[Q] Low memory troubles / moving apps to sdcard - Galaxy S II Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I have had low memory problems on my S2/4.1.2 for a long time. I have tried to get by by moving apps to the SD Card (the internal one as I can't move to the external one). This just isn't enough anymore. So I have tried moving some apps by force to the internal sdcard and while this seems to work fine, the apps are lost after a reboot.
I have tried moving using the adb shell command: "pm set-install-location 2" and also tried moving the apps using an app that requires root. The result is the same. App works fine until reboot after which it vanishes.
Is there a trick to make apps force-moved to sdcard stay working?
Especially Google Chrome would be nice to move to sdcard as it uses 60MB+ when installed.
Or is it possible to repartition the system without reinstalling everything?

galmok said:
I have had low memory problems on my S2/4.1.2 for a long time. I have tried to get by by moving apps to the SD Card (the internal one as I can't move to the external one). This just isn't enough anymore. So I have tried moving some apps by force to the internal sdcard and while this seems to work fine, the apps are lost after a reboot.
I have tried moving using the adb shell command: "pm set-install-location 2" and also tried moving the apps using an app that requires root. The result is the same. App works fine until reboot after which it vanishes.
Is there a trick to make apps force-moved to sdcard stay working?
Especially Google Chrome would be nice to move to sdcard as it uses 60MB+ when installed.
Or is it possible to repartition the system without reinstalling everything?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes you can use all in one toolbox(which i use) and several other in the playstore like link2sd
By these you wont lose your apps after a reboot
Hope it helps u mate
p.s. also if you force move an app it may get broken

galmok said:
I have had low memory problems on my S2/4.1.2 for a long time. I have tried to get by by moving apps to the SD Card (the internal one as I can't move to the external one). This just isn't enough anymore. So I have tried moving some apps by force to the internal sdcard and while this seems to work fine, the apps are lost after a reboot.
I have tried moving using the adb shell command: "pm set-install-location 2" and also tried moving the apps using an app that requires root. The result is the same. App works fine until reboot after which it vanishes.
Is there a trick to make apps force-moved to sdcard stay working?
Especially Google Chrome would be nice to move to sdcard as it uses 60MB+ when installed.
Or is it possible to repartition the system without reinstalling everything?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Follow these steps -
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=44009547&postcount=66329
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk - now Free

machokingjim said:
Yes you can use all in one toolbox(which i use) and several other in the playstore like link2sd
By these you wont lose your apps after a reboot
Hope it helps u mate
p.s. also if you force move an app it may get broken
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Link2SD only works with external SD cards and only when they are repartitioned. External SD cards are not where I want to put my apps as that location is unreliable. I would like to use the internal SD card memory (there is 5GB free which I have no other use for).
My phone's memory is split into system, data and internal SD card partitions. The data partition is used for apps. When I move to SD card, apps get moved to the internal SD card (poor name). The external SD card is just for media.
I have moved 2 upgraded system apps (that would occupy data memory) to the system partition (which now has 2% free) but that freed some MB from the data partition.
Link2SD can force move apps, but when I do that, they disappear after a reboot. The only place I can see any leftovers of those apps are in the programmanager where they appear with internal names like com.something.somethingelse. When visiting google play for those apps, they are not installed and I am offered to have them installed.

Jeetu said:
Follow these steps -
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=44009547&postcount=66329
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk - now Free
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I cannot mount my internal partitions on windows as I am not using a custom rom. I do not have the "mounts and storage" option in my recovery mode.
Anyway, that link is just for errorchecking the partition and removing stuff. Using the ADB shell and busybox, I could run fsck if I needed to.
But the space I would regain (if any) will probably not be something like the 500MB-1GB that I need.

I was perhaps hoping to repartition with a non-destructive tool, but I don't know if it has been ported to android (I would guess it has).
This is the partition table:
[email protected]:/ $ su
su
[email protected]:/ # fdisk /dev/block/mmcblk0
fdisk /dev/block/mmcblk0
Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT
Command (m for help): p
p
Disk /dev/block/mmcblk0: 30777344 sectors, 29.3M
Logical sector size: 512
Disk identifier (GUID): 52444e41-494f-2044-4d4d-43204449534b
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 30775262
Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name
1 8192 49151 40960 0700 EFS
2 49152 51711 2560 0700 SBL1
3 53248 55807 2560 0700 SBL2
4 57344 73727 16384 0700 PARAM
5 73728 90111 16384 0700 KERNEL
6 90112 106495 16384 0700 RECOVERY
7 106496 311295 200K 0700 CACHE
8 311296 344063 32768 0700 MODEM
9 344064 1392639 1024K 0700 FACTORYFS
10 1392640 5586943 4096K 0700 DATAFS
11 5586944 29720575 23.0M 0700 UMS
12 29720576 30769151 1024K 0700 HIDDEN
Command (m for help):
I would like to shrink partition 11 (UMS, internal sd card, 11GB) and expand partition 10 (DATAFS, data partition, 2GB). They are placed next to each other so I wont have to touch any of the other partitions.
Anyone have tried that?
I could probably settle for a solution that moved the apps to internal sd card and linked to them. I would try it myself, but I don't know enough of androids inner workings on what to move.

