I'm not a developer by any stretch of the imagination, but this Linux cell phone has ignited my inner geek, and I must bend it to my will.
My basic question is, with the current state of development, how much is it possible to move from the internal storage of an LG Optimus Fuel phone (L34C/KitKat) and onto the external SD card?
I blow stuff up a lot because I'm an inveterate tinkerer, too adventurous for my own good/skill level. I'm an Android noob, but an old hand at Linux, which means I think I know a lot more about what I'm doing with KitKat than I actually do. But at least I do have a fetish for backups, which is all that makes my misadventures endurable.
So I did a Nandroid backup on my L34C after modding it only enough to support the TWRP backup. But the phone's internal storage is puny, and TWRP manager will only write to the internal SD, so I could only install about 300MB more in apps before there no longer was enough space for another Nandroid backup. Which means I've either got to tone down my tweaking (figure the odds!) or find another way to do Nandroids.
Yes, I could do an initial Nandroid, followed by Titanium backups, but where's the fun in that? Same with doing online Nandroid backups. No self-respecting geek every would let someone else be in charge of maintaining his backups (IMHO). And bonus points if I can relieve internal SD overcrowding by installing/moving apps and whatnot to the external storage.
So I'm thinking this is going to require linking, but the OE FAT32 partition on the external SD card won't support it. The OE 4GB SD card was too small to be slicing up, so I bought a 16GB cat4 SD card, formatted half in FAT32 and half in Ext3, but I could never get the Ext3 partition to mount. I wasn't able to find anything definitive, but I did come across information (of unknown validity) that the L34C's lack of init.d support was the reason it wouldn't mount.
So is this true? If I install a kernel with init.d support in my L34C, will I then be able to mount additional partition(s) on the external SD card?
As for the specifics of the partitioning, I found one mention in another forum in a post dated almost three years ago stating partitions on an Android external SD card had to be no more than 2GB in size, and preferably only 1GB. Is this true? Does it still pertain to KitKat? And what is/was the cause of this partition size limitation?
If the 2GB limit is true, what about creating and mounting multiple 2GB partitions? Say, one exclusively for writing the Nandroid backup to, and a second for moving files out of internal storage?
And what of my overall objective? In the current state of development, is writing Nandroid backups to the external SD card of an L34C (or even better, to the USB) known to be possible? Or im-possible?
If not, and presuming I can manage to get an Ext-formatted partition on the external SD card to mount, which of the many <something>2SD apps should I look to to move as much material as possible off of the internals storage?
I did try installing Link2SD, even though there wasn't an external partition available that supported linking. When I tried to move an app with it, one that Link2SD itself had labeled 'movable,' it failed with:
!Failure
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 the SD card.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Dunno why it's blaming Apps2SD unless Link2 is built around Apps2.
But the advice was no help because I can't link to a partition that won't mount. And for all I know, the fact that the L34C uses emulated storage might be a show-stopper.
I've asked these same questions at other Android forums, but got no answers. I initially didn't want to even join XDA because you guys are too far above my pay grade. But I don't think I have any other choice, not if I ever want to get to the bottom of this.
Thank you for taking the time to red my long-winded post.
Hi there,
What you may wish to do is transfer them to your pc for safe keeping and not have to worry about it. You could also try inserting your sd card into your PC and manually transferring the nandroids from your pc to your sd card afterwards.
Also regards to the sd card write protection issue, I could not find anything relevant for your device in particular but you can ask your question here and someone may be able to help you.
Good luck
Hello Everyone. I have a MOTO G 3rd Gen with a 32 GB Class 10 Sandisk sdcard. I originally posted this issue on the Lenovo Forum MOTO G 3rd Gen - Photo Recovery (can't post a direct link just yet), where they suggested that I look here for advice.
I originally used my sdcard for portable storage, although I had to periodically move my photos from internal storage to the sdcard, I was satisfied with the operation of my phone. However, as I added a few apps, I started to have some issues with running out of space in internal storage IIRC.
Earlier this year, it appears that I picked up a virus, which caused Chrome to always want to open to what seemed to be a malicious page (don't recall exactly what now). I decided to do a factory reset using the Settings option to return to a clean installation of Android. I decided at that time to configure the sdcard as extended internal storage, and the process appeared to work properly.
