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I am running out of room on internal storage.

I hope someone can help me. I have a 16 gig GS3. When I plug it in to the computer It says I have 1.5gb free out of 11.9gb. This is after I deleted all but the rom I am using and most of my backups. I've tried using directorybind to move some apps but shadowgun was the only big one I had and I just deleted it. Also, if I check the properties on all the files in the sd card it comes to 8.5gb. That leaves 2gb of unseen files. If that is the OS then why do I only have 11.9gb available. I am kindof wondering if I am making a new partition everytime I flash one of these wonderful roms peope are making. Does anybody know how I can free up some space on here. I'm not storing anything on there and it wont be long before I have no room what so ever.

Nate Rules said:
This is after I deleted all but the rom I am using and most of my backups.
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What recovery are you using? How exactly did you delete most of your backups?
If you're using some version of CWM 6, it stores the meat of your backup in the /sdcard/clockworkmod/blobs directory. If you delete the backups in the backup folder, the blobs it references won't be deleted. Reboot into recovery, backup and restore, and free up nandroid space. That will delete any blobs that aren't associated with a backup. See if that gets you your space back.
Oh, and never delete stuff in the blobs folder, at least not if you expect your backups to work.

lazarus2405 said:
What recovery are you using? How exactly did you delete most of your backups?
If you're using some version of CWM 6, it stores the meat of your backup in the /sdcard/clockworkmod/blobs directory. If you delete the backups in the backup folder, the blobs it references won't be deleted. Reboot into recovery, backup and restore, and free up nandroid space. That will delete any blobs that aren't associated with a backup. See if that gets you your space back.
Oh, and never delete stuff in the blobs folder, at least not if you expect your backups to work.
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Ok, before I do this, let me make sure I understand you completely. I don't think I have done any restoring. So are all my backups stored in the blob? And a backup and a restore will take it down to one backup? Do I delete the blob and then do a new backup? I'm pretty sure this is my problem, because I was wondering why my backups were only about 20 megs.

lazarus2405 said:
What recovery are you using? How exactly did you delete most of your backups?
If you're using some version of CWM 6, it stores the meat of your backup in the /sdcard/clockworkmod/blobs directory. If you delete the backups in the backup folder, the blobs it references won't be deleted. Reboot into recovery, backup and restore, and free up nandroid space. That will delete any blobs that aren't associated with a backup. See if that gets you your space back.
Oh, and never delete stuff in the blobs folder, at least not if you expect your backups to work.
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Click to collapse
Sorry Lazarus, I reread your post and realized that free up nandroid space must be an option. I did it and it cleared up 3gb of space. So I have some breathing room. But that still leaves 7gb of stuff on my internal sdcard. Seems like alot when I am trying to minimize stuff on there. Also, I still feel like my partition is shrinking. I am pretty sure there was at least 13gb there a couple weeks ago and now there is 11.9gb.

Nate Rules said:
Ok, before I do this, let me make sure I understand you completely. I don't think I have done any restoring. So are all my backups stored in the blob? And a backup and a restore will take it down to one backup? Do I delete the blob and then do a new backup? I'm pretty sure this is my problem, because I was wondering why my backups were only about 20 megs.
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Click to collapse
First, don't delete blobs. Bad stuff will happen.
When I said "reboot into recovery, backup and restore, and free up nandroid space", I meant in navigating the menus in CWR. When you get into recovery, select "Backup and Restore", then go to "Free Nandroid Space". If you already deleted the 20mb backup files you don't need, selecting that option will free the rest of the space. Also, any time you make a new backup, CWR will try to do the same thing before starting the backup. This way, you can selectively keep the backups you need and discard the ones you don't.
Again, don't delete any blobs and expect your backups to work. If for some reason you wanted to get rid of all your backups, you could delete the entire clockworkmod folder, and CWR will remake any directories it needs when you make your next backup. The downside of freeing space this way is you'd loose all of your backups, of course.
The reason this changed in CWM6 is to save space. Instead of backing up whole partitions in one huge file, it backs up each individual file into the blobs folder. If you back up often and much doesn't change much in between backups, CWR will only make another copy of files that actually changed. Smart, eh?

