Help Making some room on internal memory

[hessodreamy]

For ages I've been really frustrated at the limited internal storage space on the (original) desire, and wondering what to do about it. I've moved to SD card what I can, and cleared whatever cache I can, but the frequent "storage running low" message is still hacking me off. What more can I do? I've not rooted the phone, and I don't really fancy doing so.

Do Apps on the sd card still take up some space in internal memory (registration data/ uninstall data etc)? in which case would I benefit from also taking some apps off the SD card.
Some programs like google maps and dolphin browser are set to cache to SD card, but it seems clearing their cache sometimes resolves low space issues. Are they misbehaving?
Am I able to manually any unnecessary stuff using a file browser like astro, without rooting?
Any other tips for clearing space?

 

[shauny13]

rooting is the only real solution, the one big major flaw with the desire was the small memory. Rooting really isnt difficult.

 

[Hadron]

All app data go into internal storage, wherever the app itself is. Likewise some elements of the app, such as the dalvik cache, and on 2.2 any object libraries. Upgrading to 2.3 would make the apps2sd more efficient in that it moved libraries as well, but only some apps have a large library so how much difference it makes will depend on your app collection. The upgrade is a ROM Update Utility, available these days at shipped-ROMs, since it's disappeared from the HTCdev site. It does however completely wipe the phone in the process.

But as Shauny says, if you really want to fix storage problems rooting is the way to go. Pay a visit to the root subforum, read the guides in the All Things Root sticky posts, have a look at some of the threads and see how you feel about it afterwards. There's no commitment - it's not for everyone, and you shouldn't do it unless you are comfortable with it. But there's no great harm in finding out what's involved.

 

[hessodreamy]

Ok So I just uninstalled angry birds. It says it's a 3MB app stored on the SD card, with about 0.8MB data. I uninstalled it and the available space for my internal memory went up by about 4MB. What gives? I can understand some user data and library or whatever being stored in internal memory, but it looks like the whole thing, or an equal amount, is stored in internal memory. Is this kind of thing normal?

 

[Hadron]

Angry birds is a lot bigger than 3MB on the SD!

I just moved the original Angry Birds between phone and internal. When on SD the application size shows as 1.19 MB. When on phone it is just under 20 MB. So what you were seeing as the size is just the size of the bit in internal storage.

Moving an app to SD does not move all components, just what are normally the largest ones. There's always part of it left in internal space.

 

[hessodreamy]

Ahhh (lightbulb going on), so the size reported in the application list on the phone is only the portion which is stored on internal memory?
Sure enough, I just moved a 20MB app to SD and the reported size has gone down to 5MB.

It's all falling into place, now. Thanks for helping me get there. I might need to have a clean out of my apps!