A few months later, I started getting messages informing me that an app update failed because I had run out out storage. After some investigation, it looked like most (all?) of my apps were continuing to use the built-in internal storage rather than the sdcard's extended storage. I tried uninstalling my apps an then reinstalling them - hoping that reinstalled apps would take up residence on my sdcard but they did not. However, it looked like I had uninstalled a few too many programs and my phone lost a lot of its functionality.
One of the functions that it lost was the ability to connect to my PC with the USB cord. Another was the ability for my google contacts to sync with the phone. Yesterday, I tried everything I could thing of to back up my data but I could not figure out how to get the USB to work properly. I decided that I would do another factory reset and removed the sdcard as I knew a reset would wipe all of my data. I removed my sdcard but the factory reset through Settings did not work this time and I instead had to do a hard factory reset. My phone is now working properly with a minimal number of installed apps.
When I reinstalled my sdcard, my phone does not recognize it and wants to format both as portable and internal storage. I was hoping that it would pick up where it left off.
As a last resort, I thought I might have to format my sd card and then try to recover deleted image files. Do you have any advice about recovering the photos on my sdcard?
The last reply on the Lenovo forum was:
When you formatted the card as internal/adopted the card was encrypted amd the key was stored on the phone in a secure location. A reset has deleted the key.
Your data on the sd card is not recoverable as the card is encrypted and the key is lost.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Essentially, when I configured my phone to use my sdcard as extended internal storage, all I ended up with was encrypted portable storage. I would rather that there was a 3rd option for having unencrypted extended internal storage.
How would I get this into the Android developers suggestion box?
TP380Z said:
The last reply on the Lenovo forum was:
Essentially, when I configured my phone to use my sdcard as extended internal storage, all I ended up with was encrypted portable storage. I would rather that there was a 3rd option for having unencrypted extended internal storage.
How would I get this into the Android developers suggestion box?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, you ended up with encrypted internal storage... The fact that you didn't understand it is the real issue.
Adopted storage is tied to not only the device, but the current installation... When an sd card is adopted as internal storage, a encryption key is generated semi-randomly and the file system is of the card becomes ext4 and encrypted, the system is decrypted automatically on boot because the key is stored in the phone. If you factory reset, it wipes your internal storage, which in this case is your sd card, and you would be fine. If you remove the card and factory reset, the key is gone forever and you have to reformat the card for it to be usable. So everything you were told in the Lenovo forums was correct, and the files are no longer recoverable by any known means.
your SD card would be nolonger useful , sorry to break this to you bro..
if your card is now encrypted state, i heavily doubt it would work again..talking of recovering photos,when encrypted.. HELL NO! it cant..
what i do is :
i always keep my memorycard as Portable, but not as internal to avoid such problems..
incase if i have formatted as internal, then while formatting or resetting.. i would take full bakup, and then Format as portable, then carryon resets..
i know these encryptions would give such a pain..
next time takecare of these issues..
suggestion: what i do is i install Googlephotos, it takes a backup of every photo & video which i have in either SDcard/internal .. so i would take necessary files while taking backup, to save time..
next time you try using GooglePhotos, it takes backup when i keep my phone in charge, (note: my internet is unlimited- so its ok for me)
acejavelin said:
No, you ended up with encrypted internal storage... The fact that you didn't understand it is the real issue..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you for the very thoughtful reply. I thought that I understood my two sdcard formatting options but I obviously did not. When I first installed my sdcard, I selected portable storage as I did not want my sdcard to be encrypted. Only after discovering that the internal storage of my phone was inadequate for my very limited number of installed apps did I switch to encrypted adopted storage.
If I understand you correctly, the reason that the adopted storage storage is encrypted is because the internal storage is encrypted.
My expectation was that the phone would seamlessly treat the adopted storage as internal storage so I am still at a loss to understand why my phone would not automatically install apps into the available in the adopted storage.
TP380Z said:
Thank you for the very thoughtful reply. I thought that I understood my two sdcard formatting options but I obviously did not. When I first installed my sdcard, I selected portable storage as I did not want my sdcard to be encrypted. Only after discovering that the internal storage of my phone was inadequate for my very limited number of installed apps did I switch to encrypted adopted storage.
