Corrupted/Unopenable .MOV and .MP4 files

[SomeonesSon]

So I've had the Mavic about a month now and flown it at every possible opportunity. The first time I discovered an unopenable file was after a full battery run and capturing one 3gb video file at 1080p in .MOV format. VLC displays the video length as 0:00 and QuickTime displays a message saying "converting" and then an error message saying "file format not recognized".
I changed the recording format to .mp4 and had no problem until yesterday when a similar sized .mp4 had the same problem. It doesn't play off the card or off my HD, the MicroSD card is the one which comes stock with the Mavic. Ugh.
These were just test flights but it is really worrying me there is an internal problem.

Does anyone have any ideas on troubleshooting this issue?

Thanks a million!

 

[Anthony Viscomi]

So I've had the Mavic about a month now and flown it at every possible opportunity. The first time I discovered an unopenable file was after a full battery run and capturing one 3gb video file at 1080p in .MOV format. VLC displays the video length as 0:00 and QuickTime displays a message saying "converting" and then an error message saying "file format not recognized".
I changed the recording format to .mp4 and had no problem until yesterday when a similar sized .mp4 had the same problem. It doesn't play off the card or off my HD, the MicroSD card is the one which comes stock with the Mavic. Ugh.
These were just test flights but it is really worrying me there is an internal problem.

Does anyone have any ideas on troubleshooting this issue?

Thanks a million!

I would first try another SD card. I have more than a few bad cards over the years. Also, try smaller videos; less than 3 gig

 

[SomeonesSon]

Thanks a lot! I just went and picked up a new card, will let you know how it goes!

 

[beachcombing]

Also, make sure that you STOP the video recording BEFORE you turn the Mavic off.

 

[AlanTheBeast]

You may be able to recover your video using the free app Handbrake. (Mac, PC, Linux)

 

[DIVO2000]

For anyone in similar situation: small tips on safety rules.

1. Switch off the recording, then turn your Mavic off.
2. If you didn't switch off the recording, or anything else happened (drone crashed, battery died, etc etc) - take the SD card our immediately, so that the power won't accidentally turn on again, and the camera won't overwrite something over your damaged file (even without you participating, that is).
3. Lock your SD card to "read only" mode.
4. Insert it into USB/laptop/computer, and if those files still can't be extracted and played with any video recorder, make an image file of your SD card (any USB Image Tool would do - google).
5. With that image file, there is a strong hope you can recover up to 99% of your card's contents (if you haven't done anything like formatting the card, recovering it with lame tools, etc). I usually turn to Restore.Media guys, they provide awesome recovery quality, but I'm sure there are other services/tools that extract data from an image file.

Might be of use to some.

 

[Mossiback]

This is the main reason I break up my recordings into smaller clips. If a file gets corrupted (or you forgot to hit the record button) you do not lose everything. And unless you are really talented, long continuous recordings get boring fast.

 

[Odom1957]

Removing an SD card while it is being accessed will cause corrupt files! Turning off the Mavic while recording will do the same. Usually, you are okay to remove an SD card from a computer without hitting the eject button, but make absolutely sure nothing is accessing the card. It only takes a second to hit that eject button. You can even setup a hotkey for it. I use something like Control+Shift+E

 

[DIVO2000]

That's the reason you have to lock it (to read only mode).
If you already have corrupt files (e.g. your mavic crashed, battery died etc) - your last files are 95% corrupted, as they were unfinished, so you won't get things worse by taking the SD out. By switching on your Mavic, though, you will - it will overwrite some data on top of your corrupted file, and then only making an image file would help.

 

[Odom1957]

I format my SD card every time I put it back in my drone. There might be some negative impacts to life expectancy, but it is a habit I have done for years coming from DSLR cameras.