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What's eating my Android space?

  • 24-08-2014 8:43pm
    #1
    RainyDay
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,925 ✭✭✭


    I have a Samsung Galaxy with 3.81GB on the phone and 58.5 GB on an SD card. I'm now down to 293 MB free on the card, though I've been fairly ruthless about moving apps from the phone to the card. I'm using Clean Master to keep some space free, but I have to clean it pretty much daily. I've moved my camera library onto the DC card, and I don't keep loads of photos on the phone anyway.

    Here's my suspicions;

    Clean Master advanced mode keeps find 3-5 GB of gallery thumbnails, though I have very few photos on the card. I had Picasa synched to the phone at one stage, though I've switched off that synch. Could it be still creating thumbnails for all my Picasa galleries each time?

    Google Play music has some music set to download, but I can't really see how much. There doesn't seem to be any option to set it to use the external card instead of the phone.


    Have you any ideas for how I can identify what is sucking up the space on my phone, and how I can stop it happening in future?


Comments

  • #2
    leche solara
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,168 ✭✭✭leche solara


    You could get an app such as File Commander which will show you what is used in internal and external storage, or you could connect to a computer and see what is on the card.


  • #3
    Reedsie
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 562 ✭✭✭Reedsie


    RainyDay wrote: »
    Google Play music has some music set to download, but I can't really see how much. There doesn't seem to be any option to set it to use the external card instead of the phone.
    Music can take up a lot of space.

    Did you go into the settings in Music? There is a 'Manage Downloads' option and a 'Storage Location' option.

    You can free up space under the Manage Downloads option.


  • #4
    _Whimsical_
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,971 ✭✭✭_Whimsical_


    Have you ever flashed your phone?

    I updated my note2 recently using ODIN. Afterwards I was left with around 400mb space on my phone. I decided to reflash it but clear data etc so it would install as a fresh rom instead of an update.After the reflash,even after I had reinstalled all my old apps,added all my pics etc, I ended up getting back over 5gbs of space.

    Worth wiping and reflashing if you feel that there's space being used that you cannot account for.


  • #5
    Keith186
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,225 ✭✭✭Keith186


    Google Music caches all recent songs you've streamed, took up lots of space on my phone.


  • #6
    RainyDay
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,925 ✭✭✭RainyDay


    Thanks for the feedback, folks.
    _Whimsical_ wrote: »
    Have you ever flashed your phone?

    I updated my note2 recently using ODIN. Afterwards I was left with around 400mb space on my phone. I decided to reflash it but clear data etc so it would install as a fresh rom instead of an update.After the reflash,even after I had reinstalled all my old apps,added all my pics etc, I ended up getting back over 5gbs of space.

    Worth wiping and reflashing if you feel that there's space being used that you cannot account for.

    You're getting beyond my technical knowledge (and maybe my technical ability) here. I did upgrade the Android OS version some time back, but I don't really know what flashing means.
    Reedsie wrote: »
    Music can take up a lot of space.

    Did you go into the settings in Music? There is a 'Manage Downloads' option and a 'Storage Location' option.

    You can free up space under the Manage Downloads option.
    Thanks, I don't have a 'storage location' option. Where exactly are you seeing this?
    leche solara wrote: »
    You could get an app such as File Commander which will show you what is used in internal and external storage, or you could connect to a computer and see what is on the card.
    Yeah, I downloaded one of these apps, and it is definitely pointing me towards gallery thumbnails. I moved all my photos off the phone, and cleared the thumbnails. I took 6 fresh photos, and within a few hours, I have 6 or 7 GB in thumbnails sitting there again - mad stuff. Is there any way I can reduce or suppress these thumbnails, or move them onto my external card?


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  • #7
    RainyDay
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,925 ✭✭✭RainyDay


    Just in case anyone else has this problem, I found a solution over the holidays.

    This thread indicates that it is a fairly common problem.
    http://androidforums.com/threads/guide-stop-giant-thumbnail-files-being-saved-on-your-sdcard-by-the-gallery.693521/

    Unfortunately, none of the suggested solutions worked for me. What did work was just deleting the DCIM folder on my sdcard. It then got recreated automatically, but with normal, proper sized thumbnails instead of the gigabyte thumbnails that were there before.


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