Keeping your storage clean - Droid Incredible Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Do any of y'all do anything to keep your internal and external storage nice and tidy?
I go in there thru my PC and delete folders and files I don't use. Sometimes they are loaded down with cache files and whatnot, and it can be thousands of them! I have found that it takes a while to process (delete) those thousands of files through my PC, so who knows what they can do to the little Snapdragon.
I have also used CCleaner to wipe the free space on both the internal and SD storage as well. I thought maybe I felt a difference, but who knows if it was placebo or what. I figured they would benefit from a nice clean slate as far as blank space goes, as well as help the nandroid backup process.
Anyone else do anything or have advice on maintaining our storage so that it is responsive and reliable?

DustinBooyah said:
Do any of y'all do anything to keep your internal and external storage nice and tidy?
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I have used the market app "SD Maid" before. It might be something to look into.
DustinBooyah said:
I figured they would benefit from a nice clean slate as far as blank space goes, as well as help the nandroid backup process
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I doubt this helps the nandroid process at all. I don't think SD or EMMC contents get backed up by a nandroid (I could be wrong though)

I clear usless stuff off of my storage on a regular basis, just for my own sanity and ease of finding stuff. The emmc is not to bad at gathering garbage but the sd is full of it every time i look. There is always burstlyimagecache folders and folders left behind by apps i have uninstalled. I usually just copy the stuff i want / need to my pc and then format it fat32, and then copy the good files back. Sometimes im lazy though and i will just use the multiselect option in root explorer, and go on a deleting spree. I use sdmaid although im not sure why they named it that, as it hardly touches the sdcard at all. It mostly clears app caches which some are on the sd but most are on the /data partirion. Cleaning up the storage wont affect nandroids as they are not backed up. However having a cleaner sd with more space can make I/O times faster therfore very slightly speeding up the nandroid writing to the sd.

Related

I switched to Apps2SD. My internal storage is still only 200MB. Why? How do I lower?

Am I supposed to go back and erase all of my apps from internal storage after they are moved to the SD card? If so, how?
I just don't understand why I only have 200MB out of 1GB available. All of my apps are on the SD card now.
What do I need to delete out of the internal memory?
Any help is MUCHO appreciated.
tia
You don't actually have 1GB of usable storage space by default. It's split into partitions, and the user storage is only ~512MB or less (I can't remember how I saw what the internal storage was split up as...)
"ONLY 200MB"
How much do you need?
I get your point. You get the point of my questions though, right?
If you have a fast SD card, you can move the dalvik cache to the SD card and free up another 60 megs or so.
You'll never see most of that gigabyte on your phone. Ever. I think the maximum you're allowed for apps on the internal flash storage is 350 megabytes. Even with Apps2SD, I think the dalvik cache for all of your apps is still stored on the internal memory, which would occupy some space.
I don't know what the heck I'm doing is the problem. Once I figure it out, I'll post some stats for new guys like me.
I've formatted my card correctly. Now I'm just trying to figure out if I'm supposed to wipe my system and reinstall in order for the apps to get "moved over" or not. I'm curious as to whether My Backup Pro or Titanium will "restore" the apps to the SD card now that I'm formatted correctly.
I believe the "moving" is not really moving it happens on install. So yes starting fresh is probably the best way to go.
There is only like 350mb or so of user installable space. Depending on rom it could go up a little but its close.
Also remember, not every single portion of the app gets installed on the SD. Some files still need to be stored on nand, just less. Much less depending on the app.
Just make sure you have a decently fast sd card if you want to move dalvik there. class 6 or better imo. It will work with a slower card but it could slow things down.
Froyo requires ext4 partition btw. Not sure what rom your using.
^^ Thanks for the info. I'm using Fresh 1.0.1, which is good because I don't even know how to make Ext4. I'm using Amon RA to partition and the only upgrade option was from 2 to 3. I didn't see anything about 4.
I'll wipe clean and see what happens.
Oh, one more thing that your post made me think of. The whole reason that I'm doing this is so that I don't have to re-install apps every time I wipe and install a new ROM. I figured that the new ROMs would just find my apps on my SD card.
If this isn't the case then it is not worth it to me. Meaning, if I still have to re-install all apps each time I wipe the device there is no benefit to me.
So: is that the case? Do new ROMs just "find" the apps on the SD card?
Aridon said:
I believe the "moving" is not really moving it happens on install. So yes starting fresh is probably the best way to go.
There is only like 350mb or so of user installable space. Depending on rom it could go up a little but its close.
Also remember, not every single portion of the app gets installed on the SD. Some files still need to be stored on nand, just less. Much less depending on the app.
Just make sure you have a decently fast sd card if you want to move dalvik there. class 6 or better imo. It will work with a slower card but it could slow things down.
Froyo requires ext4 partition btw. Not sure what rom your using.
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[Q] Getting rid of junk on SD, will this work?

