The things that waste time. April 4, 2025: I pull a SD card from the camera, put it in a reader, and plug into one of the Samsung Galaxy Book4 Edge USB-C ports. Nothing happens. Windows 11 won’t mount the card. Uh, oh-oh.
Blame always starts with software—or should. I reinstalled the drivers. No change. Rebooted the operating system. No difference. The card’s contacts were clean, so I ruled that out. Somehow, I worried, the storage thang had gone bad. Oh no! I hadn’t backed up the photos recently.
That’s the story behind the Featured Image. I put the card back into Nikon Zf and looked for something to photograph—to see if the camera would write to the SD card. Neko napped so peacefully, I couldn’t resist. Vitals, using NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR lens: f/6.3, ISO 3200, 1/250 sec, 185mm; 4:05 p.m. PDT.
I attached the Zf to the laptop, via USB-C cable, and easily transferred the portrait. That led to totally unexpected explanation: Defective card reader, and I didn’t have a spare to confirm (and I plan to see if debris, likely lint, is the cause). I since purchased a couple more SD card readers; redundancy is simply smart.
The photo is a straight RAW-to-JPEG conversion with no edits, and I considered them. Composed as captured.