Related
So a few months ago my nexus one got a notification saying i was low on memory, even though i had 27mb of internal storage left (which i though was a lot since most apps are less than 1mb). I decided to back everything up and re-flash cyanogenmod and restore all my apps + data. The notification was no longer there, problem solved.
Well i didn't want to run into that problem/notification again so i bought a class 6 16gb microsd to use app2sd and everythings been going smooth for like a month or two.
Today i got the notification again saying "Low On Space" again even though I'm using app2sd and have over 260mb left on my ext partition.
What is going on here and how can i fix this? Any help would be greatly appreciated
Most likely the 'Data' that the app uses is still on the Internal Memory. Only the apk file is stored on the sd ext. Other than that, I'm clueless myself. So, really...you're not saving that much space by using apps to SD. You may be able to get a handful or so more apps using apps2SD
I just run into same satuation.
A factory reset follow by apps restore didn't fixed the issue.
My total apps about 86MB(90 apps).But after install it use 140MB under /data.
Finally, I realized, it because apk is compressed by zip,after install(decompress), it use almost double the space under /data.
Come on Froyo!!!.
Damn i was hoping someone knew something about this.
I backed up all my apps again, wiped my phone and re-flashed gapps + cyanogen and no more notification.
Even if you move the apps to the sd card (froyo style), app data still resides on the internal storage so don't imagine you'll be able to install a ton of apps. I've been able to install more than the usual, but certainly can't install how many i want. I seriously consider ditching Android for this and some other reasons.
The big change will probably happen with Gingerbread but i can't wait for December.
There are phones with more ROM, just for that reason. Galaxy S, for example.
Anyway, the cache also resides on data partition, and can be quite big.
I was surprised to see my wife's N1 only had 20 MB of internal memory. She is running Enomther's Rom, which runs great.. I don't think the issue is tied to that.
She has hardly any apps on her phone, and rarely does anything other than work emails (Touchdown) and Facebook/Twitter.
Considering how little she has on the phone, and how little she does with it I, was just really shocked that she would have so little internal memory. She called me just now and stated she has a notification that she missed a text message because she did not have enough memory.
What the heck could be taking up so much memory?
What's the fix? There isn't really anything to delete (that I'm aware of)....
Search seemed helpess with "internal" and "memory" there were WAY too many posts. Please help if you can!
Browser cache might be huge, if she has many sites opened in many browser windows.
Her "not many" apps might be "many" enough for a phone with limited internal memory like Nexus - having ~200MB for apps, data and cache together.
There are exactly 3 solutions:
1) Keep browser in check. It's always a good practice.
2) Use native Froyo method and move apps to SD.
3) Use Apps2EXT method and move apps to SD. You can also move Dalvik-cache to /cache.
Hmm, she has MAYBE 10 apps?
I downloaded a cache cleaner and ran that, it removed maybe 8 MBs? That was this past weekend, and she got that message about low memory today. I doubt she has even opened the browser since then to be honest. Very light user.
I sent enomther a tweet, his reply was:
RT @enomther @CallipH need to implement either dalvik-cache-2-/cache or apps2ext in SpareParts (DataStorage options) ... sysdc-2-/cache is default on cm6
okay, so option 1 is to move dalvik cache to sd, which I think you do in Advanced > Amon's recovery, right? Any ill effects from doing this if I switch roms?..
Option 2, apps2ext... she does not have an ext partition and frankly surprised this is needed... is the nexus that low on memory? My Vibrant has 1.6 GBs. same question, any ill effects if moving to another rom with the apps on the ext? I did that a lot back in the day with the G1. I remember having some issues and having to do fix permissions a lot.
Thanks for all the help man.
Check, what's using the memory. Just go over the apps.
You can't do Dalvik-to-SD, because it requires EXT partition, which you don't have. You can do Dalvik-to-Cache.
There is no hassle in having apps on EXT whatsoever. The only hassle is getting them there.
ROM has nothing to do with application data usage either.
Have you tried wiping the Dalvik cache? Worth ago in case there's some built up crap I spose.
^^ thanks.
^ I did before flashing the rom. Will do it again.
I know it's relative, but how much internal memory would you expect someone to have when they just have about 10 apps?
Depends on the apps. I can count 2 - Google Earth and Motonav, for example - that take together 50MB of space without even counting the cache part. Another 4 apps like that, and you're out of memory (if you don't move them to SD using Froyo's method or old Apps2SD-EXT method).
There's also numerous games that are > 10MB, can easily add up.
I'm curious if Touchdown (Exchzange work email) is doing something funky... I know the apps on her phone and they are all very small. Thank you guys all for the posts.
I think I may format her card and partition it and move the cache to the ext partition and see what her memory looks like after that.