Backing up CWM6 backups

I have CWM 6.0.1.0 as my recovery and I have a good number of backups saved on my sdcard spanning a number of different roms (mostly cm10 official nightlies). I understand that the newer CWM backs up roms using a different method than before. When I look in my Clockworkmod directory on the sdcard, I see a BLOBS folder and a BACKUP folder. The latter contains the backups, but they are very small in size. So do I understand correctly that the bulk of the backup information is in the BLOBS folder?
Assuming that's true, how do we safely:
1) Delete individual backup? If I delete a backup from the BACKUP folder, how will it know what to delete from the BLOBS folder? Do we have to actually delete the backup from within recovery in order for it to delete the proper BLOBS info? Or can I delete an individual backup from the BACKUP folder from Root Explorer? If I do that, won't the BLOBS folder continue to grow in size with outdated information?
2) Back up the CWM backups to my PC? I assume I have to back up the entire BLOBS folder to my PC, right? And then I can just back up individual backups from the BACKUP folder, right? But I would need BOTH the individual backup and the entire BLOBS folder back on my phone to restore a backup, right? If so, then I revert back to question 1 and ask how to I pare down the BLOBS folder without messing up individual backups?
Thanks!

You can delete backups from Rom Manager or if using the newest version of cwm you can delete it from recovery. As far as backing it up. I just deleted all but the one(s) wanted and copy the cwm folder to my computer. Hope that helps.

ren274u said:
You can delete backups from Rom Manager or if using the newest version of cwm you can delete it from recovery. As far as backing it up. I just deleted all but the one(s) wanted and copy the cwm folder to my computer. Hope that helps.
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Click to collapse
So we have to delete old backups using Rom Manger or from within Recovery? I delete some of them from Root Explorer, so does that mean the Blogs info will still retain old data. Or will it know to clear that space simply because the old backup files are missing?

Travisimo said:
So we have to delete old backups using Rom Manger or from within Recovery? I delete some of them from Root Explorer, so does that mean the Blogs info will still retain old data. Or will it know to clear that space simply because the old backup files are missing?
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Click to collapse
I'm not sure how the blog info works. I just assumed if you delete from cwm it knows whats the data incorporated with the specific backup and it deletes it with it.

Wow, I tried copying the Clockworkmod folder to my PC via USB and it took over an hour just to index and then it just stopped and failed. I imagine because there are so many individual files in the Blobs folder that it causes Windows indexing to crash. I deleted all the old backups I didn't need, did the free up space thing in CWM and it's still impossible to copy to my PC. I have 3 backups left (from different roms), so I supposed the Blobs folder is going to be pretty large.
So I can see how this backup method works out good on the phone itself because it makes backups easier and faster. But trying to back them up to PC is ridiculous. The old way where I could just copy over an individual backup was much easier.
Isn't there a better way? Someone suggested zipping the Blobs folder up on the device first and then copying to PC, but zipping the Blobs folder is taking forever as well...

Extract CWM nandroid backup

Hey all,
I used CWM to make a nandroid backup. I am trying to extract data from it specifically the sdcard/DCIM where all my pictures are. I tried to just perform a restore of the nandroid backup but it fails the md5 checksum. Been there done that, got the t-shirt and I just can't fix the md5 checksum. So my next option is to just extract the sdcard/DCIM from the nandroid backup. I looked in system.ext4.tar and its not in there. Also checked data.ext4.tar and its not in there. Only other place it could be is in boot.img or recovery.img. Let me know if I am wrong about this! Anyways, I tried using unyaffs.exe and the command code "unyaffs.exe recovery.img" to extract and I get a "bad image file" error. I tried with all my backups even the ones I know work and they all give me the error so all my backups can't be bad so something either I am doing wrong or unyaffs.exe does not support newer versions of .img?
As of right now I am out of options. Does anyone have any ideas as to how I can extract/recover my sdcard/DCIM folder from my CWM nandroid backup?
Thanks!