If I understand you correctly, the reason that the adopted storage storage is encrypted is because the internal storage is encrypted.
My expectation was that the phone would seamlessly treat the adopted storage as internal storage so I am still at a loss to understand why my phone would not automatically install apps into the available in the adopted storage.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, anytime the SD card is adopted as internal storage it is encrypted... This is a privacy/security measure by Google and is not optional and it doesn't matter if your original internal storage was encrypted or not. Adopted storage basically brings the SD card into the "internal family" and it cannot be used elsewhere. Period (OK, yes, I know there is a way to get the encryption key and mount the volume in Linux, but it is still not perfect).
The reason it still wasn't treated as you expect is probably 2-fold... First, the Moto G3 has a tendency to miss the last step of adoption, called data migration, which is the act of moving existing data to the card and it needs to be initiated manually in many cases. Until this is done, the card is not used by Android except when you specify it because it doesn't think the card is ready yet. This can be done in Settings - Storage then selecting the 3 dot menu and Migrate Data. If this option doesn't appear or is grayed out, then the migration completed successfully (or you are using the card as portable storage, obviously).
The second reason is apps themselves... some of them have not been fully updated to the API standard used by Marshmallow and just don't honor the request to use the card as internal, and Android has a facility to allow this to happen for compatibility. It just uses the internal storage of the device so the app works. Some apps specifically request to be only on real device internal storage for whatever reason as well.
nandakis4 said:
your SD card would be nolonger useful , sorry to break this to you bro..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks. Your sympathy is appreciated.
nandakis4 said:
if your card is now encrypted state, i heavily doubt it would work again..talking of recovering photos,when encrypted.. HELL NO! it cant..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I put my sdcard back in my phone just now and it did not recognize it. However, when I went to Settings > Storage and USB, I had no problem formatting it as portable storage.
nandakis4 said:
what i do is :
i always keep my memorycard as Portable, but not as internal to avoid such problems..
incase if i have formatted as internal, then while formatting or resetting.. i would take full bakup, and then Format as portable, then carryon resets..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I expect that this will once again cause me to have app storage space issues. I only ran into problems with data backups once I started uninstalling apps. I had hoped that uninstalling and then reinstalling apps would then cause the phone to correctly place them into adopted storage. I cannot believe that I was so careless as to not have downloaded my photos earlier but here we are.
After apparently successfully formatting my sdcard as portable storage, I went back and converted to adopted internal storage (also apparently successfully) just now. I've re-installed MS OneNote and my phone is reporting that is taking up 85.70 MB in Internal Storage. When I go to Storage and USB, I see that 44.46 MB is used of 28.32 GB of SanDisk SD Card and 3.00 GB of 4.53 GB is being used of Internal Storage. When I reinstall 63.40 MB MS Word, I see that I'm now using 2.97 GB of Internal Storage and 173 MB of SanDisk SD Card.
[As of 1:50 pm, my phone is now reporting using 3.00 GB of Internal Storage and 137 MB of SanDisk SD Card.]
It looks like adopted internal storage is working properly. I never previously suspected that there was a problem with adopted storage and installed several large apps. The storage space problem surfaced only when there was a MS OneNote update that would not install because of insufficient internal storage space.
nandakis4 said:
suggestion: what i do is i install Googlephotos, it takes a backup of every photo & video which i have in either SDcard/internal .. so i would take necessary files while taking backup, to save time..
next time you try using GooglePhotos, it takes backup when i keep my phone in charge, (note: my internet is unlimited- so its ok for me)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! I will try GooglePhotos. I hope I can set it up to only do backups when I'm connected to WIFI.
I've been all day trying to get a Micro SD installed on my T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy Go5 so I can move apps onto it. After bricking an old SD 32 GB card and buying a new 64 GB card I started searching for help here. I found information that said the card has to be formatted as 'Internal Storage.' This post described the process (the process that worked toward the bottom).
