Raspberry switch off corrupting SD card

[dmantampfl]

Hi all,
I have already lost three SD cards with raspberry PI. I am not sure if it is related to switching off the device. The device is always in powered off condition. As there is no power button, I keep it always connected. Sometimes I just watch cable TV channels. As the device is connected at this time, the system running. But when I switch off raspberry is also getting switched off. I don't do shutdown as I don't remember everytime to shutdown while I am not using it.
May be because of this my SDK card becomes unreadable.

[IriDium]

It may not be the cards are "lost" but if you don't shutdown correctly, the operating system can get corrupted as files may be in the process of being written too when the power is lost.

From XBMC always use the shutdown command or from ssh sudo poweroff.

What version of Xbian are you using?

[dmantampfl]

Hi,
I am using XBian alpha. I will be moving to beta very soon. Shutdown may not always be an option as the device is always connected to power. So that I can switch to XBMC without going to power supply board.

When I say card is lot, it is not just OS lost. Because, I am not able to use it for anything else after that.

I am planning to buy a power switch for raspberry. Hopefully that will make things better.

[IriDium]

It would seem that not shutting down XBMC and the RPi correctly is probably the cause of your problems.
Always shutdown XBMC and the RPi correctly, especially in Alpha. Beta, is a little more forgiving.

Also, ALWAYS, power off the RPi when changing or removing the SD card. Pull the micro USB power connector out of the RPi if you cannot access the main power switch.

On my machine, I have an inline switch on the USB power cord just for this purpose.

[rikardo1979]

(8th Aug, 2013 06:55 PM)dmantampfl Wrote:  Hi,
I am using XBian alpha. I will be moving to beta very soon. Shutdown may not always be an option as the device is always connected to power. So that I can switch to XBMC without going to power supply board.

When I say card is lot, it is not just OS lost. Because, I am not able to use it for anything else after that.

I am planning to buy a power switch for raspberry. Hopefully that will make things better.

by saying lost you mean that even if you plug it into PC is not appears in devices? Or what exactly happening, can you be more specific?
Also you may try to stick the card into digital camera if you have one and to format in it