Any issues you guys can think of with that, or other ideas?
Download DiskUsage, and it will give you a good idea of what the problem is...
Sent from my Nexus One using XDA App
I have determined that a lot of my low space issues in the data/data folder are from nearly 120MB of 'system data'. I was confused but willing to work around it since system data is usually pretty important.
However, I recently set up my wife's cappy just like mine (same ROM, Kernel, Modem) and she only has 8MB of system data in her data/data folder
So, now I'm looking to understand what system data goes into that folder. I know I could do a complete clean install to figure parts of it out, but if there is an answer out there it would be much easier than the pain of a clean install.
I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe all of your application data (cache & user data, but not the applications themselves) lives in there. If you go through your application list and clear the caches, or use a cache cleaner from the market, you should be able to free up much of that space.
The nice thing about the cache cleaners from the market is that they will sort by cache size so you can see which programs hoard cache space (*coughFacebookcough*)
I've thought of that, and 1 Tap Cleaner only shows 1MB in cache. In fact, since I haven't been using a lot of my apps while figuring this out, nearly all of them are 0 cache.
Is there something that 1 tap cleaner is missing?
Cache is the easiest way to free up space, but I believe all of your user data, databases, etc. live in there as well. If you move some apps to the SD card, I think it takes the user data with it which should free up some space.
You could also go through and clear the user data from apps that have big databases (like Facebook), but this will clear all of your settings and account info. Once you start using it again, this is obviously going to start filling up again but I find it a bit hard to believe that my username, password, and settings really need to occupy the 3.06mb that it's currently taking up on my phone. It must be accumulating crap somewhere along the way.
I've moved some apps to SD w/o really affecting the amount stored there. I have also cleared some data which did help, but doesn't affect the system data.
That's the strangest part. The system data seems to be ~120MB no matter what I do. From all I can find, I only have approx 35MB of actual application user data... the rest is listed as system data, which I can't break down any further.
I've heard of the contacts storage going haywire and taking up space. Have you tried checking and/or clearing that one? Obviously you'll lose anything you don't have backed up with Google.
If that doesn't help, I'm out of ideas short of wiping all of your data and starting over.
Huh... I'll check into the contacts one. I'll report back here with what I find.
Thanks!
Darnit... only 4MB was in contact storage... and it didn't seem to affect my system data.
I guess I'll start preparing to start over. I think I may have done a backup after i fresh installed everything... perhaps I could reinstall that and see what things looked like!
Thunderbolt adds a sqlite_optimize script which defrags databases. That may help reduce the size.
Any time I use Titanium Backup to restore my apps, I do it in chucks and never restore system data since I'm always changing ROMs. For chunks I mean restore apps+data only for apps that need it, then restore apps without for all the rest. Any apps which I don't run never save any data so it saves space.
I've been trying to recover some space on my Nexus one and have been largely successful in doing so with a combination of tricks, but while looking at my partitions and tallying up the numbers something didn't seem to be adding up right; the unit is supposed to have 512MB flash, but I was coming up about 60MB short.
I found this thread which discusses the partition layout of the N1; the sizes they show all seem to match up well with what my device shows. Now, the hex address of the end of the last partion (user data) ends just a couple MB short of 512MB; the start of the first partion (misc) however seems to start over 60MB into the memory space... is there a reason for this, and if so what's occupying those lowest 63.75MB of flash space?
Baseband, AKA "radio", is what you're looking for. Unless you want your Nexus not to boot anymore, it's not advisable to try and repartition baseband space.
Instead of working hard and uselessly wasting effort, use A2SD or any other kind of linking to SD-mounted EXT partition. No matter what you try, Nexus doesn't have nearly enough internal space for any common use.
That answers my question, thank you.
As I mentioned in my original message, I was successful in freeing enough space on my device; a combination of moving apps and libraries (copy to system/lib and symlink back to original location) into the system partition and clearing out bulky or unnecessary apps has left me with over 60MB of free data space without even having to resort to fancy A2SD business (just normal android move to SD card). I was simply curious about what was filling in the remaining space on the flash chip and the radio pretty much fits the bill.
As someone with pretty average amount of user apps (a bit less than 100) and 700 MB user space taken, I can't see the point in doing what you mentioned for anything but pure fun. But if that suits you - I won't argue.
Well, by my app drawer I'm sitting at ~125 (44 purely in data, 34 moved to SD with standard android method, rest either native system or moved there) apps, and if my "puny" N1 can have 60MB free and not even need ext-style A2SD I'm not quite sure how the N1 doesn't have "nearly enough internal space for any common use". Seems to me the point (not "pure fun" as you dismissively imply) of doing what I've done is to able to keep using a pretty decent phone that still has more than enough storage space if you make the least bit of effort to manage it.
