Ricoh xD-Picture card controller

English Hardware
#1

Hello, Guys

Just wonder if any of you have Ricoh xD-Picture Card controller working on your laptop?

My SD card can work in my 5in1 media card reader however I do not know how to make xD-Picture Card controller work.

Please advise.

I am using 64bit openSUSE 11.2 with latest stable kde 4.

Thanks,

#2

More info is needed. Post the output of

/sbin/lspci -nn |grep Ricoh

Also, with relevant media inserted, note the output of

dmesg |tail

lsscsi

Does the reader work with any media card type? (eg SD, xD)

BTW, I found this short but interesting blog (which concerns Ricoh R5C832 controllers):

http://intr.overt.org/blog/?p=59

#3

My media card reader works with SD card at least.

There is no output for dmesg|tail after I insert the xD card into card reader.

#4

Post the output of the first command I gave you. Chipset details might be helpful.

#5

My quick research online suggests that there is only experimental linux support for xD picture cards (with Ricoh devices) at this stage. (The sdhci and ricoh_mmc drivers handle the other media types).

However, it looks like support is in the pipeline:

SDHCI upgrade to support MMC/SD/SDIO/xD Picture/Memory Stick - msg#00013 - linux.drivers.sdhci.devel

Re: [Bug 202490] Re: [Feature Request] Provide a driver for Ricoh R5C822

So maybe openSUSE 11.3 will have support for xD picture cards.

#6

…
http://intr.overt.org/blog/?p=59

I think kernel in openSUSE 11.2 is above 2.6.25. So the blog info does not help at the moment.

#7

Sorry, I am not in front that laptop right now.

However I do remember it is like this:

System peripheral: Ricoh Co Ltd xD-Picture Card Controller (rev FF)

#8

Don’t worry about that info now - it won’t make a difference.

I think kernel in openSUSE 11.2 is above 2.6.25. So the blog info does not help at the moment.

No ,that was only a workaround for MMC cards.

See my last post. The last link I provided has a link to an experimental driver (tarball) for the 5822 chipset. (Hopefully support will be provided in the 2.6.34 kernel).

#9

I have 11.3 milestone 7 loaded in virtualbox. Is there any way I can verify xD card reader will work when 11.3 released?

Thanks for the info.

#10

It may be too late to submit a bug report for this release. Anyway, I was only going on this Ubuntu bug page:

[Bug 202490] Re: [Feature Request] Provide a driver for Ricoh R5C822 xD](http://www.mail-archive.com/ubuntu-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com/msg2198104.html)

*** NOTE: this is a wishlist item - a request for new functionality.
At present, and perhaps forever, xD support on linux is extremely
limited. This issue is a request to have xD support added for a
specific, and somewhat popular, chipset. Please do not add “me, too”
items. We know that it doesn’t work. If you want, please add yourself
as a subscriber, and click on link to indicate that “This bug effects
me, too” In the meantime, there are two xD readers known to work with
linux, so if you simply must have xD support, those would be your
options.

Now there is an xD driver for this chip.
Supports kernel from 3.6.32.

  • (http://launchpadlibrarian.net/44373795/ricoh_xd_3.tar.bz2)

    To install please do ./make && sudo make install && sudo make load

    Note that this package installs several kernel modules, similar to
    compat-wireless
    So, make sure that there is no conflict between existing mtd modules and
    these.

I think you’ll need to try installing the driver manually.

#11

Well, Lets wait for another month and see what happens with 2.6.34 kernel in 11.3.

Thanks,