SD Card Reader not Working in Windows 10 for some Lenovo Users

Some frustrated Lenovo users have been posting lately on support forums that they are having troubles with the SD card readers on their tablets after making the upgrade to Windows 8.1

Lenovo users seem to be among the most affected users by Windows 8.1, as they have reported issues with battery drain, some touchpad problems and slow performance issues with the Yoga 13 Windows 8 hybrid device. Now, a number of users is reporting that they are having issues with the functionality of their SD card reader after upgrading to Windows 8.1.

Here’s how one Lenovo users is describing his problem:

Upgraded to Windows 8.1 and the Realtek SD drivers in the download are for the P400 Windows 8.0 does not appear to be installing…  Can’t find it in Device Manager, not being recognized when inserted.   Nothing wrong with the hardware because it works in a VM under windows 7 with no problem.  Anyone else having this problem?

Another has reported a similar issue back when Windows 8.1 wasn’t even released, and he had actually updated to Windows 8 from Windows 7. Here’s what he said at the time:

Got an issue with my card reader, bit weird, upgraded to Windows 8 from Windows 7, all worked fine before. Any how, I’ve downloaded latest drivers for my Realtek SD card for Win8. When I insert a SD card, Win8 recognises it ok and opens the folder on the card. I then “safely remove hardware” , ejecting the card. This is where the problem is. I then re-insert the SD card back in and “No response” from Win8. I go into Device Manager and everything is ok. I have to restart the laptop for it to clear. Then its fine for one time again.

I un-installed the Realtek drivers and let the Microsoft generic drivers kick in. Same again, but when i go into Device manager, there’s an exclamation mark on the card reader saying. “Windows cannot use this hardware device because it has been prepared for “safe removal”, but it has not been removed from the computer. (Code 47). My laptop is an Acer 5735z running windows 8 64bit. All was working when running windows 7 64bit

So, as we can see, Realtek seems to be the culprit, and I have researched more on this subject and, indeed, found more Windows 8.1 laptops having Realtek SD card drivers with problems. We’ll investigate more and get back to those affected when we will find more about this another annoying Windows 8.1 problem.

SD Card reader issues in Windows

Not only Lenovo users encountered SD Card reader issues. There are also many errors in Windows 8, 8.1 and 10. Multiple issues like SD card not showing up in Windows 10, Micro SD card not reading or SD card not detected on any device are giving headaches to Windows users. Happily, these errors can be fixed by trying one of our solutions from this guide.

Another fix, for Micro SD card reader errors, can help you get rid of this annoying problem.