I ran through these instructions step by step and freed up a lot of memory, I think mostly by moving several downloaded apps to my SD card. Everything is running smoothly again and had several emails and other types of messages start flowing in. I’m guessing they may have been stuck out in cyberspace because of the low memory.
Now a happy camper again.
Any chance this works for the old LG Optimus phones as well? Using my old one as a plaything for the kids, but still running into storage issues.
Never had one of those, but as I understand it your RW LG Optimus is rooted, and you shouldn’t need this technique if you install Link2SD - Android Apps on Google Play.
Installed Link2SD. Followed directions to partition my SD card with two primary partitions. Now Link2SD says it can’t gain root access. Did RW LG Optimus offer a ROM upgrade that took away root? I think I’m running version 109. Would a factory reset maybe do the trick and restore root?
Hi @erebus,
There was no ROM update that took away root.
Did you install SuperUser?
There’s a discussion that you ought to read all the way through, it includes a link to setting up Link2SD on the Optimus as well as some additional insight from RW customers who had successfully installed Link2SD. It’s good stuff: Low memory message
Oh. My. God. This is so much more helpful than anything that 3 days of a “support ticket” had done. Thank you very much for posting this. Perhaps now my alarm won’t randomly decide that it’s going to refuse to shut off at 6:30 in the morning.
Hi…I’m new to Republic and I just tried what this blog suggested about moving apps to sd card, and i’m proud to say it worked…to some extent Well I have a Qmobile A2 Noir Classic with 2.3.6 (gingerbread android)
Some of the apps I have downloaded did move to the sd card(which is a 8 GB Kingston MicroSD) but on the second try and most of them didn’t move at all. The funny thing is they were in my sd card and functioning properly until a while ago, Im not sure what went wrong…
Notes
I hope someone can help
You’re reporting multiple issues when trying to write to the SD card. That suggests the SD card may be less than healthy. Plug it into a computer’s card reader and scan it for errors, or try a different one in the phone.
Want to Thanks carlH again for a wonderfully written & documented piece!
I just reactivated my Defy after purchasing RW Moto X, & for those that think the DEFY is at End-Of-Life (EOL), think again. (Moto X does not have the FM tuner)
The 1st use of the Moto “*set_external_install_location.exe” *utility was last year when Defy was new, using XP.
When I was finished reactivation, loaded Wifi Pilot & Airplane Mode Modifier, to save batt. life, then checked Settings/storage use/ and internal storage only had 81MB free.
Now again under Windows 8 it was even easier/faster to use the Moto utility as the driver installed automatically.
Reactivation requires a big wipe of the Defy & SD card, very much like doing an OS reinstall.
I had tried to keep Defy’s apps to a min of those I really need & also searched for very small apps as there are apps that claim to do the same things but vary widely in memory usage. (the Moto X has plenty, no worries).
Now a check of internal storage shows "133MB used and 255MB free!
Now, to go kill some updates
Thanks Carl
So does this move the .dex and .so files over too? I’ve been using Link2SD for years, but am curious about this for non-rooted devices.
I would suggest visiting Google’s developer forums to learn more about how standard Android “move to SD” works. I don’t know all the details but some portions of the app do remain in internal memory.
The change my script makes simply overrides app preference to remain in internal memory. More on that here:
I have a moto defy and have had the problem of low storage for months now. I have tried deletion of programs, pictures, and music. I moved Pandora and voice recording to SD card but no changes in my status of storage. I’m down to 2.35 MB of storage. I always delete my emails and presently at a stand still. I don’t use it for games only Pandora, emails and very little phone calls. Is there any thing I can do other than up grading to a new phone?
In your list of things you say you’ve done, you didn’t mention doing these things:
The next thing would be to identify what is using up memory. Settings / Applications / Manage Applications.
Each app in the Downloaded list has a storage number right there with it in the list.
Please list (in your reply here) each app there and the amount of storage used.
Just stopped all updates and removed already installed updates. Problem has been resolved for now but updates will be required later on down the road.
Thanks for your help.
The advice was written specifically for “apps you don’t care about”. If you never use the apps, then you don’t care about them. The updates might only be required ‘down the road’ if you decide you want to use them.
And realistically, given the age of the Defy XT, which is already a senior citizen in phone years, there isn’t that much time left for it “down the road”.