Also, my phone has the brick bug but I have no idea what this actually means. Is this something that could cause a problem if I used a partition manager on the internal memory?

Related

Apps2SD stopped working

I set up apps2sd a couple of months ago and had about 120meg of internal memory free (up from 25ish). I've since upgraded to modaco 3 (from 2.8), and the free memory has been falling to below 40meg now.
Is there any obvious reason why this would be, and what I can do to solve it?
he who searches shall find answers...
I've done a search, and it looks like apps are being installed to the phone and not the sd card.
Is this easy to rectify, or do I need to repartition?
I've had a look at my sd card using ADB, and it is partitioned as follows
Model: SD SU16G (sd/mmc)
Disk /dev/block/mmcblk0: 15.9GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos
Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
1 512B 15.4GB 15.4GB primary fat32 lba
2 15.4GB 15.9GB 512MB primary ext3
3 15.9GB 15.9GB 31.5MB primary linux-swap(v1)
(parted)
I'm using Modaco 3.0, but my apps don't seem to be moving to my sd card. I tested it using the following information and this confirms what I thought.
To confirm whether A2SD is working properly from a terminal / ADB Shell type:
busybox df -h
You should see something along these lines below:
/dev/block/mccblk0p2 532.9M 67.1M 438.7M 13% /system/sd
The key is that you see one of the entries as /system/sd
This means that the phone is picked up your Ext2 partition.
Next if you see the above you can check that you setup the symlinks properly.
To do this type these cmds:
cd /data/app
pwd
The terminal returns /system/sd/app which means that the apps are now being saved onto the Ext2 Partition since the /system/sd = your Ext2 partition.
If it returns /data/app then the apps are still being installed onto the phone's internal rom.
Hope this helps, let me know if not.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi guys i kno this is slightly off topic but i wanted to know if theres a way to check hw much my memory i got left on my ext2 partition cos im tryin to install the game iron sight by polarbit which is 16mb and im gettin out of space message but i still have 47mb of internal phone memory? Thanks in advance
edit: sorry disregard this post i used the above busybox df -h ang gt my answer my bad gt buttons for eyes lolz
Can anyone help?
I think my sd card is partitioned correctly, and I have modaco 3.0...
Sausageman said:
Can anyone help?
I think my sd card is partitioned correctly, and I have modaco 3.0...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you quoted yourself a way to check if it is working or not...
kendong2 said:
you quoted yourself a way to check if it is working or not...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's not working, and I don't know why as I think I have all the right bits for it to work.
I was hoping that someone who knew about how it worked would be able to suggest solutions or diagnose the problem...
same for me too.
with modaco roms my a2sd isnt working. but when i install 2.01 roms a2sd works just fine.
btw how much space is occupied after 1st boot with a2sd in modaco 3.0 you are getting? i get 44 mb occupied after 1st boot.
and the old apps ?
I had installed Modaco ROM 3.0 with a SD card entirely formated FAT32.
Then... the apps resided in the real /data/app (physical internal memory).
I create partition ext4. The new apps resides in this partition (i.e on SD card).
Well.
And the old apps which resided really in /data/app?
If the system melds old /data/app and /system/sd/app (ext4) where are physically my apps?
If my old apps are physically in /data/app, how can I move it in sdcard?
dd