I'd been trying to figure out how to install the Android SDK on my Windows PC without downloading Android Studio in order to get the adb shell mentioned in that post set up. I found this post and this post on the stackoverflow forum, but just wasn't able to figure it all out. But it looks like I need the Java SE Development Kit 10 installed.
I was able to set up USB debugging on the phone though.
Can anyone help me out here and describe just what must be done to achieve all this?
Thanks for any feedback on this
Not really able to help but i read many people advise against using SD card as internal storage. Most regular SD cards r not fast enough or durable enough to last more than a few months. Just sharing
sautom said:
Not really able to help but i read many people advise against using SD card as internal storage. Most regular SD cards r not fast enough or durable enough to last more than a few months. Just sharing
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think you're right about that. I've installed programs on USB sticks that can be quite sluggish. Then again I've had a number of system maintenance utilities on flash drives for years that aren't and still perform fine. Then they don't get used for hours on a day to day basis.
I moved a number of apps on my old Galaxy Ace to a micro sd card though, most used was the Poweramp music player that's always performed well.
And I've got the card now, so I may as well try to get it set as internal and just see how it performs over time. Thanks for you feedback sautom.
TakuSkan said:
I've been all day trying to get a Micro SD installed on my T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy Go5 so I can move apps onto it. After bricking an old SD 32 GB card and buying a new 64 GB card I started searching for help here. I found information that said the card has to be formatted as 'Internal Storage.' This post described the process (the process that worked toward the bottom).
I'd been trying to figure out how to install the Android SDK on my Windows PC without downloading Android Studio in order to get the adb shell mentioned in that post set up. I found this post and this post on the stackoverflow forum, but just wasn't able to figure it all out. But it looks like I need the Java SE Development Kit 10 installed.
I was able to set up USB debugging on the phone though.
Can anyone help me out here and describe just what must be done to achieve all this?
Thanks for any feedback on this
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you have lollipop or newer Android version, you should be able to use the "Adoptable storage" option.
Also, if performance is important to you, then you won't like this option, using sdcard as internal is slower, the only "gain" in using this is the system has more storage to use. There is no gain on performance, you actually lose there.
I don't recommend using sdcard as internal storage though. There are way too many issues that come along with using this kind of modification. A lot of times, the sdcard gets corrupted, then the real issues start when you try to fix it, usually, the device won't function properly, the data on the sdcard gets lost/corrupted, just to name a couple of the many possible issues. It isn't exactly "easy" to fix this when it happens, depending on what goes wrong, sometimes it can't be fixed.
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Droidriven said:
If you have lollipop or newer Android version, you should be able to use the "Adoptable storage" option.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've read quite a bit on this and "adoptable storage" now, and agree that trying to use an expansion SD card as internal memory to run apps is a bad idea Droidriven. I still have a little over 1 GB left on the tiny built in 8GB internal SD Card memory, and have most of what I want installed.
I'm pretty green when it comes to Android, coming from many years with Windows and a tad with Linux. I see that with v6.0.1 Marshmallow, the OS began setting up a system directory tree on the 64 GB SD card when I installed it, and I'm able to set data folders there for apps like the camera. That'll be good for storing large camera videos and other media files.
One thing I haven't figured out yet though is whether or not there's any setting on a non-rooted phone like this Go5 that will allow me to transfer files directly into the 'Android' folder on the internal 8 GB card from Windows. I'm able to connect the two via USB or FTP and write files from Windows to folders on the 8 GB card like 'Download'. But I can't copy any files from Windows over to any of the writable apps folders in the 'Android' folder. I've resorted to copying them 1st to 'Download' from Windows, and then using a file manager in Android to copy files over to the 'Android' folder. I'm not used to such rigid file/folder permissions.
Does this sound like an issue that will require rooting? It'd make life a lot easier if that weren't the case. I'd think if I can write files to that 'Android' folder from within Android, I ought to be able to do the same remotely somehow.
Thoughts?
TakuSkan said:
I've read quite a bit on this and "adoptable storage" now, and agree that trying to use an expansion SD card as internal memory to run apps is a bad idea Droidriven. I still have a little over 1 GB left on the tiny built in 8GB internal SD Card memory, and have most of what I want installed.
