My wife is having problems with her D700. After last use (taking pictures at Buffalo Trace Distillery) and removing CF card when arriving home, card cannot be re-inserted in camera. Obtained another new CF card but similar results.

What could possibly have happened to cause this problem. Card was removed as usual using the ejector button, and she is an experienced user who never forces anything with respect to use of the camera?

Online research indicates the D700 may have a pin problem that will sooner or later appear but wondering if anyone here has real live experience with this. If so, how costly a fix is this to repair, and how long will it take if sent off to repair facility?

Never had to deal with something like this before (45+ year Nikon user) and so please excuse my questions if simplistic.

Thanks, Steve

Visit my Nikonians gallery.

Its easy to determine if you have a bent pin, just take a small flashlight and look into the slot the cf card fits in. If you have a slightly bent pin and haven't used too much force trying to insert the card you may be able to straighten it with a small vascular clamp you can get at Radio Shack. Make sure you remove the battery and let the camer sit turned on for 24 hours before you try to straighten it, not because of a shock hazard but to keep from shorting out the cf connector. Don't use a lot of force and don't bend it back and forth or it will break. If its beent completely over then don't try fixing it just send it in.

Visit my Nikonians gallery.

I had this happen some years ago with a D70. It was one single pin at the end of a row that was bent and I managed to straighten it using a pair of my wife's tweezers (the flat ended type). I didn't enjoy the experience, or the thought of the repair bill if I got it wrong. Since that time I've used just a single CF card, currently 16GB with my D700, which gives me space for approx. 600 14-bit lossless compressed RAW files and which I almost never remove from the camera. I used to carry a battery powered back-up 80GB hard drive and connect the camera to it but now I download the RAW files from the camera to an iPad - this has the added advantage of being able to view the images at a decent size, a great help when deciding what to keep and what to delete.

Good Luck with the pin straightening!

Visit my Nikonians gallery.