• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

Root Rooted Desire, S-ON, CM7, low memory. What to do?

TheOnlyRick

Newbie
Hi - A few months ago I rooted my Desire, running CM7. I did the EXT3 or EXT4 SD formatting thing (where apps can be 100% installed to SD), but I'm S-ON.

I'm hitting up against the low memory warnings. Can anyone help with checking that I've done everythng right, and what else I need to do?


Bravo PVT1 SHIP S-ON
HBOT-0.93.0001
MICROP-031d
...
RADIO-5.11.05.14

ClockworkMod v.2.5.0.7

Thanks, Richard
 
Apps aren't 100% moved to sd-ext - only the apk, plus dalvik cache if you have set it up that way. So that's the first question: what a2sd tool are you using (DarkTremor, Simple2Ext, some other?) and have you moved the dalvik cache?

App data anyway remains internal, so all the pre-root precautions of checking that contact storage or Facebook data aren't growing out of control still apply.

Finally, how many apps are installed? Some internal space is still used, so eventually you will use the 148 MB you have. At that point S-Off can let you recover unused space in the system partition.

Or if you don't want to do that, you may find that moving some of your large apps "to sd" via the applications menu helps. If an app has a large lib it takes up less internal space when moved to fat32. Of course you can't use the app's widgets if you do this, not all apps can be moved this way, and only some will actually save you space doing this.

I assume your ext partition is being used? Quick System Info can check this (or Ti Backup if you don't have that).
 
You say you partitioned the SD card EXT3/4 but did you install the script that moves the apps/data?

CM7 does not do this automatically you have to either flash the script or download an app from the market (s2e or something) to get it to work.
 
Or if you don't want to do that, you may find that moving some of your large apps "to sd" via the applications menu helps. If an app has a large lib it takes up less internal space when moved to fat32. Of course you can't use the app's widgets if you do this, not all apps can be moved this way, and only some will actually save you space doing this.

Hadron - this is really interesting - I wasn't aware of this (not that I ought to be - I'm a total novice!). Is there a way to check which ones will have this impact other than just trying this step and seeing what happens?

Also, if we then 'move to phone' will it put it back in the SD cards 'internal' partition, and not back onto the internal memory of the phone, or not?

Thanks,
Andy
 
Here's how I solved the problem:

1. S-Off using Revolutionary. Can use their recovery.
2. Once S-Off flash http://alpharev.nl/bravo_alphaspl-cm7r2.img using Android Flasher
3. Installed http://ftp.bestblog.de/DesireS/gingerbread/RCMixS_v2.0_A2SD_CM7Hboot.zip
4. After installation and booting up, look for MCR Script in the apps drawer. Run the script move dalvik to SD

Started out with internal memory at 20MB with 67 apps installed. After the above, I now have 185MB of internal memory.

No regrets with RCMixHD CM7 version. Very stable.
 
It's not the ROM, unless Rick doesn't have an a2sd script active (which is easy to fix). But he's currently S-On, so can't flash a different HBOOT at the moment.
 
Hadron - this is really interesting - I wasn't aware of this (not that I ought to be - I'm a total novice!). Is there a way to check which ones will have this impact other than just trying this step and seeing what happens?
The best way is to use a terminal. Type "su" to get superuser access, then "du -hs /data/data/*/lib". That will list the sizes of all of the applications' lib directories, which is the extra bit that "move to sd" moves. Most will be small, but there may be a few large ones, depending on what apps you have installed.

It's something that came in with Gingerbread. With Froyo "move to SD" just moved the apk, so you were always better off using sd-ext. With GB the "move to SD" moves the app's lib directory as well, which the a2sd+ script does not (though there are variants which move more stuff). Overall the sd-ext solution still wins on space because it can move the dalvik cache, which the google solution doesn't do, but if an individual app has a large lib then you can gain more space by moving that app "to sd".

This does have the aesthetic drawback that bits of that app are now in 3 places - the apk and lib on fat32, the dalvik cache in sd-ext, and the apps own data (and potentially some other bits) still in internal storage. And not all apps can be moved to fat32, plus the usual restrictions of losing widgets etc for any apps you do move that way. But if using a GB ROM and short of space this can save significant space if you have apps with large libs.
Also, if we then 'move to phone' will it put it back in the SD cards 'internal' partition, and not back onto the internal memory of the phone, or not?
Yes, "move to phone" will move the apk back to sd-ext, as before (and also lib back to internal). Other app components aren't affected either way.
 
If I merge what you're saying with what Hadron said earlier, this is the first para of what he wrote.(?)

But no, I haven't run any script. If I just need to dload an app off the market then good - I like that this sounds easy! (I found the rooting process quite scary.)

Thanks, R.

You say you partitioned the SD card EXT3/4 but did you install the script that moves the apps/data?