I'm pretty green when it comes to Android, coming from many years with Windows and a tad with Linux. I see that with v6.0.1 Marshmallow, the OS began setting up a system directory tree on the 64 GB SD card when I installed it, and I'm able to set data folders there for apps like the camera. That'll be good for storing large camera videos and other media files.
One thing I haven't figured out yet though is whether or not there's any setting on a non-rooted phone like this Go5 that will allow me to transfer files directly into the 'Android' folder on the internal 8 GB card from Windows. I'm able to connect the two via USB or FTP and write files from Windows to folders on the 8 GB card like 'Download'. But I can't copy any files from Windows over to any of the writable apps folders in the 'Android' folder. I've resorted to copying them 1st to 'Download' from Windows, and then using a file manager in Android to copy files over to the 'Android' folder. I'm not used to such rigid file/folder permissions.
Does this sound like an issue that will require rooting? It'd make life a lot easier if that weren't the case. I'd think if I can write files to that 'Android' folder from within Android, I ought to be able to do the same remotely somehow.
Thoughts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I always just use the ES File Explorer app, it lets me move whatever I want to/from Android folder.
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Droidriven said:
I always just use the ES File Explorer app, it lets me move whatever I want to/from Android folder.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, from within Android. I'm using the free open source Amaze file manager that I can do that with. But I can't connect the Android phone to a Windows PC and be able to copy files from Windows to the Android folder on the phone. Just to Download, and maybe DCIM and the root of the internal 8 GB SD memory.
Can ES File Explorer access shared folders on a Windows PC? Amaze sets up an FTP server, but I don't see where it can access files on a Windows system.
EDIT: Seems it can: How to Access Shared Windows Folders on Android, iPad, and iPhone
TakuSkan said:
Yes, from within Android. I'm using the free open source Amaze file manager that I can do that with. But I can't connect the Android phone to a Windows PC and be able to copy files from Windows to the Android folder on the phone. Just to Download, and maybe DICM and the root of the internal 8 GB SD memory.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You should be able to do this with just Windows. Are you sure that you have your USB options set correctly? It should be set to MTP(file transfer).
When you connect the device to PC, you should see a USB icon in the status bar on the device, pull down notification panel, it should have a notification that takes you to your USB options.
Or, when you connect the device, you might get a pop-up menu on your device that has settings for USB options.
It varies from one device to another and one android version to another.
Do you have USB debugging enabled in developer options?
Also, if you do some reading about everything that the ES File Explorer app can do, you'll see that it can be used to transfer files to/from PC via more than a few options, including wirelessly/remotely.
It has several things it can do and different ways to connect when connecting/connected to other devices, including smart TV and others. It can also be used as a server or even be used to create a hotspot.
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Droidriven said:
You should be able to do this with just Windows. Are you sure that you have your USB options set correctly? It should be set to MTP(file transfer).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes Droidriven. I have set USB debugging and USB is set as MTP. I just discovered that Amaze does connect to Windows like ES File Explorer by running it's cloud search function. So far Amaze has done everything I've been told to use ESFE for. But Amaze is very light. I just used Amaze to copy a file over from a shared Windows folder to that Android folder on the phone.
I have Total Commander on the Windows system, but when I use it to navigate to an apps subfolder of Android on the phone, it can't see any of the files or folders that I can access with Amaze from within the phone.
So I'm half way there Just need to figure out how to get Windows to see and write files on this Go5 now.
TakuSkan said:
Yes Droidriven. I have set USB debugging and USB is set as MTP. I just discovered that Amaze does connect to Windows like ES File Explorer by running it's cloud search function. So far Amaze has done everything I've been told to use ESFE for. But Amaze is very light. I just used Amaze to copy a file over from a shared Windows folder to that Android folder on the phone.
I have Total Commander on the Windows system, but when I use it to navigate to an apps subfolder of Android on the phone, it can't see any of the files or folders that I can access with Amaze from within the phone.
So I'm half way there Just need to figure out how to get Windows to see and write files on this Go5 now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know where you're having issues, all I have ever done is just connect my device to Windows via USB then use the native Windows Explorer file manager to transfer to/from internal/external to PC/device. I've never had to do anything special or use any extra software on the device or PC to achieve this, plus, I've done this on different Windows systems.