I recently backed up my sd card and noticed that there is just a hell of a lot of crap there I would love to get rid of as much as I can because I am sure my nearly filled 16gb card would benefit from several gigs of extra space.
Anyway, here is what want to do. Copy the folders involved with clockwork (or nandroid) bapckup. After all the important files are safely backed up, format the card and copy the backup files back to the phone. Then just do a simple restore and the SD card SHOULD be as pristine as possible with my apps restored. I am basing this purely on assumption, but it seems to make sense.
If I am going under the proper assumptions and this will work, are there any pitfalls I should be ready for? What folders am I looking for? Just the clockwork folder? Do I need to get any of the system folders like .android-secure or any of those important looking ones?
Thanks for the help.
stinkbud said:
I recently backed up my sd card and noticed that there is just a hell of a lot of crap there I would love to get rid of as much as I can because I am sure my nearly filled 16gb card would benefit from several gigs of extra space.
Anyway, here is what want to do. Copy the folders involved with clockwork (or nandroid) bapckup. After all the important files are safely backed up, format the card and copy the backup files back to the phone. Then just do a simple restore and the SD card SHOULD be as pristine as possible with my apps restored. I am basing this purely on assumption, but it seems to make sense.
If I am going under the proper assumptions and this will work, are there any pitfalls I should be ready for? What folders am I looking for? Just the clockwork folder? Do I need to get any of the system folders like .android-secure or any of those important looking ones?
Thanks for the help.
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I have done the exact thing several times when partitioning my SD card. Should work fine.
Well, I'd dump CWM for Amon Ra, first, then copy your files to your computer, like you said.
Then use the format option in Settings to format your card, reboot, and you'll have just the needed files on there.
Then copy back the stuff you know you need.