[Q] Freeing up memory

Hi,
I'm new to the forums and I'm trying to figure something out about freeing up memory for my low memory smartphone .
Things I'm familiar with are:
app 2 SD, using titanium backup to move apps to sd, using root explorer to delete stock apps, clear dalvik cache. I also noticed that each time u place an app to the SD, there is still a part that is placed on the internal memory.
I like having lots of apps so I'm looking for all possible ways to free up memory. Right now I have about 24MB free space. At 18-19MB it starts giving the low memory warning.
Since the custom rom I'm using, uses quite some space and because I ran out of options to get more space I tried something new:
removing files from the system folder
I used root explorer to delete:
ringtones I'm not using, startup & shutdown sound, T9 languages I'm never gonna use, log files (crash dump)
Root explorer shows I got 41 MB free memory (so I deleted about 17 MB of system files I'm not using anyway)
But when I looked at how much free internal space inside the settings menu, I noticed the value didn't change (24MB)! .
So if I install about 5 MB of apps it's gonna give me the low memory warning again.
I tried rebooting: doesnt change a thing.
I tried clearing dalvik cache: it seemed to work for a moment. The menu showed I have 36 MB of free space. But then as soon as I changed a file it popped back to 24MB
It's like the phone doesnt know there is free space he can use
Does anyone got a solution for this weird problem?
ps: my specs
GT-i5800 (Samsung galaxy 3 / apollo)
using Kyrillos' rom v7.0 overclocked
Hardedge said:
Hi,
I'm new to the forums and I'm trying to figure something out about freeing up memory for my low memory smartphone .
Things I'm familiar with are:
app 2 SD, using titanium backup to move apps to sd, using root explorer to delete stock apps, clear dalvik cache. I also noticed that each time u place an app to the SD, there is still a part that is placed on the internal memory.
I like having lots of apps so I'm looking for all possible ways to free up memory. Right now I have about 24MB free space. At 18-19MB it starts giving the low memory warning.
Since the custom rom I'm using, uses quite some space and because I ran out of options to get more space I tried something new:
removing files from the system folder
I used root explorer to delete:
ringtones I'm not using, startup & shutdown sound, T9 languages I'm never gonna use, log files (crash dump)
Root explorer shows I got 41 MB free memory (so I deleted about 17 MB of system files I'm not using anyway)
But when I looked at how much free internal space inside the settings menu, I noticed the value didn't change (24MB)! .
So if I install about 5 MB of apps it's gonna give me the low memory warning again.
I tried rebooting: doesnt change a thing.
I tried clearing dalvik cache: it seemed to work for a moment. The menu showed I have 36 MB of free space. But then as soon as I changed a file it popped back to 24MB
It's like the phone doesnt know there is free space he can use
Does anyone got a solution for this weird problem?
ps: my specs
GT-i5800 (Samsung galaxy 3 / apollo)
using Kyrillos' rom v7.0 overclocked
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.diskusage&hl=en
Check where most of the space is used at, try clearing cache+dalvik in recovery and see if it improves. What is your phone's max Storage amount[avail for apps]
Ace42 said:
market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.diskusage&hl=en
Check where most of the space is used at, try clearing cache+dalvik in recovery and see if it improves. What is your phone's max Storage amount[avail for apps]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I got DiskUsage and it pretty much tells me the same as root explorer.
When I go into /system it shows I got 41,6 MB free space (& 10,6 MB System data),
but strangely enough when I go into /data it shows I got 23,9 MB free space & (38,7 MB system data).
I wrote down what Diskusage shows with the most important subfolders:
App storage (3 dirs):
Data (192,4MiB)
> 43.1 MiB Applications
> 125.5 MiB System Data
> 23.9 MiB Free space
[Root required] > /Data (24 dirs)
/data (192,4MiB) :
> 83.9 MiB dalvik cache
> 26.0 MiB data
> 16.0 MiB app
> log
> ...
> 38,7 MiB System data
> 23.9 Mib
[Root required] > /System (22 dirs)
/system (209 Mib)
> 59.7 MiB app
> 53.0 MiB lib
> 14.3 MiB framework
> ...
> 10.6 Mib System data
> 41.6 Mib Free Space
I'll try clearing dalvick once more but this time I'll clear cache too to see if that works, as you said.
by the way, Ace42 , thanks for the quick reply.
But I tried what you said and it didn't change much. I'm thinking there's a cap/maximum for the amount of storage that can be used for apps.
Or maybe there is a mimimum amount of space that is reserved for system files or system resources.
I don't know..
Hardedge said:
by the way, Ace42 , thanks for the quick reply.
But I tried what you said and it didn't change much. I'm thinking there's a cap/maximum for the amount of storage that can be used for apps.
Or maybe there is a mimimum amount of space that is reserved for system files or system resources.
I don't know..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Most of the phone's ROM space is for /system , from what I see the /data partition is pretty much 200MB. Dalvik/cache gets recreated, and there's a folder for all installed apps[sytem/user] in the dalvik folder[data/dalvik-cache] . You have to lower the amount of apps you use, delete system apps that aren't needed and remove their folder from /data/data & data/dalvik-cache. Or use a ROM that's much smaller, and you'll see more space. The installed apps are using a minor amount of space, so that's not an issue really.
oh forgot to mention that
/system dir = 209 Mib.
I edited it in the post.
How come it's larger than /data or app storage (192,4MiB) :s ?
Can I move the free space to the other folder (or is the correct term partition here)?
How come it's larger than /data or app storage (192,4MiB) :s ?
Can I move the free space to the other folder (or is the correct term partition here)?
Hardedge said:
How come it's larger than /data or app storage (192,4MiB) :s ?
Can I move the free space to the other folder (or is the correct term partition here)?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Because it contains important system files, and they require a lot of space.
It needs to have the most space compared to anything, and /cache is is normally big too since it also can be used to hold OTA's, when given out.
Ace42 said:
Because it contains important system files, and they require a lot of space.
It needs to have the most space compared to anything, and /cache is is normally big too since it also can be used to hold OTA's, when given out.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So is there no way to release the +15MiB I deleted from the system directory? And give it to /data?
Thanks for the info by the way