JDubbed said:
Hey all,
I used CWM to make a nandroid backup. I am trying to extract data from it specifically the sdcard/DCIM where all my pictures are. I tried to just perform a restore of the nandroid backup but it fails the md5 checksum. Been there done that, got the t-shirt and I just can't fix the md5 checksum. So my next option is to just extract the sdcard/DCIM from the nandroid backup. I looked in system.ext4.tar and its not in there. Also checked data.ext4.tar and its not in there. Only other place it could be is in boot.img or recovery.img. Let me know if I am wrong about this! Anyways, I tried using unyaffs.exe and the command code "unyaffs.exe recovery.img" to extract and I get a "bad image file" error. I tried with all my backups even the ones I know work and they all give me the error so all my backups can't be bad so something either I am doing wrong or unyaffs.exe does not support newer versions of .img?
As of right now I am out of options. Does anyone have any ideas as to how I can extract/recover my sdcard/DCIM folder from my CWM nandroid backup?
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A nandroid backup will never have your internal data backed up in it. It backs up your system and the data incorperated with apps and and all that stuff. Pictures, music, video, etc. does NOT get backed up every time you do a backup (thank God!). That stuff is ALWAYS still there unless you do a wipe data/factory reset on the phone. I'm sure someone else will chime in here but I'm almost 100% positive I'm right. If you are looking for your pictures just boot your phone and hook it up USB to your computer. Open up the drive on your computer and look in the DCIM folder, your pics will all be there.

copene said:
A nandroid backup will never have your internal data backed up in it. It backs up your system and the data incorperated with apps and and all that stuff. Pictures, music, video, etc. does NOT get backed up every time you do a backup (thank God!). That stuff is ALWAYS still there unless you do a wipe data/factory reset on the phone. I'm sure someone else will chime in here but I'm almost 100% positive I'm right. If you are looking for your pictures just boot your phone and hook it up USB to your computer. Open up the drive on your computer and look in the DCIM folder, your pics will all be there.
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Click to collapse
Thanks for that. Unfortunately my phone came back from Samsung after a storm fried my phone and they wiped my phone crystal clean. I thought that was one of the points of a nandroid backup was that it also backed up or at least gave you the option of backing up your personal files like music, pictures and so forth. I was under the impression this whole time that my files were safe in my nandroid backups now I cannot believe all my irreplaceable pictures are gone. Years of pictures lost. Maybe a recovery software could bring it back?

Nope they gone bro let it go if it fried the phone and SD card
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using Tapatalk 2

Suggestion...
From here on out... I would install Google+ and instant upload that stuff or PicasaTool or something... That is what I do... I have them set as private unless I want to share it. It's the best form of picture backup, unless you plug your phone into your computer on a daily basis and transfer them...
I would go for the instant upload method in the future... does pics and videos....
Sorry man... they are gone...Factory doesn't mess with that stuff... If your phone got fried, its a different board inside and the internal SD is on the "motherboard" of the phone...

It also doesnt hurt to just backup your memory card(s) files to your pc every so often, via good 'ol fashioned drag and drop.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using xda premium

onealvideo said:
From here on out... I would install Google+ and instant upload that stuff or PicasaTool or something... That is what I do... I have them set as private unless I want to share it. It's the best form of picture backup, unless you plug your phone into your computer on a daily basis and transfer them...
I would go for the instant upload method in the future... does pics and videos....
Sorry man... they are gone...Factory doesn't mess with that stuff... If your phone got fried, its a different board inside and the internal SD is on the "motherboard" of the phone...
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Click to collapse
Yes. Another option is Dropbox, which you can also set to automatically upload pictures. Then, they sync with the Dropbox folder on your desktop.
If nanbackup backed up your SD card every time, people would run out of space in no time. Especially if you keep more than one backup handy. This is why I would encourage OP to use an external SD and be sure to physically take it out of the phone before wiping, flashing, anything like that. Multiple redundant backups, bro.