CM7 does not do this automatically you have to either flash the script or download an app from the market (s2e or something) to get it to work.
 
If there's no a2sd tool or script Ti won't report a2sd storage - I know 'cos I don't have one at the moment (but do still have an ext partition). And as has been said, CM7 does not come with this by default.

The easiest is probably to install Simple2ext from the market. That provides a gui for managing a2sd on CM7.

When I used CM7 I used to add DarkTremor a2sd myself, which is what GingerVillain and MIUI use, but that was because I am familiar with it.
 
Should add that most ROMs do automatically use sd-ext if present, though you often have to do something else to move dalvik. CM7 is unusual in that respect.

But it's always recommend to read the first couple of post of a ROM's XDA thread just for this reason - to find out if it has any particular quirks or requirements.
 
Cool -that's what I was starting to think!

I'll go with simple2ext.

Thanks Hadron,

R.
If there's no a2sd tool or script Ti won't report a2sd storage - I know 'cos I don't have one at the moment (but do still have an ext partition). And as has been said, CM7 does not come with this by default.

The easiest is probably to install Simple2ext from the market. That provides a gui for managing a2sd on CM7.

When I used CM7 I used to add DarkTremor a2sd myself, which is what GingerVillain and MIUI use, but that was because I am familiar with it.
 
The best way is to use a terminal. Type "su" to get superuser access, then "du -hs /data/data/*/lib". That will list the sizes of all of the applications' lib directories, which is the extra bit that "move to sd" moves. Most will be small, but there may be a few large ones, depending on what apps you have installed.

It's something that came in with Gingerbread. With Froyo "move to SD" just moved the apk, so you were always better off using sd-ext. With GB the "move to SD" moves the app's lib directory as well, which the a2sd+ script does not (though there are variants which move more stuff). Overall the sd-ext solution still wins on space because it can move the dalvik cache, which the google solution doesn't do, but if an individual app has a large lib then you can gain more space by moving that app "to sd".

This does have the aesthetic drawback that bits of that app are now in 3 places - the apk and lib on fat32, the dalvik cache in sd-ext, and the apps own data (and potentially some other bits) still in internal storage. And not all apps can be moved to fat32, plus the usual restrictions of losing widgets etc for any apps you do move that way. But if using a GB ROM and short of space this can save significant space if you have apps with large libs.

Yes, "move to phone" will move the apk back to sd-ext, as before (and also lib back to internal). Other app components aren't affected either way.

Thanks Hadron - really instructive, clear and helpful - as always.
 
Glad it was straightforward to resolve. Especially as CM7 will probably be my next rom - can't be bothered to change hboot and although Redux is great I miss flashing a new version every couple of weeks.
 
Having something of the same problem here, but after hours of searching i cannot solve. Was running MIUI happily for months and fancied a change. Im,
S on
HBOOT 0.93.001
Microp- 031d
Radio 5.11.05.27
ClockworkMod v2.5.07
I wanted to change to one of the latest Sense roms (Runnymede AIO v2.5 or the likes) and this required a EXT4 partition, which i did with gparted (16g sd with a 1.4g partition). Then I flashed the a2sd scripts followed by the rom. All good until I got the Low on Space prompt nearly straight away:mad:.
With Titanium Backup it shows that a2sd is there, with Ter Em I typed 'SU' and 'a2sd check' and got 'a2sd not found'.
I tried several other roms with a2sd and a2sd+ included but the same result:confused::confused:
Far from an expert on this stuff but I do genuinely try to reseach before I ask!! Have got excellent help here before.... and hopefully again:D (Its probably something really simple Im doing wrong!?!?!)
Any ideas?
 
Hi - After putting this off using S2E for ages, but now I'm gonna go for it.

2 questions:
1) What's the safest way to see if I did correctly EXT partition my SD card?
For some reason when I boot into the Linux CD to use the partition manager on my Desire, it would only see the SD card 1 times in 10.

2) To take a backup, do I do that through Clockwork Mod Recovery (under Backup and restore)? I guess that backs up to SD. Do I then need to backup the SD to my PC?

Thanks, Richard
 
In short, if I run S2E and I didn't format the SD properly, is that a problem?

(Separately, if someone can tell me what type of backup I need to run, then great!)

R.

Hi - After putting this off using S2E for ages, but now I'm gonna go for it.

2 questions:
1) What's the safest way to see if I did correctly EXT partition my SD card?
For some reason when I boot into the Linux CD to use the partition manager on my Desire, it would only see the SD card 1 times in 10.

2) To take a backup, do I do that through Clockwork Mod Recovery (under Backup and restore)? I guess that backs up to SD. Do I then need to backup the SD to my PC?

Thanks, Richard
 
Yes use Clockwordmod. Always do a backup before changing anything like running scripts installing add-ons. That way, you can always go back to where you start.

Saved me many times.
 
Back
Top Bottom