Repartition media and data partitions on Nook Tablet

Congrats to all who figured out the rooting process on NT. The NT has a measly 1gb media partition and over generous 11gb data partition. Can more experienced developers look into gparted-live-0.10.0-3.iso and e2fsprogs-1.41.14.tar.gz to use as tools to repartition the NT? I do not have a NT yet. I have a rooted emmc CM7.1 NC oc'd to 1.225gHz. I appreciate and respect all the effort that goes into this project. I used the develop financial apps for a big US bank.
hwong96 said:
Congrats to all who figured out the rooting process on NT. The NT has a measly 1gb media partition and over generous 11gb data partition. Can more experienced developers look into gparted-live-0.10.0-3.iso and e2fsprogs-1.41.14.tar.gz to use as tools to repartition the NT? I do not have a NT yet. I have a rooted emmc CM7.1 NC oc'd to 1.225gHz. I appreciate and respect all the effort that goes into this project. I used the develop financial apps for a big US bank.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looks like it won't be necessary...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1355969
Necessary no, but definitely desired.
Sent from XDA Premium app CM7.1
Not even desired if storage is really not partitioned, as it now appears.
unsivil_audio said:
Necessary no, but definitely desired.
Sent from XDA Premium app CM7.1
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
At best, repartitioning will give you an additional 1GB of space, and probably break the ability to ever do a factory restore or load additional updates when they are released by B&N.
I think we need to wait for an unlocked bootloader or at least an accessible CWM with bootable workaround (like on the Droids) before we start messing with the filesystem.
Current configuration allows 11gb for purchased apps, movies, books, music from Amazon app store, BN app store or Google market. Only 1gb is allowed for end user loaded music, books, movies etc. If you have over one thousand song music collection (5gb) you want loaded to NT you will need to use a microSD card. You cannot load an HD movie in the 1gb media partition. The old NC partition scheme had 5gb media and 1gb data. The newer NC partition scheme (blue dot) has 1gb media and 5gb data. Most users will not utilize the 11gb for purchased apps.
Thank you hwong for my case in point.
Sent from XDA Premium app CM7.1
hwong96 said:
Current configuration allows 11gb for purchased apps, movies, books, music from Amazon app store, BN app store or Google market. Only 1gb is allowed for end user loaded music, books, movies etc. If you have over one thousand song music collection (5gb) you want loaded to NT you will need to use a microSD card. You cannot load an HD movie in the 1gb media partition. The old NC partition scheme had 5gb media and 1gb data. The newer NC partition scheme (blue dot) has 1gb media and 5gb data. Most users will not utilize the 11gb for purchased apps.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can add custom search paths to some media players to scan /data/media (or whatever you want to call it). You might even be able to setup a symlink. You can also open the files (large movies, etc) directly from a file manager like Root Explorer.
I do see your point, though, how the layout is different from the NC. I'm using a 32gb memory card so I guess this isn't an issue for me.
The data partition is ext4 formatted whereas the media partition is vfat formatted. When the NT is connected to a computer via USB, the vfat system is what the user sees for loading his own content. I do not think the ext4 partition shows up as a drive on the computer.
thread moved..
Thread moved to general section ..
So, ext4 cant be used ? Can't have books and videos, etc stored in it ?
hwong96 said:
The data partition is ext4 formatted whereas the media partition is vfat formatted. When the NT is connected to a computer via USB, the vfat system is what the user sees for loading his own content. I do not think the ext4 partition shows up as a drive on the computer.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What about in a linux distribution like ubuntu? I know that windows doesn't read ext4 (unless 3rd party drivers are installed) nor the first partition (if the nook tablet is really partitioned, that is).
You can store files on the EXT4 partition and access them through a file manager, but it won't appear as a drive on your computer when you connect it. You would have to copy files to an SD card, then from the SD card (plugged into the Nook) to the /data partition.
I'm working on a way to create a "virtual" FAT filesystem within /data that would be mounted to /media instead. This would allow you to use around 10GB for media (while leaving 1GB for /data). The best part is that it doesn't require any repartitioning or reformatting and can be easily undone.
If you can't wait for that virtual mount to work (which sounds super cool, by the way; would a different approach be to look at the smb.conf in the Samba server for Android and share /data via Samba over the network? I've read the 'stock' samba server can't share linux filesystems, but I can't help but wonder if that can't be overridden in .conf) you can do some fugly hacking like I did on the NST:
