I had that issue with the SD card being stuck and having a lot of friction upon inserting or removing it. I actually had to pull it out from the fully inserted position because the spring action, like you aaid, (like most laptops), did not push it out to be easily removed. i looked in the slot where the card goes ans saw that the sd receiver and the hole in the side of the unit were not aligned. that was putting pressure on the sd card receiver and pulling it away from the circuit board. Surprisingly one day the cards went in and out perfectly fine but then the unit acted like there was no card inserted at all. I decided to tinker around cause im fairly comfortable with fixing electronics, and i saw that 2 spots where the sd card receiver is soldered to the circuit board broke because they were pulled off from the pressure. i just soldered them back together but i made the sd card receiver raised by soldering it while slightly lifted from the circuit board and now with the black base back on it receives sd cards perfectly fine and reads them like it should as well. hopefully that is of some use to you

i would peek inside and see if it looks like the hole of the unit and the card receiver are lined up. i may have voided my warranty but am happy i was not without it for a longer period of time. and my warranty is up in 5 months. so meh.

good luck