Thank you. Would a usb card reader help?
Absolutely, at least this is an excellent idea. And it's a good device to have anyway, as a decent multi-card reader likely has slots and supports cards that your PC's card reader does not. And of course you can always use the external USB card readers for ANY computer that doesn't have a built-in hardware card reader of its own, which is a real plus... like when at someone else's machine and you want to "take some data home with you".
But mostly those USB card readers seem to be highly successful in overcoming or avoiding these driver and hardware anomalies and unexpected problems stemming from using built-in card reader peripherals to handle specific flash card types which are supposed to be "compatible", either in desktops or laptops. The unique issues dealing with handling a particular flash card technology has been absorbed by the card reader manufacturer, and the USB interface seems to make it all seem totally generic and problem-free.
So, depending on your needs, you can go with USB 2.0 or USB 3.0, but for the extra price I would strongly suggest the latter, as it is much faster which makes a real difference if you're dealing with very large cards like 32GB - 128GB and are transferring lots of data.
And depending on the types of cards you want to support, you can go with 9-in-1 or 28-in-1 or 56-in-1 etc. readers. Current large SDXC and micro-SDXC cards are no problem.
I've had nothing but perfect results using IOGEAR card readers. I've not used Transcend card readers but they get very high marks.
I'd recommend the USB 3.0
IOGEAR GR309 which should probably be adequate, or the USB 3.0
IOGEAR GFR381 for more card-size capability.
Or, the USB 3.0
Transcend RDF8K. Or the potentially faster USB 3.1
Transcend RDF9K.
Whatever you decide, these are excellent little things to have around.