On the NC and NST, /data is an android-only vanilla filesystem
/mnt/media is the filesystem that is swapped out of Android for copying in from Windows.
On a rooted device where /data is not full, you can use fdisk (or busybox fdisk in case you have not symlinked busybox to the commands it supports) to shrink /data. I would do this over a wireless connection, so that you don't get involved in both partition editing and unmount/remount at power on.
If the /data partition is the LAST partition listed by /mount, you can delete it and resize it hot very easily.
delete it.
hit n
create the 'new' partition as a smaller size.
w to write your changes.
You get an error about the kernel still using the old partitioning. You don't care. Reboot, and your /data partition has shrunk. Now might be a good time to run fsck on that new, smaller paritition. You'll get a warning about running fsck on a mounted disk. On a device with a resized partition and no actual filesystem damage, this has not been an issue for me. YMMV.
Then you would need to delete and recreate /mnt/media to the desired size, toggle the partition label to make it a fat filesystem, reboot, confirm that those boundaries worked also, and then run mkfs.vfat (if I'm remembering correctly) on your new partition.
The tricky bit is getting the partition order correct in a complicated filesystem like this one.
On the NST, you don't actually have to get everything just right.
I found that out by happy accident - I wanted to resize /data and /media there, and they are partition 6 and 8 respectively.
The first time I did it, I was confused about which set of notes described what. When the device failed to start 8 times, it looked at the world and realized a reimage was needed, and formatted the available ext fileystems as /data and /cache, and the fat filesystem as /media.
I did not realize this until quite recently, when I needed to reimage my NST to apply update 1.1, and lo and behold: the partition table after reimaging from stock was not in the order I'd ultimately imposed on it the first time.
I do not know how robust the recovery on the NT is.
Seems to me this is a great time to find out - but I would only muck around with the /data and /media and not touch anything below those, and I don't have one of the NTs so my money's not at risk.
mmcblk0p10 is media vfat partition
Mmcblk0p11 is data ext4 partition
Here is how you repartition /data and /media partitions using Gparted and e2fsprogs as done by a Kindle Fire owner. Methodology is same for Nook Tablet.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1388996
hwong96 said:
Here is how you repartition /data and /media partitions using Gparted and e2fsprogs as done by a Kindle Fire owner. Methodology is same for Nook Tablet.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1388996
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Partitioning seems different as that Extremely Well done set of instructions for a fire only seems to use GParted which I don't believe understands the partitions on th NT???
I could very easily be wrong and if you tried and were successful doing this on an NT then I apologize and want to buy you a case of beer for your efforts to help us all on the NT.... just I'm skeptical as NT doesn't use traditional FS layout or format as far as I believe...
If this worked for you PM me with some proof and your paypal and I'll pay up with thanxs added... else I just felt obliged to question and put my money where my mouth is to save others from at a min. soft bricking their NT...
I still haven't picked up an NT yet so I did not try this yet.
For discussion only.
I would think the repartitioning process is simpler than the Kindle Fire since the /media(vfat) and /data(ext4) partitions are at the end of the SD. Gparted does not create ext4 partitions. Gparted can create ext2 partitions and e2fsprogs changes ext2 to ext4 if I follow the logic correctly. My first step would be to make a backup of the /data partition. Then I would delete /data partition. Then I would increase the /media partition using GParted. Then I would create the /data partition as ext2 using GParted. Then using commands in e2fsprogs to convert format to ext4. Then restore the /data backup from the first step.
Here is the NT partitions from NookDevs
http://www.nookdevs.com/Dump_NookTablet_Partitions
hwong96 said:
Gparted does not create ext4 partitions.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not yet! An update to it today actually has gparted displaying the partition correctly (it wasn't before? I thought it had ok support for ext4 partitions before, or since 2009ish), so pretty sure they're working on it. I'd be inclined to wait for official support over making ext2 partitions tbh
hwong96 said:
Here is how you repartition /data and /media partitions using Gparted and e2fsprogs as done by a Kindle Fire owner. Methodology is same for Nook Tablet.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1388996
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Has anyone tried it? I wish to try, but don't understand how to make those binaries work, coz KF used CWM, which we don't have yet! Can anyone direct me?

