SD card issue with Sony A7 III

I recently purchased a 128GB SanDisk Extreme PRO SD card for use in my Sony A7 III camera only to discover that the card is not recognised by the camera when it is inserted into slot 1. A bit of research revealed that this is a common problem, with literally dozens of users of the Sony A7 III reporting the same issue. It seems that the problem occurs with some 128GB and 64GB cards and is dependent upon the card’s batch number. In the case of the 128GB card, those with a batch number ending in 766G are the ones not recognised. Carrying out some further research highlighted that some owners of the A7R III have experienced the same problem. The retailer who sold me the card shows little sign of wanting to replace the card, but I have contacted Sony and SanDisk to try to find out where the problem lies. I was wondering if AP can throw light on the matter? Terry Woodroofe

This is a well-publicised issue on the internet. If you type the search term ‘128GB card error A7 III’ into Google you’ll come across lots of likeminded Sony A7 III users who’ve used various online forums to express their concern of not being able to use their high- capacity 128GB SanDisk cards in slot 1. The problem lies with 64GB and 128GB SanDisk Extreme PRO SDXC cards that have 766G batch codes. Interestingly, those who own 128GB versions of the same card but with the 824G batch number haven’t experienced the same issue and these cards work perfectly fine just as they should in both card slots. Sony has recently come forward and released a firmware update (v2.10) for A7 III and A7R III cameras with a fix for a bug found in the previous firmware version 2.00. Photographers who have experienced the same issue as you, have since reported that the new firmware fixes the problem successfully. We recommend all Sony A7 III and Sony A7R III users to visit www.sony.com/ electronics/support, type in the name of your camera model to locate the new firmware and install it to resolve this problem – Michael Topham, Reviews editor