Android Lollipop on Lenovo phone

googler

A Plus model, with Android Lollipop

Have installed max capacity SD card for extra storage, but having difficulty getting Apps to store on the extra card. Have set default storage location via Settings > Storage to be the external card, but downloaded apps still install on the internal storage. Most all Apps, when viewed in System > Apps have the 'Move to SD Card' option greyed out and inaccessible.

Googling has brought forth little help, other than repeats of the above process, or advice to install third party App Manager or File Manager tools. I expected this to work straight out of the box, without addtl s/ware. Was I mistaken?

OH has installed more apps than me (we both bought same model at same time), and has around 28Gb free on external card, and internal storage filled with no way to move stuff from internal to external card.

Suggestions?

Shrimply

I'm afraid the only real advice is that 8Gb phone storage is really pushing it these days if you intend to use more than a few apps.

Without rooting the phone, the apps that have the option grayed out are not going to be moveable. They can't, or won't work from external storage. So there isn't much you can do if it is apps rather than media (which is all moveable to the SD card) that are using up the space.

There was a recent thread about this which might be some help.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5661075

ballyblack

Install this APP to SD app

Move apps: moves apps to either internal or external storage for getting more available app storage

It will identify any APPS that will move and do it for you

Prepare for disappointment, many Apps will not move!!

A 8GB device is next to useless nowadays:eek:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.a0soft.gphone.app2sd

googler

If I'm reading it right, from the summary, that App doesn't do anything apart from scan the Apps to see which can be moved - which will report the same as looking at them individually, to see if the "Move to SD card" is greyed out or not?

Feeling sort of misled by the product description now - says you can install 32Gb for extra storage, but doesn't state anywhere that this storage is restricted to certain stuff.... it's taken hours of experimenting, googling and such to get to this point...

custardy

googler wrote: »

If I'm reading it right, from the summary, that App doesn't do anything apart from scan the Apps to see which can be moved - which will report the same as looking at them individually, to see if the "Move to SD card" is greyed out or not?

Feeling sort of misled by the product description now - says you can install 32Gb for extra storage, but doesn't state anywhere that this storage is restricted to certain stuff.... it's taken hours of experimenting, googling and such to get to this point...

This is an android limitation,the product description is the same for all.

Shrimply

googler wrote: »

If I'm reading it right, from the summary, that App doesn't do anything apart from scan the Apps to see which can be moved - which will report the same as looking at them individually, to see if the "Move to SD card" is greyed out or not?

Feeling sort of misled by the product description now - says you can install 32Gb for extra storage, but doesn't state anywhere that this storage is restricted to certain stuff.... it's taken hours of experimenting, googling and such to get to this point...

Yes you are right, if you have been through them all individually, the app will do nothing else.

I can understand you feeling misled, but think about it this way, if SD storage was as good the phone companies would increase the phone price by a tenner, include an SD card, and be able to advertise them as having 32GB of storage.

All you can really do is work out which apps are taking up as much room and decide whether you need them or not or whether there is lighter alternatives.

If your email app for instance is taking up a lot of space it's possible to switch to one which stores emails on the SD card. A lot of apps, I'm thinking banking and weather apps etc, offer little more than what can be done in a browser so can be removed and replaced with internet shortcuts.

esuhl

I have a phone with 1GB system storage, 12GB user storage, and a 32GB micro-SD card.

With the stock firmware, by default everything is installed to the 1GB system partition. Most user-installed apps can be partially moved to the 16GB user partition, but they still take up some space on the 1GB partition, severely limiting what can be installed.

However, you can use Apps2SD to create an additional system partition on your SD card on which to install apps, with just the file system links on the 1GB partition.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=in.co.pricealert.apps2sd.pro&hl=en

Shrimply

esuhl wrote: »

I have a phone with 1GB system storage, 16GB user storage, and a 32GB micro-SD card.

With the stock firmware, by default everything is installed to the 1GB system partition. Most user-installed apps can be partially moved to the 16GB user partition, but they still take up some space on the 1GB partition, severely limiting what can be installed.

I have tried and failed to understand exactly how android storage works, so this might be nonsense. I don't think your set up is true in all cases though, the whole of my S7's storage is available for apps to be installed on, but very few can be moved on to the actual SD card. I think I've had older phones set up like you describe.

Apps2Sd would need a rooted phone I think and I'm not sure that's a root the OP would want to go down.

esuhl

Shrimply wrote: »

I have tried and failed to understand exactly how android storage works, so this might be nonsense.

I know what you mean! It's taken me ages to get my head round it. I more-or-less get it now... I think...

Shrimply wrote: »

I don't think your set up is true in all cases though, the whole of my S7's storage is available for apps to be installed on, but very few can be moved on to the actual SD card. I think I've had older phones set up like you describe.

From memory, my Samsung Galaxy S2 has 1GB system storage, 12GB user storage, and a 32GB SD card.

By default, apps get installed to the 1GB system partition. Some can be "moved" to the 12GB user storage, but this only moves some of the files, so the 1GB storage gets used up pretty quickly even if you move as many apps as possible. Also, some apps don't let you move them.

In order to be compatible with Windows/MTP/PTP, the SD card is (by default) formatted with the FAT32 filesystem. This means you can transfer files via USB, but prevents you from installing or moving apps to the SD card. However, you can repartition the SD card so that it has a Linux-compatible partition. This effectively increases the built-in 12GB user storage. But you still have the problem that some app data are stored on the 1GB partition and you'll run out of space there long before you fill up the 12GB space.

Shrimply wrote: »

Apps2Sd would need a rooted phone I think and I'm not sure that's a root the OP would want to go down.

Yes; you'd need a rooted phone. But rooting is easy. Once you've done it, you can enable/disable it via the settings. And (on recent versions of Android) even when it's enabled, programs are only run as root IF they request it, and IF you select "allow" on the menu that pops-up.

Apps2SD can run scripts to move all the files on the 1GB system partition to a nominated Linux partition on the SD card, and replace the files that Android "can't" move with hard links. When you update an app, Apps2SD automatically kicks in after the update completes to move the newly created files to the Linux partition.

For reasons I can't remember, the SD card isn't mounted by Android until after the OS boots up, which means that apps installed on the SD card aren't available. Apps2SD takes care of this by performing a soft-reboot once the OS has loaded.

TL;DR: Apps2SD works. It requires root (easy to do), but increases boot time.