[Q] Specific App not moving to SD card

Hello all. I am new to the forums and to Android, so bear with me.
I have been searching around for the past few days for a way to solve the issue that I am having and have not been able to find anything that works for me. So here it is:
I have an LG Optimus L5 II (LG-E450B) running stock Android 4.1.2 (non-rooted) Kernel Version 3.4.0. My carrier is Virgin Mobile (Canada). I recently realized that the stock 2GB of internal memory is not nearly enough for me, so I went out and bought a 16GB Sandisk microSD card. I put music on it, set photos to autosave on it, etc. which all worked great. However, I have been unable to get some apps to move over correctly.
I realize that some apps can't really get moved (at least without rooting, etc). The app I am specifically trying to work with is iBird pro. It's App Info appears as such:
Total: 641 MB
App: 12.68 MB
USB storage app: 628 MB
Data: 4.00 KB
SD Card: 0.00B
The "Move to SD Card" option is available, but when I do it all that it does is drop the App to 3.51MB and up the USB storage app to 637MB. All of which stays on the internal memory. Obviously it is only moving 9MB or so of App to the virtual SD internal memory (which I believe is what shows up in my files manager as /storage/sdcard0, so it doesn't actually move it to the SD card (though a few other apps have sucessfully been moved).
I have tried using App2SD, but it says that the program is not supported by my device (and the iBird Pro shows up as "Phone Only" anyway).
I have tried the ADB hack trick set-install-location 2 and reinstalled the app and still nothing, it just saved on the internal memory.
Finally, when I open the app, it also downloads another ~600MB of database data (bird songs, pictures, etc), which also saves on the internal memory. Or at least tries to but the memory gets full and it stops the download.
Anyone have any ideas for me? I know a lot of people ask this question, but none of the other solutions I came across seemed to help me. I would really appreciate it! I would prefer not to root my phone, by the way. Unless of course someone can make me an incredibly convincing argument.
Cheers!
This is how android's built-in app2sd works.
I don't think you can do anything w/o root.
I suggest rooting, make a second partition to your SD card (2-4 GB) and use link2sd.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]
There are oh so many reasons to root your phone and few not but that choice is yours
Sounds like only some of the data/libraries are able to me to SD on this app of yours so if you don't want to root it than you'll have to leave it on internal.
And FYI, many apps don't play well or are slowed considerably on SD, so be careful what you move and if you don't Yardley use an app its best to just not even download it, but again choice is yours
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2
if you can't do root so sit back and relax.
Ok, so I decided to root. Which was actually freakishly easy. So how do I move stuff now? I have tried a number of apps, all of which only bring up "App Options" and we have determined that the "Move to SD" option there doesn't work correctly. I just want to figure out how to get the app and all of the data that it will download later to install on the SD, I never thought it would be quite this complicated.
Benjiboy180 said:
Ok, so I decided to root. Which was actually freakishly easy. So how do I move stuff now? I have tried a number of apps, all of which only bring up "App Options" and we have determined that the "Move to SD" option there doesn't work correctly. I just want to figure out how to get the app and all of the data that it will download later to install on the SD, I never thought it would be quite this complicated.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Use Link2SD.
Make a second partition (2-4 GB) and move (link) that app to the second partition.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]
Tried Link2Sd? I would rather use that.
Sent from my A89 using xda app-developers app
Ok, so I partitioned my 16GB card into two FAT32 partitions (10 GB and 4 GB) and a Swap Partition of ~850MB (roughly following this guide: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2126363). However, when I opened Link2SD and tried to select FAT32/FAT16 as the file system of the SD card's second partition it came up with the Mount Script Error "Mount script cannot be created. mount: I/O error". I had tried formatting with Ext4 and Ext2 file systems as well earlier, but when I selected either it said ext2 or ext4 (whichever I was trying to use) was not supported by my device (which I am assuming means my kernel does not support either).
