Broken microSD card or cracked USB stick: can the data still be recovered?
In short: yes, it is possible, as long as the memory itself is not damaged. A microSD card and many small USB sticks are monoliths: the controller and the memory are sealed together in a single block of plastic. A cracked card, a card that stopped working after a short circuit, or one damaged while being pulled out of a phone can still contain intact memory that can be read in a lab. The one hopeless case: a crack running through the memory die. Do not try to glue, sand or solder the card yourself.
Written after the Flash Workshop "Deep dive into the monolith structure. Recovery of physically damaged monolith chips" at ACE Lab TechWeek 2026 (Alicante, October 2026). ACE Lab makes the PC-3000 range, the reference equipment used by data recovery labs.
Is your storage device a monolith?
According to the workshop, the most common monolith is the microSD card. The same construction is found in:
- SD cards from many brands;
- mini USB sticks that barely protrude from the port (such as the SanDisk Ultra Fit);
- many promotional USB sticks or metal sticks (including key-shaped ones), where the monolith is embedded in resin inside the casing.
In a conventional USB stick, you can see a separate controller and memory chip on a small circuit board. In a monolith, none of that is visible: it is one uniform, solid block.
How a monolith is made
The ACE Lab engineer described the manufacturing process in two steps:
- A very thin copper substrate (0.25 mm) carries the contacts (USB, SD or microSD), the pads for small components (resistors, capacitors), those for the controller and the memory die, and tiny vias connecting the different layers. The die is the actual memory (NAND type): a silicon chip much smaller than the card.
- The controller and the memory die are glued onto this substrate, then connected to it with very fine gold wires. The whole thing is then encased in resin, giving you the "piece of plastic" you know.
What this means for recovery: there is no memory chip to desolder. To read the memory directly, contact points hidden under the resin on the back of the card have to be exposed, sometimes deeper. They are then connected by soldering fine wires, or with specialised adapters (such as a spider board or a contact socket), linked to a professional flash memory reader.
This direct read bypasses the controller: what you get is the raw content of the memory, not files ready to copy. The read errors then have to be corrected, the scrambling applied by the controller removed and the order of the data reconstructed before the files can be found. This is one of the reasons the work takes time.
What the workshop showed
Seeing inside without damaging anything. Before any intervention, the goal is to find out where the controller, the memory die and the traces are. ACE Lab compared an X-ray machine from a smartphone repair shop, which shows the controller and the traces but not the memory dies, with an industrial X-ray machine, which shows the gold wires and the dies, even when four memory dies are stacked at different depths. An alternative method, much cheaper but less precise, was also presented: lighting the monolith with infrared, which passes through the resin, and photographing it with a camera or digital microscope whose infrared filter has been removed.
Working out the pinout. On a good-quality X-ray image, the engineer can follow the gold wires between the memory and the controller and work out which contact point carries which signal. The signals of a NAND memory follow a standard order, which helps a lot. The substrate is often universal: it has several positions for dies from different manufacturers, and the final pinout depends on the memory actually fitted.
Disabling the controller. Sometimes the damaged controller starts up as soon as the card is powered and blocks access to the memory, causes a short circuit or produces more and more read errors. ACE Lab showed SD cards and USB sticks where the controller had to be located by X-ray, the resin sanded away layer by layer, and the traces linking it to the memory cut.
Hidden pins. Some monoliths do not have all their contact points on the back: some sit on an internal layer. They then have to be located by X-ray, the resin sanded away deeper, and wires soldered onto them.
A "lucky case". A SanDisk mini USB stick, left plugged into a laptop, broke in two. The crack ran through the controller, not the memory: after soldering wires onto the right points, the data could be read.
Short circuits found without even powering the card. An X-ray image revealed burnt capacitors inside a monolith, with the gas that had escaped from them, and bubbles on an overheated controller. On a Samsung EVO microSD, the faulty capacitors were spotted by X-ray and then removed, which cleared the short circuit. To locate a hot spot, engineers use a thermal camera, freeze spray, a white layer of rosin that disappears where things heat up, or… thermal paper.
A card damaged with fingernails. A microSD card was pulled out of a phone with fingernails, cutting traces between the controller and the memory. They were rebuilt with wires of 0.02 to 0.007 mm, and the data could be read.
The impossible cases. When a crack or scratch runs through the memory die itself, recovery is not possible. Hence the workshop's advice to engineers: before sanding or soldering, first take an X-ray or a backlit image to know where the memory is.
The workshop's conclusion: recovering data from a physically damaged monolith is possible, but it is not production-line work. It takes plenty of costly equipment, and experience that even good engineers do not always have.
What to do right away
- Stop inserting the card into a phone, camera or computer. If it has suffered a short circuit, every power-up can make the damage worse. If the card gets very hot as soon as you plug it in, remove it immediately.
- Keep all the pieces if the card or stick is broken, even the smallest ones, and do not bend it to "see if it holds".
- Do not glue, sand or solder the card yourself. One stroke of a file in the wrong place can hit the memory, and then nothing more can be done. Do not open the metal casing of a USB stick either: removing the monolith can damage it.
- Do not format the card if your device offers to, and do not run any "repair" software.
- Write down what happened: a fall, the card forced into the reader, the phone dropped in water, the card pulled out with fingernails…
Our approach
- Free diagnosis: we examine your card or stick, assess the chances of recovery and give you a quote.
- If recovery is possible, your files are extracted and then checked.
- Your data is returned on a storage device you provide, or on a Belgium Data Recovery device at extra cost.
We work on a No Cure No Pay basis: if we cannot recover your data, you pay nothing. If you gave us a list of your important files and we recover less than 75 % of them, you can turn down the result at no cost.
Read also: USB stick and memory card data recovery and USB drive not recognised: causes and solutions.
Frequently asked questions
01My microSD card is cracked. Are my photos lost?
Not necessarily. It all depends on where the crack runs. If it affects the controller or traces, the memory can still be read, after repairing the traces or through a direct connection. If it runs through the memory die itself, recovery is no longer possible.
02My card is no longer detected, but there is no visible damage. Can it be recovered?
It may be: a shorted component or a faulty controller can stop the card from working while the memory is intact. The diagnosis will tell.
03Why is recovery from a microSD more complicated than from a regular USB stick?
Because a microSD is a monolith: the controller and memory are encased together in resin. There is no memory chip to desolder. To reach the memory, contact points under the resin have to be exposed, sometimes on internal layers.
04Can I try to repair the card myself?
We advise against it. Sanding, soldering or gluing without knowing where the memory is can damage it permanently. Keep the card and all its pieces as they are.
05How long does monolith recovery take?
It depends heavily on the damage. A card that can be read after a simple intervention is handled much faster than a monolith whose controller has to be disabled or whose hidden contacts have to be found; a complex case can take a very long time. We give you the timeframe after the diagnosis.
06Are branded cards easier to recover?
Not necessarily. The brand on the label does not tell you which memory is inside: the same substrate can hold dies from different manufacturers. What matters is the internal construction and the nature of the damage.
Real cases handled in the lab
