB drive clones, however it does not seem to support cloning SD/CF cards (at least, the version I have, 2011, does not.)

To create a VHD and copy the memory card contents to it, which would pretty much be as good as a MacOS DMG, do the following:

  • Right-click Computer, choose "Manage"
  • Expand the "Storage" node
  • Right-click "Disk Management"
  • Select "Create VHD"
  • Fill out the form
    • Size XYGb (i.e. 16Gb)
    • Fixed Size
  • Watch the status bar for progress
    • May take a few minutes...
    • Virtual disk will appear as an unallocated drive when done
  • Right-click "Disk" (should appear bright greenish-blue, unlike normal drives which are silver)
    • Select "Initialize"
      • Use MBR format for greatest compatibility
  • Right-click "Unallocated Volume" (should have a black "Unallocated" strip color)
    • "New Simple Volume..."
      • Next...
      • Next...
      • Pick a drive letter or mount to folder
      • Next...
      • NTFS or FAT32 (NTFS offers more features)
      • Add a Volume Label
      • Perform a quick format (Checked)
      • Next...
      • Finish
  • The drive should automatically mount, ready for use

Once you have a VHD, you can just drag-and-drop copy everything from a CF card to the VHD. In windows, cameras themselves show up as devices in Computer. You can open up the camera, and directly access the memory cards inside them, and just copy the DCIM and any other folders across to the VHD. If you have a card reader in your computer, the cards will usually show up as removable drives once you pop a memory card in. You can again just copy the DCIM and any other folders across to the VHD. Cameras usually have pretty fast interfaces, and copy pretty quick. Some memory card readers for computers, particularly cheap ones, are often limited to USB 1.1 speeds, so you might only get a few mb/s out of them. USB 2.0 ones will usually get you about 20mb/s. If you have the option, even for non UDMA-7 memory cards, picking up a $20 USB 3.0 PCI-e card and USB 3.0 CF/SD card reader will get you about 40-50mb/s (and significantly more, up to 150mb/s, on todays native UDMA-7/USB3 compatible CF cards.)

Originally by user124. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user124

14y ago

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Windows 7 can do something similar using a VHD (Virtual Hard Disk). With Disk Management, you can create a VHD file, mount it, copy the SD card’s contents into it, and later remount that file as a drive. That gives you a single mountable backup file you can keep for a while and then delete.

Based on the answers, this is more of a practical backup container than a guaranteed bit-for-bit clone of the card, but it fits your goal of quickly preserving the contents before reusing the card.

Another suggested option is Microsoft SyncToy, which can help automate copying the card contents to another drive or folder. It won’t give you the same “mountable image” workflow, but it is a straightforward backup tool for Windows.

So if your priority is a mountable archive, use a VHD. If your priority is simply copying files reliably, SyncToy is a simpler alternative.

UniqueBot

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14y ago

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