[TIP] How to regain [possible a lot of] internal storage

I tried something tonight and I think discovered a great way to regain internal storage. I had about 1gb left internally and I couldn't figure our what was taking up so much data because it didnt seem like even my largest apps added up to what I was using. The steps reclaimed 7.5gb of space. Thats a lot of "unknown" data if you ask me.
WARNING: THIS WILL ERASE EVERYTHING ON YOUR INTERNAL STORAGE. Make sure photos, music, downloads, etc. are backed up elsewhere first. (I.e. I had to go into this knowing I would lose all of my Spotify music.)
1) Make a titanium backup of everything just in case something goes wrong with step 2.
2) Reboot into recovery and make a nandroid backup that you SAVE TO EXTERNAL SD Card.
3) Wipe data. I know on TWRP it will show a red triangle and remind you you don't really have to do this. Go forth boldly knowing you have a nandroid.
4) restore your nandroid.
5) reboot and see how much more internal data you have now (share here if it worked.
If anyone smarter than me at android (who are many) and can offer additional input on this, please feel obliged. I can honestly say this worked for me and my phone works just perfectly (and looks thinner doing it )
Sent from my SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
I also apologize if this is the oldest trick in the book and I have only just discovered it. But, I know I'm no the only one still figuring out android.
Sent from my SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
I think that wipe removes everything from your internal SD card.
And I could be wrong, but I don't think restoring a nandroid will restore EVERYTHING that was on your SD card. Like pictures, music, etc.
So I'd probably suggest backing up the entire SD card contents as well.
Or another option is to use SD Maid to wipe all your old, unused cache/etc. It's safer and won't remove anything you would have wanted to keep.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/...en.sdm&feature=nav_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwyLDNd
Here is the "Pro" version unlocker. I bought it and like it a lot for cleaning up ROM's of old junk.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/...SwxLDEsImV1LnRoZWRhcmtlbi5zZG0udW5sb2NrZXIiXQ..
Dumb question: you need to save your nandroid to your EXTERNAL SD card for this to work right? Otherwise it will wipe your nandroid too?
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app
sgp77 said:
Dumb question: you need to save your nandroid to your EXTERNAL SD card for this to work right? Otherwise it will wipe your nandroid too?
Sent from my SGH-I747 using xda app-developers app
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Most definitely. I'll add that to original post.
Sent from my SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
CZ Eddie said:
I think that wipe removes everything from your internal SD card.
And I could be wrong, but I don't think restoring a nandroid will restore EVERYTHING that was on your SD card. Like pictures, music, etc.
So I'd probably suggest backing up the entire SD card contents as well.
Or another option is to use SD Maid to wipe all your old, unused cache/etc. It's safer and won't remove anything you would have wanted to keep.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/...en.sdm&feature=nav_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwyLDNd
Here is the "Pro" version unlocker. I bought it and like it a lot for cleaning up ROM's of old junk.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/...SwxLDEsImV1LnRoZWRhcmtlbi5zZG0udW5sb2NrZXIiXQ..
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Click to collapse
I've used SD Maid (Pro) and it does give some "relief" to storage. However, I've still not achieved nearly the results I have with this method. Also, you have to select each cleaning method one at a time and it can take a while to process results. It's definitely a great option for folks afraid to take this plunge
Thank you for pointing out about the pics and storage. I'll add a warning to rhe OP. I keep all that stuff on my external card (as most probably do), so I didn't think about it. The Downloads folder is something people might want to back up as well.
Sent from my SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
natefish said:
I tried something tonight and I think discovered a great way to regain internal storage. I had about 1gb left internally and I couldn't figure our what was taking up so much data because it didnt seem like even my largest apps added up to what I was using. The steps reclaimed 7.5gb of space. Thats a lot of "unknown" data if you ask me.
WARNING: THIS WILL ERASE EVERYTHING ON YOUR INTERNAL STORAGE. Make sure photos, music, downloads, etc. are backed up elsewhere first. (I.e. I had to go into this knowing I would lose all of my Spotify music.)
1) Make a titanium backup of everything just in case something goes wrong with step 2.
2) Reboot into recovery and make a nandroid backup that you SAVE TO EXTERNAL SD Card.
3) Wipe data. I know on TWRP it will show a red triangle and remind you you don't really have to do this. Go forth boldly knowing you have a nandroid.
4) restore your nandroid.
5) reboot and see how much more internal data you have now (share here if it worked.
If anyone smarter than me at android (who are many) and can offer additional input on this, please feel obliged. I can honestly say this worked for me and my phone works just perfectly (and looks thinner doing it )
Sent from my SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2
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Click to collapse
So just so you know, what you have done here is delete all of your data. Titanium backup only backs up the actual APK and installer data. Any larger games like ones from gameloft and allot of others will now need to download their resources again so once you play those games the space will be taken up again.
whoamanwtf said:
So just so you know, what you have done here is delete all of your data. Titanium backup only backs up the actual APK and installer data. Any larger games like ones from gameloft and allot of others will now need to download their resources again so once you play those games the space will be taken up again.
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Click to collapse
That's a valid point, to an extent. I did not have any games like that installed when I did this and went from 1gb free to 8.5. I gave up playing games like that on my phone because 1) I have an iPad and 2) 16gb is not enough room for that stuff. There is an app (think it's called GL to SD) that will put the extra data those games download onto your external sd card. The biggest thing I lost is Spotify, but I don't mind resyncing that app if it means I just made a heck of a lot more room for more music.
I'm not a developer and I'm not an expert at Android by any means. I do know, however, that my phone runs perfectly fine after this experiment. I think all OS's do this memory cluttering to an extent. I know Windows does and I remember my iPhone doing it as well. I used to restore once in a while just for this reason. So, I don't pretend to know all the reasons, but I can speak from multiple experiences.
whoamanwtf said:
So just so you know, what you have done here is delete all of your data. Titanium backup only backs up the actual APK and installer data. Any larger games like ones from gameloft and allot of others will now need to download their resources again so once you play those games the space will be taken up again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The paid version of Titanium is very powerful. There are settings you can adjust. An odd game I enjoy is paradise Island. I have moved it from an HD2 to a pos gb G2x and on to the GS3. You need a large sdsc card.
Just wanted to confirm that I had the same issue and used a similar process to regain my internal storage. In my case, I had deleted a large amount of files (~7gb's) and never gained the space back in available internal storage.. So I went into recovery (I'm using TWRP) and wiped internal storage, system, data, cache.. Then just installed a fresh rom (stored on my ext sd), bingo, everything seems to be perfect again.
+1 for titanium pro, this helps me keep my storage in check
Or, you download Disk Usage from the app store, run it and delete the largest folders which are typically TWRP or CWM backups....thus saving all of your other data.
And everyone that does this will gain back all of their storage, because they will be completely wiping their internal storage.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda premium
I think I figured out one of the problems
Facebook and google both "sync" their galleries with my phone. thus putting upto 9 gigs of pictures onto my internal storage, without anyway of removing them (so it seems???) I can't disable them in the gallery, and I can't find their physical existence in "my files"
Is there anyway to remove them if they've accidentally synced??
although currently it's too late as I just did a wipe to my phone, deselecting those options I figured I would pose the question and hopefully give someone some food for thought.
EDIT: I also assume this is the same with any other account based app that syncs large file directories. (maybe twitter?)

