I have an EOS 350D which is like 10 years old by now. Ever since I have used the very same CF Flash card because 1 GB was enough most of the time.
At some point a CF card reader had a bent pin in it, I just bought a new one without thinking about it. Then I had some issues with the new card reader, did not think too hard about it.
Today I tried to insert the CF card into the camera, the camera would not recognize the hard. This happened before, so I just pushed it in again with a bit more force. Then I had an Err 99
and it did not work. So I took out the CF card and to my horror saw this:
All the sudden I understood that it was not the card reader, it was the card itself! With shivers I looked into the card slot of the camera and saw certain doom:
This is what the new cardreader looks like now:
So because I have used the same card over and over and not checked the card once, I have now bent a pin deep inside my camera. It must be rectified such that I can use another card with the camera.
The only way I can think of “fixing” it would be taking a screwdriver and try to bend it back. But I am certain that I do not have the dexterity to apply the force exactly where needed. Also the bent pin will probably sit a bit below the upright pin next to it, I don't really have a chance to fix that bent pin without bending more pins.
So what can I do about it? I fear that sending it to Canon to replace the card reader will be more expensive than a used camera of the same kind :-/.