Phone lost access to internal storage - Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I have a ZTE Axon 7, running LineageOS 15.1 with TWRP recovery.
Today, my phone decided that it doesn't want to find my internal memory. If I open ES Explorer, it shows internal memory as 0.0 of 0.0. I can't access my photos through any media viewer. I can't access my downloads from my browser. I can't get to any of my files.
BUT, everything seems to work normally otherwise. My apps are still there, and they work. I can open the camera, and take a picture, but it doesn't save it. I can access the internet through my browser. I can check my email and get push notifications.
I rebooted my phone, put in my FDE password (fully expecting that it wouldn't work) and it booted right up. My text messages and call logs are all still there.
If I connect it to my computer via USB and change to MTP, my computer recognizes the phone, but Explorer says "This folder is empty".
It seems like some apps can see the data, but others can't. For example, I can see my text messages in NextSMS, but I can't back them up with SMS Backup and Restore.
Is there anything I can do short of wiping it and starting from scratch?
Edited to add followup questions: A) Could a factory reset work? B) If I have to reflash Lineage...how can I do that if I can't transfer anything to the device?

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[Q] sd card readonly, sqlite database exceptions

Hi,
I have a strange problem with my sgt 10.1.
I'm not rooted, do not have TW. Yesterday I installed connectbot, and deinstalled it after using it.
Now, almost all my apps crash (browser, music, etc). Looking through the traces it says it cannot write into readonly database, or cannot create a database. I figured it was a space issue (which is not indicated by Android) and tried to delete some stuff.
I cannot delete anything anymore. From ES File explorer (Androis app), I cannot delete any files from my sd card, and when mounted to my laptop, I cannot delete things either.
Restarting does not help, and brings back the problem in 3 minutes.
So, what is going on here?

problems after deleting verizon's bloatware

Dear all, i'm a very newbie on android phone and i live in Indonesia... i've ever used android phone (motorola photon 4g) but i am only using the phone, and never do things like rooting, change ROM or anything like that because i don't understand it at all.
Now i'm using Droid DNA, bought from someone in Indonesia, with condition :
1. rooted (I check it w/ root checker app)
2. seems like still using the stock rom (i don't know for sure)
3. injected with indonesian's CDMA cell operator smartfren (and just change it to Esia cell operator 2 days ago)
Problem:
1. For the CDMA network, all works fine. but when i switch to GSM (with Telkomsel or AXIS operator's simcard) i only can make a phone call n SMS. the mobile data won't connect, it says "disconnected because service unavailable". actually i have used the simcard for my photon and it works fine for the mobile data (internet and for wifi hotspot / tethering). I already trying modify di APN parameter following instruction from the official website of both of the operators, but still the mobile data won't connect at all. Can anyone help?
2. Starting from my will to make this droid dna have more internal memory space, i've deleted files considered bloatware from "website tutorial" (i forgot from which), but before that i have backed up with titanium backup app. then came up problems with the phone after i deleted several app from that "tutorial". I've tried to restore from the titanium backup app, but there's still problem stays :
a. when i try to enter the menu Settings>storage came up "unfortunately the process com.android.settings has stopped" or "unfortunately, Settings has stopped" only opted to click ok then go to the home screen.
b. when entering the Gallery, only shows photos taken before i deleted the bloatware. all photos n videos taken after, don't show up at all. also all application that uses the Gallery, like Camera & whatsapp, only show those files taken before "it" happens.
c. from the titanium backup app, it only shows only 10 or less application (actually it shoud be more than 30 i guess if i look on the titanium backup folder using x-plore file manager app for android)
d. if i connect it to pc, the htc sync app says no HTC device detected (it's detected before). on windows explorer, the phone is detected but i can only view files before i deleted the bloatware, and i can't do any file copy paste to the phone's internal memory.
it can be noted that, all files exist after i deleted the bloatware (photos, videos, file document like excel word pdf that i downloaded) are shown with Quickpic app, android file manager app like x-plore, astro, ES file explorer and i can delete, copy or move all the files within the phone's internal memory.
Can anyone help please, especially the second point, because now i can't backed up my phone to PC and can't added files for example copying Papago's files for navigation that i have downloaded via PC. i need to back it up so i can delete those files in the phone memory so i can have more space for taken any new photos videos or document.
thanks before.
Regards,