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Droidriven said:
I don't know where you're having issues, all I have ever done is just connect my device to Windows via USB then use the native Windows Explorer file manager to transfer to/from internal/external to PC/device. I've never had to do anything special or use any extra software on the device or PC to achieve this, plus, I've done this on different Windows systems.
Sent from my LGL84VL using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think it may be because this was a T-Mobile phone and that they may have disabled some functions like "adoptable storage" which doesn't seem to be present, as well as maybe setting permissions to prevent access to certain system folders.
I've even found that I have to change the extensions of some files like ini files to txt before I can drag and drop from Windows Explorer via a USB connection to just a few folders on Android.
It is a bit nutz. Rooting would probably solve the problem. But I'm not ready to go there yet. There may be an answer for getting the Windows > Android file viewing and writing yet. But at least for the moment I can copy both ways with the Amaze File Manager.
Okay, I'm back to considering formatting this 64 GB SD Card as internal storage. I would really like to record video to it, and with the internal memory limited to 1 GB that's left of the total of 8 GB from the factory, that's just not going to make it.
I got the Android SDK and 'adb shell' working on my PC, and started researching how to run commands that would target just the SD Card, and not the existing memory. The command 'sm list-disks' returns: disk:179,32
Is that the phone's internal memory, the SD Card's memory, or perhaps all memory on the phone? When I run the command 'sm list-volumes' I get:
private mounted null
public:179,33 mounted 38C4-18FE
emulated mounted null
I know 38C4-18FE is listed on the phone as being my added SD Card. So I'm hesitant to run the command I see people using to format their SD Cards: 'sm partition disk:179,33' I've wiped the wrong drives by mistake before using Windows diskpart when I didn't specify the right drive/volume. Can anyone clear that up for me?
I'm still hesitant to do this as it seems the phone will automatically begin to use the entire contents of the SD Card as space to run its OS. Might there be commands that would specifically alot the space on the card for writing data, and not for apps that would write and rewrite data there? Something I could create a folder in and point video recording apps to?
Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow
TakuSkan said:
Okay, I'm back to considering formatting this 64 GB SD Card as internal storage. I would really like to record video to it, and with the internal memory limited to 1 GB that's left of the total of 8 GB from the factory, that's just not going to make it.
I got the Android SDK and 'adb shell' working on my PC, and started researching how to run commands that would target just the SD Card, and not the existing memory. The command 'sm list-disks' returns: disk:179,32
Is that the phone's internal memory, the SD Card's memory, or perhaps all memory on the phone? When I run the command 'sm list-volumes' I get:
private mounted null
public:179,33 mounted 38C4-18FE
emulated mounted null
I know 38C4-18FE is listed on the phone as being my added SD Card. So I'm hesitant to run the command I see people using to format their SD Cards: 'sm partition disk:179,33' I've wiped the wrong drives by mistake before using Windows diskpart when I didn't specify the right drive/volume. Can anyone clear that up for me?
I'm still hesitant to do this as it seems the phone will automatically begin to use the entire contents of the SD Card as space to run its OS. Might there be commands that would specifically alot the space on the card for writing data, and not for apps that would write and rewrite data there? Something I could create a folder in and point video recording apps to?
Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's possible to partition the external sdcard so that it has separate partitions with one of those partitions devoted to internal storage and the other for whatever you want. I'm not versed in specific tools and methods to do it, there are many.
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Droidriven said:
It's possible to partition the external sdcard so that it has separate partitions with one of those partitions devoted to internal storage and the other for whatever you want. I'm not versed in specific tools and methods to do it, there are many.
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Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm happy with dedicating the entire memory in my sd card to adoptable storage space. I just want to know if adb is returning the right designation of my added sd card memory, and not the default internal memory.
Does the command 'sm list-disks' run from an adb shell that returns this for me: disk:179,32 mean that 179,32 is the designation that represents the sd memory card I added? Or if I try to use adb to partition 179,32 as adoptive memory, will I be formatting the default internal memory? What would be an adb command to return the designation of the small 8 GB default internal memory of my phone?