Edit: Ok, so I changed it. I deleted the Swap partition (couldn't get the swap stuff to work anyway, it's not required right?). There is now 1 10GB partition and 1 5GB partition. Link2SD created the mount link just fine this time. Testing it out. "Install Location" gives a Warning "App2SD is not supported by your device. Because your device has a primary external storage which is emulated from the internal storage. You can link the app in order to move its files to your SD card." Does this mean that I can't automatically link files to the SD card?
Benjiboy180 said:
Ok, so I partitioned my 16GB card into two FAT32 partitions (10 GB and 4 GB) and a Swap Partition of ~850MB (roughly following this guide: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2126363). However, when I opened Link2SD and tried to select FAT32/FAT16 as the file system of the SD card's second partition it came up with the Mount Script Error "Mount script cannot be created. mount: I/O error". I had tried formatting with Ext4 and Ext2 file systems as well earlier, but when I selected either it said ext2 or ext4 (whichever I was trying to use) was not supported by my device (which I am assuming means my kernel does not support either).
Edit: Ok, so I changed it. I deleted the Swap partition (couldn't get the swap stuff to work anyway, it's not required right?). There is now 1 10GB partition and 1 5GB partition. Link2SD created the mount link just fine this time. Testing it out. "Install Location" gives a Warning "App2SD is not supported by your device. Because your device has a primary external storage which is emulated from the internal storage. You can link the app in order to move its files to your SD card." Does this mean that I can't automatically link files to the SD card?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Swap IS NOT needed.
Second partition should be ext 2/3/4.
Test to see if auto-link works.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]
Vagelis1608 said:
Swap IS NOT needed.
Second partition should be ext 2/3/4.
Test to see if auto-link works.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good to know swap isn't needed. However, Link2SD did keep saying that Ext2 or Ext4 wasn't supported. I can try it again though.
Benjiboy180 said:
Good to know swap isn't needed. However, Link2SD did keep saying that Ext2 or Ext4 wasn't supported. I can try it again though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Use Ext3. If it doesn't work use FAT. It can get buggy (not very often).
Also I think that if you can link apps 1 by 1, then you can (probably) use auto-link as well.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]
Vagelis1608 said:
Use Ext3. If it doesn't work use FAT. It can get buggy (not very often).
Also I think that if you can link apps 1 by 1, then you can (probably) use auto-link as well.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok, so Ext3 didn't work. So I stuck with the second partition being FAT32 as well. The mount worked fine.
When I try to create the link I get the following error: "Failure. create_link.com.whatbird.pro[1]: can't create /data/sdext2/data/com. whatbird.pro/lib/libfileutils.so: I/O error"
I was able to move the bulk of the apps Obb files to the SD using FolderMount. However, I am unsure how to move the 650MB Misc. data files to the SD.
Benjiboy180 said:
Ok, so Ext3 didn't work. So I stuck with the second partition being FAT32 as well. The mount worked fine.
When I try to create the link I get the following error: "Failure. create_link.com.whatbird.pro[1]: can't create /data/sdext2/data/com. whatbird.pro/lib/libfileutils.so: I/O error"
I was able to move the bulk of the apps Obb files to the SD using FolderMount. However, I am unsure how to move the 650MB Misc. data files to the SD.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Flash CWM recovery, in 'mounts and storage' press 'format SD-Ext'. This fixes the I/O error (I think).
If the misc files are libs then ALL of them can be moved/linked.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]
Vagelis1608 said:
Flash CWM recovery, in 'mounts and storage' press 'format SD-Ext'. This fixes the I/O error (I think).
If the misc files are libs then ALL of them can be moved/linked.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ROM Manager does not list the LG- E450B as a device supported by CWM Recovery so it won't to an install of CWM Recovery,
Benjiboy180 said:
ROM Manager does not list the LG- E450B as a device supported by CWM Recovery so it won't to an install of CWM Recovery,
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Look for a custom build here on XDA.
Sent from my GT-I5500 [CM7.2]