Internal memory folders changed after J.B Kies update?

Hi I have been dealing with this problem for awhile now and still haven't been able to find a fix (without rooting). After I updated JB from Kies when it came out my internal and memory card folders are completely different? Also it says I only have 11.95GB total in my internal memory. The internal memory folder says :sdcard0. And my memory card folder is: extSdCard? I'm not rooted. Does anyone know how to get the folders back to the regular names ext sd ect? Any help would be appreciated, thanks.
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RPK925 said:
Hi I have been dealing with this problem for awhile now and still haven't been able to find a fix (without rooting). After I updated JB from Kies when it came out my internal and memory card folders are completely different? Also it says I only have 11.95GB total in my internal memory. The internal memory folder says :sdcard0. And my memory card folder is: extSdCard? I'm not rooted. Does anyone know how to get the folders back to the regular names ext sd ect? Any help would be appreciated, thanks.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda premium
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That is how it they are formatted now. It's not a mistake or anything being messed up. I guess I'm just used the internal being sdcard0 and ex sd card being extsdcard. I don't use myfiles much. I use root explorer and it can displays it as storage and then inside that folder is extsdcard and sdcard. Or there is a fodler just called sdcard for the internal in the root of the file system.
What problem is it creating, other than just being different than you are used to ?
hednik said:
That is how it they are formatted now. It's not a mistake or anything being messed up. I guess I'm just used the internal being sdcard0 and ex sd card being extsdcard. I don't use myfiles much. I use root explorer and it can displays it as storage and then inside that folder is extsdcard and sdcard. Or there is a fodler just called sdcard for the internal in the root of the file system.
What problem is it creating, other than just being different than you are used to ?
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Click to collapse
Yhea, i'm having some trouble too. After the update my extCard is totally mess-up. The folders with the pictures and songs are not recognized, and the Gallery doesn't show hundreds of pictures, but i see if i use a file manager. I've synced all my songs so far, but with the pictures is a mess: seems also the format is not recognized anymore and with Kies i'm not seeing a way for put the pictures in the new folder named "Photo". It's really frustrating.
hednik said:
That is how it they are formatted now. It's not a mistake or anything being messed up. I guess I'm just used the internal being sdcard0 and ex sd card being extsdcard. I don't use myfiles much. I use root explorer and it can displays it as storage and then inside that folder is extsdcard and sdcard. Or there is a fodler just called sdcard for the internal in the root of the file system.
What problem is it creating, other than just being different than you are used to ?
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Click to collapse
I cannot use the Apps2sd app anymore. And basically I would just like to be like before the update.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda premium
i'll try not to rant too hard but Kies and OTA firmware updates are a joke. you are essentially dirty flashing one rom over another with no real clearing of caches, no resetting, no way for all the programs to regroup, rebuild and run on the system hardware/software properly. the thing about dirty flashing is, it sticks well with some devices but generally not with many others. you'll see these types of issues many times among the avid flashers and those that must have the latest release of a developers rom.
i would recommend backing everything up, booting into stock recovery, wiping data/factory reset and wiping cache. if you decide to perform another update via kies in the future, i would do this procedure before AND after the update.
yes, you have to start over when you perform these sorts of actions but you have to ask yourself, are you happy with how your device is performing now (before the update)? is it worth starting over? (it might be if you're going to run on the updated OS for a year or so) and how well do you want it to perform after you install the update?
cheers
EDIT: i just assume everyone accesses recovery and download mode so i didnt post the button combo. recovery is: Volume Up + Home + Power. release just the power button when you get a vibrate.
RPK925 said:
Also it says I only have 11.95GB total in my internal memory.
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This is normal for a 16GB SGS3. 16GB is advertised but actual formatted available space is less. 11.95GB is right on par. This is the case for just about all devices that have memory that is writable, including hard drives on a computer.
RPK925 said:
I cannot use the Apps2sd app anymore. And basically I would just like to be like before the update.
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Click to collapse
Any particular reason why you are using Apps2sd? $10 to $20 will land you an external memory card with huge amounts of space (32GB at least). This is plenty to store music, photos, and other misc. files. And even with a ton of apps installed to internal, you still should have ample space left over. There is just no good reason to use Apps2sd on this phone as it has so much internal memory. If this is just to keep you from losing data, then I would suggest rooting and using an app such as Titanium Backup as it makes it super easy to restore apps and the corresponding data after anything that requires a factory reset.
simonMac777 said:
Yhea, i'm having some trouble too. After the update my extCard is totally mess-up. The folders with the pictures and songs are not recognized, and the Gallery doesn't show hundreds of pictures, but i see if i use a file manager. I've synced all my songs so far, but with the pictures is a mess: seems also the format is not recognized anymore and with Kies i'm not seeing a way for put the pictures in the new folder named "Photo". It's really frustrating.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As stated by xBeerDroidx, factory reset from stock recovery. You will have to re-setup your device but it will be a one time frustration for now until the next update.
As stated by xBeerDroidx, factory reset from stock recovery. You will have to re-setup your device but it will be a one time frustration for now until the next update.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually i did.
After the update, without factory reset, everything was (almost) fine… except a strange malfunction of the Gps (lock signal lost after a while) and sporadic reboot without reason. For the Gps I’ve found here the solution (NV Rebuild), but for the reboot… I wasn’t sure about it. So I decided for a factory reset. After that my ext card, with the ICS paths, was not recognized. So bucked up everything, format the ext card and let Kies sync my files and create all the folders needed from JB: Camera Photo Video for pictures, and media for the music. Now I’m let’s say 90% ready to go… I’m curios to test especially the Gps.

