Expert: LizaL - 11/21/2006

Question
Picure has been sent to you! :-) It's about 2,5 MB in size... Are you able to receive files that size? I can  zip it if you like....

Thanks again for not giving up on me! :-)
Best regards
Stig Norheim

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The text above is a follow-up to ...

-----Question-----
Hi again Liza and thanks so far.

Answer to your questions:

1. Computer..... A "normal" PC with Win XP proffesional
2. I have three computers in a local network at home, and it happens on all of them.
3. I transfered the pictures from the camera to the computer, using a USB cable. I use the standard Windows software that pops up when connecting the camera to the USB cable when I transfer the pictures.
4. It's not possible to open the pictures in a web browser...
5. Yes, I see most of the thumbnail in for example Windows Explorer.
6. Yes I have. In Word I only see a red cross up in the left corner, and in Photoshop I get different error messages: "Could not complete your request because of a problem parsing the JPEG data" and nothing happends.(Thats when I open a file that don't show a thumbnail) Also, when I open a file that have a thumbnail I get this error message: "This document may be damaged(the file may be truncated or incomplete) Continue? - So when I open the file I see like 5% of the file. The rest is white....
7. Same as question 6 happends when I rename a file to tif.

As I said, I'm on a PC. Also, all the photos used to be ok. After downloading to the computer I was able to see all the photos for months. But after I formated the computer (the C drive)(I removed all the photos to another disk first!)none of them are possible to look at... (I copyed them back to the same location where they used to be on the disk that i formated.

I hope this will help you, help me! :-)
If you like, I can send you one of the photos, and you can see for yourself?

Thanks again for helping! :-)

Best regards,
Stig Norheim
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The text above is a follow-up to ...

-----Question-----
Hi Liza,
I have a big problem! All my photos (jpeg)are not possible to open anymore. Dosen't matter what software I use.... All I get is this error message "invalid jpeg marker" Do you know how to recover/open these images? Is there any software that recover jpeg files?

Thanks! :-)
-----Answer-----
Hi Stig,

I can tell you what this means, and give you a couple of suggestions -- but I'd like to have some additional info in order to try and help you further.

An invalid JPEG marker usually occurs when there's an error with your computer's drive trying to read the file, or if you're using a card reader to download the pictures to your computer. Sometimes the problem lies with the card reader, itself.  In other words, it's generally a read and/or write error. But it can also be an error due to USB -- so if you're using a USB cable connected to your camera, and importing photos that way, it could be your cable causing the problem, or your USB connection altogether. Either way, your photos are experiencing bad information, usually in the header portion of the file.

If you can, please post back and tell me more:

1. What kind of computer are you using?
2. Does this happen on every computer you've used? You might try opening the images on another machine.
3. How do you transfer images from your camera to your computer? Also, what software do you use in the transfer?
4. Have you tried opening the file in a Web browser?
5. Do you see a thumbnail for the picture, in a file directory?
6. Have you tried placing -- not opening -- the files? That is, have you tried placing (or inserting) them into another program, like a page layout program, or even a program like Microsoft Word?
7. Have you tried to change the extension of the photo file? Sometimes this will work -- try changing one to .TIF instead of leaving it as .JPG and see what happens.


There are companies out there that will aid in data recovery, but I don't know whether you're using a Mac or PC, so I don't know how to advise you. So please post back with the additional info. Hopefully this is something you can fix on your own, though, so you won't have to go to added expense of having someone else do it for you!

Lisa
-----Answer-----
Hi again Stig,

Thanks for going to the trouble of answering all those annoying questions! But that really helps. Yes, by all means, please do send me one of the pictures. Send it to lizal@little-works.com. I'll take a look at it today and see if I can figure something out by trying to open it here -- I have two Macs and two PCs, and I can try on all four machines.

I find it interesting that you started having this problem after you reformatted your hard drive -- I also find it interesting that you can't use the Open File command in a Web browser and navigate to a picture to display it onscreen. That said, I don't know right offhand why these things are happening, but I especially think the HD reformat might play a part in all this.

But right now these are just observations. If you'll go ahead and send me a representative picture, I'll try and look at it -- and if I can't open it, maybe at least I can figure out something about its file structure. At any rate, having your answers and seeing a picture will help me research this.

I'll post back in a day or so, after I've gotten the picture and had a chance to try and figure out what's going on!

Thanks,

Lisa

Answer
I should be able to receive it but if I don't by the afternoon (I'm on EST here and it's about 8 a.m. now) I'll post back and let you know.

I won't give up -- and if I don't know the answer, I'll try my best to steer you to someone who does!

Lisa