But hey, who am I to judge if you prefer to buy whatever latest phone the carriers tell you you should want every 12 months just so they can cram more bloated apps on it?
I appreciate the answer to my initial question about what's using the lowest block of flash storage (I was simply curious about what was using it - I couldn't find information if it was flash overprovisioning or some other low-level portion of the OS using it), but I don't really appreciate the unnecessary negative attitude and commentary for what was just a simple question. Thanks anyways.
I guess you didn't understand my point(s). I'll elaborate:
First and foremost, my point is this: N1 is a crap of a phone. Having it for over 1 year, and trying to adapt it to my wife for 3 or 4 months later on before giving up on it, taught me that this phone can't be dealt with by anyone who doesn't want to accept its touchscreen limitations. It was so refreshing having the phone (MT4G in my case) just react without fuss and not expecting it to crap out at any given time - not even mentioning the huge speed-up. The price of "upgrade" (selling the N1 and buying any previous-generation phone, like DHD/MT4G/DS/DZ) can be brought down to as low as $50, and the benefits are huge, I already wrote it a couple of times on the forum.
To the storage point (actually, several points):
N1's NAND is painfully slow, compared to anything, even to regular Class 2 SD card. You can try copying any large file from NAND to EXT and back, from NAND to NAND and from EXT to EXT and see what takes more time. You're likely to discover that A2SD actually adds performance instead of hurting it.
My app data (/data/data/*) alone takes roughly the same space as your whole internal /data storage has, so I guess the amount of apps alone isn't that meaningful of a measurement. I still call it a perfectly normal and average data usage - I don't have anything special installed, no heavy games that save 200+ MB of data on internal memory, just apps like Goggles, Flash, iGO and a couple of other big apps that aren't movable by normal means (and tend to crap the system out when they're forced to move). The problem in your approach is not even the one-time amount of work you had to invest to make that space, but the amount of work you'll have to invest to keep the phone running - moving system updates to /system upon every update, clearing browser cache, etc - generally, keeping things in constant check. Free time is something you learn to appreciate when you don't have enough, and more hassle-free setup is always preferred IMHO.
But again, different people have different needs, so while I can post my point of view - I don't argue with yours.
Thank you for elaborating, actually; it clarifies much that was not apparent in your earlier posts. This thread isn't really about the pros and cons of the N1 so all I'll say is that the advantages of the N1 (small size, OLED, build quality, tricolor trackball LED, etc..) still outweigh its manageable downsides for me, even compared to very modern handsets - so I'll stick with it until I can find a suitable upgrade that I'm happy with (is it so hard for HTC to make a <=4" qHD AMOLED? Seriously...).
Your point about the NAND being slow is interesting; this is something I hadn't heard and will have to benchmark; if it pans out it would be a point in favor of A2SD, but not really in favor of replacing the device over it
The upkeep I don't find that bad; Titanium backup makes integrating updated system apps a single touch for the batch, and I've only got a couple libraries symlinked into system that are unlikely to be frequently updated. With the space I've freed I shouldn't need to clear browser caches nearly as often - so it actually saves me time and frustration regularly for the one-time effort.
Thanks again for taking the time to reply and to clarify your points
If a2sd+ doesn't work for you you could do custom mtd partitions like I did using fireats custom mtd if u google it u will find it basically you can shrink ur system partition down to almost half because it is being wasted I mean whatever size u want to define it as. I'm using miui and my system partition that i defined is 120 mb (4 mbs are free just in case) and my cache partition is 15 mb. Now that leaves 301 mbs free for user data. I have 107 user apps installed about 10 games or so and I still have 120 mb free for user data for me that's more than enough. This way ur phone won't be buggy because u will only use the system partition for ur rom again I would suggest miui since it takes minimal space and is very smooth and stable with amazing battery life (I use tiamat kernel). Hope this helped
---------- Post added at 06:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:52 PM ----------
Oh if u use a2sd in conjunction with custom mtd then u can have close to 750 mb of space available for user data given that ur sd ext partition is 512 mb (which was stable for me using 8gb card) that's basically rivaling new phone memory so don't just call the nexus one off just yet it can surprise anyone that knows how to play with it or stuck with it for 2years like me lol.
I've already been using root access with shell and titanium backup to move apps and libraries into the system partition without resizing it, so I'm already using the available space there. The only major difference is you've dramatically shrunk your cache partition from the default of (IIRC) 100MB down to 15MB; this seems like a pretty huge reduction, and I feel this would have performance implications, especially when running larger apps...