TakuSkan said:
I'm happy with dedicating the entire memory in my sd card to adoptable storage space. I just want to know if adb is returning the right designation of my added sd card memory, and not the default internal memory.
Does the command 'sm list-disks' run from an adb shell that returns this for me: disk:179,32 mean that 179,32 is the designation that represents the sd memory card I added? Or if I try to use adb to partition 179,32 as adoptive memory, will I be formatting the default internal memory? What would be an adb command to return the designation of the small 8 GB default internal memory of my phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried running the command without the external sdcard inserted? That will tell you the designation of your internal because internal is all it will see, then insert the external sdcard, then you can run the command to see what the designation for the external is. Once you setup Adoptable Storage, there will be no difference in designation, the OS will see your internal and your external as one complete storage space, it sees external as if it were internal and identifies/labels it as such for all intents and purposes.
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Droidriven said:
Have you tried running the xommand without the external sdcard inserted? That will tell you the designation of your internal because internal is all it will see, then insert the external sdcard, then you can run the command to see what the designation for the external is. Once you setup Adoptable Storage, there will be no difference in designation, the OS will see your internal and your external as one complete storage space, it sees external as if it were internal and identifies/labels it as such for all intents and purposes.
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Click to expand...
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That is exactly the information I've been after Droidriven. That sounds like the perfect way to differentiate default internal memory from an SD addon. I read where after formatting/partitioning the sd card, installed apps will stay on the internal memory unless you opt for an ill advised process of moving them to the new space where they probably won't perform well.
How will the OS see the added sd memory after formatted as adoptable storage? My concern is that since this a cheap flash memory sd card, I don't want the OS to start writing and rewriting to this sluggish, slow flash memory card and just wear the thing down. Is there any way to specify the added memory as being data storage only? I only want the extra memory for writing video from the phone to a space large enough to hold multiple files
TakuSkan said:
I read where after formatting/partitioning the sd cardm installed apps will stay on the internal memory unless you opt for an ill advised process of moving them to the new space where they probably won't perform well.
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That's right.
TakuSkan said:
How will the OS see the added sd memory after formatted as adoptable storage?
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As far as I know, it will see all one space with no way to "store here instead of there" that I know of. The OS uses the entire space as it sees fit.
TakuSkan said:
My concern is that since this a cheap flash memory sd card, I don't want the OS to start writing and rewriting to this sluggish, slow flash memory card and just wear the thing down.
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That is exactly what it will do, this is the common cause of sdcard formatted as internal getting burned out, they aren't meant to do all that writing/rewriting/overwriting/deleting constantly. Frequent activity kills it in the end, hence, my original post warning against the downsides to using external as internal. Once external is incorporated into internal, if the external gets corrupted, the OS won't boot or operate, potentially making a terrible mess to get the device recovered but not the external sdcard, it's toast at that point, along with everything that was stored on it, in some cases, the device can't be recovered either, due to lack of software support or publicly available downloadable firmware.
TakuSkan said:
Is there any way to specify the added memory as being data storage only? I only want the extra memory for writing video from the phone to a space large enough to hold multiple files
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It might be possible somehow, but it probably requires root and some other apps that use root to make the needed modifications to direct data where you want it stored. I'm not sure it's possible though because, as I said previously, the OS sees internal and external as one complete partition, with no way to "see" a difference between them because they no longer have differing disk designations.
In my honest opinion(based on my exposure and experience with various devices that have used this as an option and the issues they have had along the way), using external as internal is too risky and shouldn't be used. Oddly, Adoptable Storage works better on devices that have better hardware and plenty of internal storage than it does on lower end devices with limited hardware and limited storage, the lower, limited devices are typically the ones that end up having issues. I know, this seems counter-intuitive since the better devices don't need the extra internal storage and the lower devices do need the extra internal storage, but we both know that flash memory is very unreliable for continuous write/delete/rewrite and is doomed to fail.
Could you possibly consider some kind of OTG storage, wireless USB drive or some kind of "cloud" storage or FTP setup?
You should be able to direct your downloads, your pics and your recordings to the folder of your choice when downloaded/created instead of having to move them after. I'm not certain you need to do this just to be able to use your external to store data.
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