i have installed the latest version of pi-top os on an 128GB sandisk sd card using etcher now i needed to put a different os but i cant remove any files from the sd card i have tried removing the files manually and the raspberry pi imager erase function nothing works and the only partion of the sd card that shows up is the recovery partion and every time i manually delete the files when i take out the SD card and put it back in all they files are still there i have tried reformatting i need help
@beastly First of all, welcome to the pi-top forum.
When needing to replace the OS, Etcher is going to reformat the card automatically when you use it to flash a new OS to the card. You don’t actually need to manually delete any files manually or format it first.
In fact, it wouldn’t be recommend to delete files because the partitions are set up during flashing as well as the partitions will likely need to be different, depending on the OS you are flashing to the card.
In general, are you trying to delete files from the card and then copy files to the card from an image or something? (Just needing clarification why you are deleting files off the card prior to flashing a new OS.)
Just put the card in a system, start Etcher and flash it again with the new OS. Etcher will take care of clearing the card and properly setting up the new OS and proper partitions, etc. If the card is failing to allow a different OS to be flash/verified, then it maybe is possible the card itself has an issue.
Hope that is helpful.
this helped the only reason i was deleting files of the sd card is because the flashing would always fail because the only partition that was showing up only had 128mb of space i was able to get a usb sd card adapter and it was abele to read all the partitions on the sd card and i was able to reflash the os so i think there is something wrong with the sd card reader that’s in my laptop thanks for helping
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Fantastic to hear. Glad you got your OS going that you needed.