Other than that, if I find my current space as set up proves to be inadequate in the future (it seems just fine for now) then a2sd appears to be the best option for those who need even more additional space on a nexus one.
15 mb is more than enough for cache partition unless u plan to download huge 3d games and as we all know gaming isn't the reason that we have held on to nexus one for so long I haven't seen any app large enough to not install due to my partition size. I messed around with that too first I had it set at 5 mb but that made market force close every time then I set it at 10 was stable but large apps couldn't download and then I tried 15 and hasn't given me a single problem. Otherwise all that space is wasted so why not dedicate it to user data? With 20 mb partition u can download almost all games that can function on nexus one but since I'm not a big mobile gamer I stuck with 15 mb cache.
Most normal programs don't use /cache.
To fix your cache market issue:
Code:
su
busybox mv /cache/download /sd-ext/download
ln -s /sd-ext/download /cache/download
If you don't have a sd-ext you could use /sdcard/download instead. The directory will already exist if you've downloaded anything from the browser, so I just remove /cache/download before linking. I used to get package file invalid errors from this setup though...
Ti backup will also let you move stuff to /system and re-odex your rom instead of shrinking /system. Sure, everytime system stuff updates you need to click a few times, but unless space is real tight, it works fine. The re-odex-ed rom seems to boot faster for me than with external dalvik-cache, too, but that could just be me pretending. I've never busted out the stop-watch.
I like to keep apks on a2sd and put dalvik-cache on internal memory. It's kinda like raiding the two interfaces together to get the sum of the bandwidths of both when launching a program.
siberx: I'm sticking with the N1 until I find a decent phone that has been designed to fit in my pocket instead of sitting in a purse or on the bar too... I considered the glacier for a while, but, near as I can tell, the only benefits of going there are better touch screen and gpu.
I used firerat's mtd patch to rejigger my girlfriend's desire paritions to something more sensible (something like a 230mb system partition stock? ridiculous!) and that worked smashingly; the same trick against my N1 didn't go so well though. Seems like my Nexus with CM6.1 on it is still using the cache partition for dalvik at least partially, and I think shrinking it down to 20mb made it too small to boot right. Not a big deal anyways; I've got enough space to work with as is
I tried to do some benchmarks on my internal flash for comparsion, but the only decent benchmark I could find (without getting manual about it on command line) was Passmark's mobile benchmark; problem is they wan't 90MB free to run the internal memory benchmark, so my 60MB isn't cutting it for that
Anybody know of a decent benchmark that will bench both internal and SD read/write speeds that doesn't need such a huge chunk of free space?
ezdi: I considered for awhile buying a G2 for the faster CPU/GPU and improved touchscreen, but ultimately decided against it due to the extra weight and thickness (combined with the nexus' other advantages like OLED and tricolour LED). Eventually some manufacturer will figure out there's a still a market for compact high-end phones...
ezdi said:
siberx: I'm sticking with the N1 until I find a decent phone that has been designed to fit in my pocket instead of sitting in a purse or on the bar too... I considered the glacier for a while, but, near as I can tell, the only benefits of going there are better touch screen and gpu.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Better touch screen is a reason enough by itself.
GPU, much faster and bigger internal memory (both system and data), much faster and bigger RAM, and most of all - 90% HW-compatibility to one of the most popular devices in the world (DHD) - means staying updated and speedy with ROMs that fly where they crawl on Nexus (if they exist at all). Plus - all ROMs besides ICS are 100% functional, CM, MIUI, Sense 3/3.5, you name it. And if it's not enough, 20% hassle-free overclock is standard.
From quite satisfied Glacier owner.
I've been mostly an iOS user in the past, with the exception of switching to the Droid & Droid Incredible a few years back, and find myself back again with the HTC One (great excuse to leave Big Red). However, my storage seems to be getting cluttered up and I am having a hard time figuring out why. I've been using FX browser to try and ID the culprits, and I get that my photos are taking up a lot because I've been taking a lot of Zoes and HDR photos (new baby in the family), but I can clean those up fairly easily. I only have two nandroids saved up with a total of 5.3 GB (photos are 5.7 GB), but what is "bothering" me is how Titanium is taking up 4.7 GB. I've got it set to only keep one backup, and I have it synced to my Dropbox, but I cannot see why it is taking up so much space. I even went through and deleted all the old apps it had backed up that I do not use anymore, and I even went so far as to completely erase everything in the backup folder and do a backup with just the currently installed apps and settings so I could have a clean slate. I do not ever remember Titanium taking up so much space before, does it compress and save photos as well? Also, I remember from my past Android experiences that there was a .trash folder that I would have to empty every once in a while, but I do not see anything similar on my One's Main Storage. Is there a trash file hidden somewhere?