[HOWTO] Use external SD card as internal storage in KitKat

Beware, this guide is more or less untested, it will interfere with stuff like memory encryption and OTA or other firmware updates. You have been warned, I assume no warranties for bricked phones, SD cards or lost data.
Many cheap-ass Mediatek phones ship with Android 4.4.2 or later and only ridiculous amounts of internal storage (2GB in my case, CAT B15Q). That may be enough for basic apps, but as soon as you install Navigon or other data-heavy apps (or WhatsApp with a load of videos) you're going to run out of space in no time - and because Google is a bunch of fools, they disallowed app installations to SD cards entirely in 4.4!
So, we're going to move /data in its entirety to our nice huge SD card and be able to use even bigger apps on small phones. It might be possible that this guide works on other phones, but that depends on how they boot and where the fstab and init.rc reside!
Prerequisites:
Mediatek-based 4.4.2 or later phone with root access in recovery (boot it in recovery, run adb shell, therein run id. If it says root, all fine. If not, install CWM)
A large enough SD card (I chose a 32GB card with a 50:50 split between /data and the "external sd card")
Solid Linux knowledge, one Linux PC and one Windows PCs. I urge you to NOT use any kind of VM unless you have experience with USB passthrough.
spFlashTool and the Mediatek drivers from http://forum.xda-developers.com/general/general/stock-rom-cat-b15q-rom-development-t2988774, for a flashing guide see http://forum.xda-developers.com/android/help/howto-firmware-flashing-cat-b15q-t2989627
mtkdroidtools from https://www.androidfilehost.com/?fid=23501681358558543 on the Windows PC
mtk-tools from https://github.com/bgcngm/mtk-tools on the Linux PC (no, Cygwin does not work, it messes up the permission bits), cloned on an ext4 partition (not sure if ext2/3 can handle the extended permission bits...)
a network connection between the PCs or a USB stick to transfer files
Take the sd card out of the phone and insert it into your computer. Many laptop SD slots don't like SDXC (>4GB), you might need e.g. a Huawei 3G stick or a SDXC-compatible USB dongle.
Repartition the SD card using Acronis Disk Director, gparted or whatever you're familiar with. The first partition must only be resized (this is the FAT partition), the second partition is a ext4 (!) partition. Both MUST be primary partitions. Acronis and other tools on Windows might require a reboot to repartition SD cards. I recommend a 50:50% split, but if you're heavy on apps or their data, you might go for a 25% FAT: 75% EXT4 split.
Boot your phone into recovery, connect to it with adb in a root shell.
Assuming your data partition is at /dev/mmcblk0p8 (look in /fstab to find it out, followed by mount /data and ls /data to verify), execute the command "dd if=/dev/mmcblk0p8 of=/dev/mmcblk1p2", wait until it is finished. This can take up to ten minutes or more, depending how much data there is.
Shut down the phone, take out battery and SD card.
Insert the SD card into your Linux machine, run resize2fs /dev/sdb2 (or wherever the ext4 sd card partition ended up, check it in dmesg) as root so that the filesystem grows; then eject the SD card and put it back into your phone
Readback your BOOTIMG partition, transfer it to the linux PC (or, if you already have a boot.img for your current firmware, use this one)
On the Linux PC, open a rootshell (to avoid permission issues when building the ramdisk).
Run "./unpack-MTK.pl /path/to/bootimg"
"cd boot.img-ramdisk" (directory might be named different, depending on how you named the bootimg dump file)
Using a text editor, edit the "fstab" file(s) (there might be multiple, with suffixes): From (adjust if needed)
Code:
/[email protected] /data ext4 noatime,nosuid,nodev,noauto_da_alloc wait,check,encryptable=footer
to:
Code:
/dev/block/mmcblk1p2 /data ext4 noatime,nosuid,nodev,noauto_da_alloc wait,check,encryptable=footer
Now, edit the init.rc file (beware, other .rc files in the ramdisk root might also contain mount commands!).
Search for "on fs_property:ro.mount.fs=EXT4" and again replace /[email protected] (or whatever the node for /data had been) with /dev/block/mmcblk1p2 in the commands in this block (should be fsck, tune2fs,ext4_resize and mount).
Repack the boot image: ./repack-MTK.pl -boot boot.img-kernel.img boot.img-ramdisk/ /path/to/newboot.img
Transfer newboot.img to the Windows PC and flash it using spFlashTool
boot your phone, look in Settings->Memory to see if it went OK!
If the memory view didn't change, also modify the other blocks of on fs_property, in case your device does not use an ext4 rootfs (but yaffs or ubifs instead).
Functionality
It is a good idea, but
Are I still have part of it as external storage?
If yes, it means I can not remove it because there are some apps used it.
If no, it means I will not have external storage anymore!
e.ahmedmahfouz said:
It is a good idea, but
Are I still have part of it as external storage?
If yes, it means I can not remove it because there are some apps used it.
If no, it means I will not have external storage anymore!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The SD card is now both internal and external storage! You are not able to remove it because else your system will not boot anymore.
harddisk_wp said:
The SD card is now both internal and external storage! You are not able to remove it because else your system will not boot anymore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
what if the sd card is damaged ?
Can my phone boot again..or will booltloop
madthinker said:
what if the sd card is damaged ?
Can my phone boot again..or will booltloop
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you manage to kill your sdcard while you have my sdcard hack installed, then the phone will bootloop until you insert a new sd card partitioned just like the old one. Then it will act like you had factory-resetted it.
Alternatively you can always reflash original boot.img/recovery.img and use the phone with limited internal memory.
harddisk_wp said:
If you manage to kill your sdcard while you have my sdcard hack installed, then the phone will bootloop until you insert a new sd card partitioned just like the old one. Then it will act like you had factory-resetted it.
Alternatively you can always reflash original boot.img/recovery.img and use the phone with limited internal memory.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i see, thanks to explain me :good:
There is another way to get more space: Link2SD (2.- euros) with a second partition on your external SD-card exactly like shown above (ext4 partition, primary).
The advantage is, that if the sdcard is faulty the system still runs, just the apps which are symlinked to the ext4 partition won't run.
So I use this for all these not absolutely important apps which needs lots of internal memory, e.g. kindle bookreader, Amazon, WhatsApp etc. I dont use it for all apps, most importantly not for any app, where there is no alternative. Last week my two years old 64 GB MicroSD card (SanDisk, with warranty 10 years) in my SGS4 stopped working and this could happen all the time. They are not that reliable I think, that I would put my system on it.
I did this now with the Cat B15Q of my friend.
EDIT: and she has now more than 1 GB free internal space
I think this is the best solution, 2 GB for the pure ROM and the system apps is more than enough and all user apps go to the external sd-card (2nd partition).
good day!
hope you can help me.
what if i want vice versa? because my phone's default storage (0) is sd card.and i want my default storage will be its internal since it is 32gb rom. tried all ways but i think the answer is its boot.img. thank you..hoping for a help

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