[Q] 4.1.2 --- video / image files, thumbnail and cache

Hi
I will be passing on my company phone for someone else to use for couple of weeks, and I am having some privacy concerns about it. I have already transferred all images/videos from the phone's ext SD card, but now I am worried of how I can securely erase the data. I don't wanna buy a new SD card just for this, so I was wondering if there is any way to safely erase/destroy those data.
For starters, I got my self 'secure file deletion' from play store, which allows to wipe off selected data off the phone memory and the external card. Which I did. Images/videos are stored under:
/storage/extSdCard/DCIM/Camera
But after wiping those off, I realised that not all image/video data is cleaned off. The OS also stores thumbnails for those media. Surprisingly, those are stored in phone memory and location can't be changed:
/storage/sdcard0/DCIM/.thumbnails
In there, there are .JPGs (thumbnails) and a strange '.thumbdataXXXX' file. So, I use 'secure file deletion' to remove those as well. Funny thing is that even after erasing those, I can still see the thumbnails of the corresponding video/image (but when I select it, it says 'file not found' - which is expected, because its already been wiped). Nevertheless, my guess is that the thumbnails of those videos/images are also cached elsewhere. But where?
My question is - is that all there is to it? Is the OS storing any more related data in regard to images/videos that I need to wipe? Are those actions I have taken enough to give me peace of mind that my media are safely wiped off beyond recovery?
I found that the secure deletion apps are very few, most of them require root and most even don't work properly (e.g. files reappearing after wipe etc). There are some good ones like 'ishredder 3 pro' and 'clean master' that offer secure wipe options - but only for wiping off entire phone/card memory - which is not what I want here. Any more suggestions?
The phone is a non-rooted Samsung with 4.1.2 Android OS on it. I don't wanna root the phone and I don't want to wipe entire ext card - so any suggestions, please bear that in mind.
Makes me wondering why there isn't any build-in function to the OS for secure deletion of files? Sure it would be slower and not everyone would applaud it, but it could be enabled on demand e.g. via Developer Options...
ta!
I have also noticed, that ever since I started using 'secure file deletion', when I connect via USB to copy files from the extSD to the PC, I get "device not connected" errors every few files I copy. Then, I have to use 'enable usb debugging' (from Dev Options) in order to get the device to show up again.
Any thoughts on my initial queries will be most appreciated. Someone must have noticed those issues. Perhaps they are not specific to 4.1.2 but maybe other versions of the OS...
jstoner said:
Funny thing is that even after erasing those, I can still see the thumbnails of the corresponding video/image (but when I select it, it says 'file not found' - which is expected, because its already been wiped)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just another observation regarding this. If I go into File Manager and nagivate to "/storage/extSdCard/DCIM/Camera" and then go back to Gallery, then the thumbs of videos that are already deleted don't show up. That's a workaround for refreshing the cache (without having to do a full restart).
Anyone noticed those issues, or is it just me???

Problem with phone storage access after recovery reinstall

My phone is a (cheap) Wiko Ozzy. I know it's not the greatest machine ever but it does the job for my mobile needs (being able to quick search the internet everywhere and communications), it was only 80€ new and it comes with no bloatware but google's. Also to root it a simple framaroot run does the job.
I have the phone customized alot, many xposed tweaks, automate, nova laucher, gravity box. The rom is the stock 4.2.2
One day I was messing up with android tweaker 2 and changed the dalvik heap size. When I reboot it the did not boot... It had that vibration key feedback problem. lol....
I went into recovery mode and made a backup... Yes, I did not had one and made it after the boot problem.
For my luck Wiko has a website with the roms they put on phones for download. With a simple program you can reinstall the rom very easily. I did it and my phone booted. I then tried to restore the backup I had previously done and for my surprise it boot with all my customizations but root access and busybox that I had to reinstall.
So what is the problem you ask?
Well I lost access to the phone storage and now It says Im out of space when I try to install apps
I used to have SDcard, Internal Storage and Phone Storage.
And I used to have the option to default install on sdcard and phone storage. The phone storage option disappeared but on the bottom of the page there is a mount option for it that just wont work.
I also tried to access it on windows and even after formatting the phone storage drive (windows was prompting for it and since the phone worked all fine without access to it I did it) the problem persisted...
Can you help me please?
I wanted to make the apps install on phone storage without having to make a real factory reset so I dont end without all my tweaks...
No one have any ideas?
I dont know what more can I add...
The phone is working fine... the only thing missing is one of the three partitions I had before the reinstall...
The weirdest to me is that in the storage settings I have the option to mount the "Phone Storage" but it fails.
I click it and the bars for type of files appears and disappears a few seconds later with the notification: you can safely remove phone storage....
Now I cant even install Adobe Air to try .swf viewer because it says it is out of space... It's like it ignores the sdcard default install option (the only one I have now and that is selected).

I tried to encrypt a rooted Z2 (D6503), but it just reset my system

I clicked "encrypt", then I left it to work. But it must have done something else while I was away.
When I returned to it, it had a new standard installation, un-encrypted, un-rooted.
It asked me for a Google account and other first time setups, then it synced with a 4 day backup that must have been downloaded from my Google account, which installed all the apps that I had before, but none of their user data.
Because in the past I lacked enough free space on the internal disk, I must have moved app settings to the sdcard. Maybe this is why they weren't saved and restored automatically?
My main issue is that I lost all my Google Authenticator tokens, and on the sdcard I can't find this directory: /Android/data/com.google.android.apps.authenticator
I also tried installing on my Windows all kind of undelete tools for smartphones, but most of them fail to even see the internal storage when I connect the Z2 through USB. The one that worked great for the sdcard didn't find the directory that I was looking for.
Please help. What the hell happened? Do I have any chance of recovering my Google Authenticator tokens?

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