Integral · UltimaPro · UltimaPro X2 · Gamer's Edge · Gamer's Edge X · microSD Express · Security · Crypto · Courier
Integral is the British brand in the high-street shops and the supermarket aisle, on cards and drives built from the common makers' flash and controllers: the UltimaPro and UltimaPro X2 SD and microSD lines for cameras and phones, the Gamer's Edge cards for consoles, including the Gamer's Edge X microSD Express card for the Switch 2 that was named beside PNY's in the early-2026 reports of cards the console stopped reading, the plain Integral microSD cards in blister packs, and the Courier, Security and Crypto USB drives, the last two of them hardware-encrypted drives that do not open without their password. The faults are the common ones, with the common outcomes: torn tables after an interrupted write, a format accepted, a card worn out in a dashcam, a drive snapped in a port, a controller stopped. The encrypted drives add one of their own: a password nobody can remember, which no laboratory can get past, and the drives that erase themselves after too many attempts do exactly that. Integral's warranty, like every maker's, replaces the card. An Integral card a reader still sees is £149 + VAT after the free look, fixed in writing; one no reader sees, or one snapped, locked or counterfeit, is £299 + VAT; an Integral microSD Express card whose controller has failed is SSD work from £449 + VAT.
Rather talk it through? An engineer answers the bench line
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| Line | Models and markings | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| UltimaPro and UltimaPro X2 | SD and microSD; X2 UHS-II | Cameras, phones |
| Gamer's Edge | microSD A2; Gamer's Edge X microSD Express 256GB to 1TB | Switch, Switch 2, Steam Deck; Express from £449 + VAT |
| Plain Integral | microSD in blister packs | Phones, dashcams |
| Courier, Security, Crypto | USB drives; Security and Crypto encrypted | Offices; password needed |
| What you see | The usual reason | What the bench does |
|---|---|---|
| Switch 2 stopped reading a Gamer's Edge X | Firmware handshake | Album at UHS-I in a reader; NVMe work if nothing reads |
| Security or Crypto drive asks for a password nobody has | Hardware encryption | Nothing without it; said plainly |
| Needs formatting, or card error | Torn file tables | Image; rebuild the tables on the image |
| Not detected anywhere | The controller has stopped | Chip-off on a board; test pads on a monolith |
| Write-protected with the switch open | The end-of-life lock | Copy off now; image in passes if it is slow |
| Shows the wrong size, or loses files past a point | A counterfeit under this label | The real flash recovered; the rest was never stored |
A case number goes on the envelope and a number on the card the day it is opened, with both sides photographed. The card goes into a reader on a hardware imager that controls how long each read may take, never a laptop slot, and what it presents is read first: its capacity, its identity registers, its file system. That decides whether it is a card a reader can see with a fault in the data, or a card whose controller has stopped, and which band it falls in. The first look is free, and you can stop there owing nothing.
A card that answers at all is imaged in full on hardware that limits every read and retries on its own terms, weak areas last, with a map kept of what could not be read. A card that is slow, that drops out, or that has locked itself read-only is imaged the same way, in short passes with the power cycled between them. Nothing is written to the card at any stage, and every later step happens on the image.
A card no reader sees is a monolith job. The coating is removed to expose the internal test pads, the pinout is matched against a database or mapped by hand, a needle adapter is fitted, and the raw flash is read out around the dead controller. The scrambling, the error-correction layout and the page and block order are then solved in software, and a virtual image of the card assembled from the raw dump.
On the image, the FAT or exFAT tables are rebuilt where they are damaged and read where they are not, deleted entries are brought back, and where the tables are gone the photographs and video are carved out by their own signatures. Video files cut short by a dead battery are rebuilt from a reference clip from the same camera. Every photograph is opened before it goes on the list; a file that will not open is not counted.
What was recovered is listed for you first, and only then does a bill exist. Approve the list and it is invoiced; turn it down and it is not, and where nothing has come back, most jobs carry no charge at all. The files go home on fresh media with the card, tracked, with the postage paid here, and your case stays open until you have opened them yourself.
The card read on the bench with torn exFAT tables; nothing had been formatted. The tables were rebuilt on the image, the last RW2 files carved by signature and dated from their own metadata, and every frame opened.
Illustrative example — replace with a genuine caseNo, and neither can anyone. Put the password on the form and the drive is recovered like any other.
Usually not. Put it in an ordinary reader; the album reads at UHS-I speed. The games come back from your account.
£149 + VAT if a reader still sees the card after the free look; £299 + VAT if none does, or if it is snapped, locked or counterfeit; microSD Express from £449 + VAT. Fixed in writing.
Looking at it is free. Back comes a list of what opened and what did not, together with a single price to finish, set down in writing while you are still free to say no. On most jobs an invoice only follows the data. Until that list reaches you, leave the card in its bag and format nothing.