Accidentally deleted emulated 0 folder.

Whilst clearing out my internal SD on my PC I accidentally deleted both of the 'Storage' folders. Doing so has completely wiped my internal and external SD and obviously these includes a huge amount of memories in terms of photos/videos and I'd really like to retrieve them.
Is it possible? If so, how?
I doubt it. Do you have a nandroid you can restore? You could probably even try only restoring System, so you still have the up to date data.
Literally deleted my 2 nandroids before I accidentally deleted the bloody storage folder. Found an app called 'Undelete' - Currently restoring almost 25,000 files to my SD then I'm gonna have to go through them and delete the corrupted ones.
Great way to spend my 2nd last day of 2014.
CurtisAndroid5 said:
Literally deleted my 2 nandroids before I accidentally deleted the bloody storage folder. Found an app called 'Undelete' - Currently restoring almost 25,000 files to my SD then I'm gonna have to go through them and delete the corrupted ones.
Great way to spend my 2nd last day of 2014.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good luck, I hope you get what you need back. Hopefully it's as painless as possible.
Did you succeed in recovering the data after deleting the Emulated 0 folder.....
If yes let me know, even am in search for the way to recover the data....
thanks in advance.
I did the same thing, what you did is the equivalent of selecting all files on your sdcard0 and sdcard1 (internal and external storage) and deleting them. Are they fully recoverable? Maybe if you didn't write anything to the storages, you could try Recuva but I believe there isn't a way to "magically" make the files appear again, because that;s not what you want if you'd delete a file or is it?
sprremix said:
I did the same thing, what you did is the equivalent of selecting all files on your sdcard0 and sdcard1 (internal and external storage) and deleting them. Are they fully recoverable? Maybe if you didn't write anything to the storages, you could try Recuva but I believe there isn't a way to "magically" make the files appear again, because that;s not what you want if you'd delete a file or is it?
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Click to collapse
When i connect my mobile it list as portable device with out a drive letter. Recuva will list only the drives listed and Portable device is not getting listed. Is there any solution to list as a removable disc instead of portable device.

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