Thanks for the replies. Yeah I am just going to let it go. Probably a new internal SD card anyways like suggested. I still think there should at least be an OPTION in CWM to backup full internal SD card and make it default no. I have a 32GB card and having 1 to 2 concurrent FULL SD and nandroid backups wouldn't dent it. But it is what it is.
Since I want everything backed up not just pictures and videos I think the infamous old fashion drag and drop method is the best option. I'll store the data on my PC HDD or something for safe keeping.
If anyone discovers an app that not only backs up nandroid but complete internal SD or selectable internal SD folders as well please post it here. Between Titanium Backup and CWM it still does not backup everything. Maybe a 3rd app is needed to cover my ass with internal SD data or an all-in-one backup tool is yet to be created.
:good:

If you ask sk8tr I am sure he would try to integrate it....
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using xda app-developers app

[Q] Late stage backup

Having never gotten the rom I was using 100% working I, stupidly, did not set up a full backup. Long story short, things went sour, I can't boot into my rom and I'm hoping I can get some backup help.
What I've done:
Tried everything I can think of to get the rom working
Copied the sd card to my pc
What I would like to do:
Somehow get my installed apps (and hopefully app settings) copied back onto a clean install of the same rom.
There is not enough room to do a nandroid backup 2g free. Is there anything else I can do/can I use the copied sd card as part of a restore?
Thanks.

You can do a nandroid of /data in recovery. But if the problem is in that partition, restoring it will just put you back where you are now.

Does a /data backup do everything I need? I assumed android_secure was required and that's a whole 3 GBs too big.

android_secure is where the apps are stored when you move them to your sdcard. But if you can't back that up, it's academic. /data might save some of your app settings and files.

iElvis said:
android_secure is where the apps are stored when you move them to your sdcard. But if you can't back that up, it's academic. /data might save some of your app settings and files.
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Just curious why there would be an android_secure if this phone has only internal storage?
Sent from my HTC One X using xda premium

bkmo said:
Just curious why there would be an android_secure if this phone has only internal storage?
Sent from my HTC One X using xda premium
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Because it partitions the storage (stupidly).
If I copy android secure, could I just put it back after a restore, or would that mess with things? Alternately, if there clear files I could delete to make room for the nandroid of android.secure I could do that. Nearly all of my apps are in there, meaning the data backup is a bandaid on a pretty huge cut.

took the plunge BUT

I backed up all the data I wanted to carry over on my PC EXCEPT of course my titanium backup apps.
Is there any way to explore a nandroid backup to find the SD (if it even backs up SD) so I can find my TB folder and paste it to my phone?
My phone did not push my apps from Google when booted and I hate having to manually reinstall them even though I dont have many

tevil said:
I backed up all the data I wanted to carry over on my PC EXCEPT of course my titanium backup apps.
Is there any way to explore a nandroid backup to find the SD (if it even backs up SD) so I can find my TB folder and paste it to my phone?
My phone did not push my apps from Google when booted and I hate having to manually reinstall them even though I dont have many
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Click to collapse
You can use TB to extract the apps and data directly from the nandroid.
Copy the nandroid back to your phone's backup location (/TWRP/backups/ or /clockworkmod/backup/)
In TB, press menu then it's near the bottom.

+1 works!
Menu > Extract from Nandroid backup...

thanks one more question
Its upgraded and rooted yet when I go into my folder structure I dont see TWRP folder. I Know twrp works cause its there and I ran a backup but the folder isnt there for me to put my old backup in there.
any tips?
thanks

Try here
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2938749

thanks but none of those are it. I can see a file called twrp but its not a folder. Maybe ill just try to create the folder myself and run another backup, wonder where the first one went.
can see see my sd fine and access everything else normally.
thanks

You'll need to wipe your storage probably. Read the thread. People have reported that issue.

rootSU said:
You'll need to wipe your storage probably. Read the thread. People have reported that issue.
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Click to collapse
Got it, luckily I never delte folders when creating new ones so oddly when I renamed the TWRP file that was supposedly a folder to "twrp2" it returned it to a folder status. I just renamed it back to "TWRP" and it works.
Alls good.
Hopefully maybe that might help someone else.

tevil said:
Got it, luckily I never delte folders when creating new ones so oddly when I renamed the TWRP file that was supposedly a folder to "twrp2" it returned it to a folder status. I just renamed it back to "TWRP" and it works.
Alls good.
Hopefully maybe that might help someone else.
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Click to collapse
Ha. Crazy

rootSU said:
Ha. Crazy
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Click to collapse
Update
You have to first run the
su
restorecon -FR /data/media/0
command THEN rename the folder. Just did this on my nexus 7