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Help Samsung Galaxy Exhibit - Low Memory Question

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swishin13

Lurker
My dad has a Samsung Galaxy Exhibit and he receives a low memory warning (< 15MB) when trying to open his picture gallery. The device memory shows there is 84MB/1.34GB free.The phone also has a 32gb microSD card in use.

What I don't understand is the device storage shows there is 1.22GB of pictures/videos. When I plug the phone into a Windows computer it only shows 45MB of used space. I turned on to view hidden files and folders and searched through all the folders and could not find these pictures/videos. Any idea where these pictures/videos could be stored?

I believe Android has inaccessible system files, could the pictures/videos be related to these files?
 
Windows cannot detect and view non-native file systems, unless you go through the process of installing third-party drivers to support for those different file systems. Android uses the ext4 file system, Windows only supports NTFS and FAT. So whatever you see in Windows Explorer can only show you a limited representation of what's actually on that phone.
 
Thanks for the information on the file system Android uses! I will look into installing drivers to view ext4 files on a Windows computer.

I will pull the SD card out and then select the Pictures/Videos from the Storage menu. I didn't think do that earlier. If the SD card is plugged in it shows pictures/videos on the SD card and I could not find where the internally stored media is.

Do you have any suggestions on how to find these pictures/videos and transfer them from the internal storage to the SD card?

Thanks for your help!
 
https://www.devicespecifications.com/en/model/f8d92711
Regarding a Galaxy Exhibit, by default a microSD card is formatted as FAT32 so basically a Windows PC has full access to the card contents, with the caveat that FAT (and all its variations) has limited file/folder permissions and metadata support.
That phone's internal storage is using ext4 so even with third-party driver support added to a Win PC there are still issues regarding access to a system running a non-native OS.
Samsung includes a basic file manager app that will come in handy to shuffle files around that might make things easier. Look in your apps menu for the 'My Files' app. With such a limited amount of internal storage space in that model I'm guessing you've already been moving as much as you can to the card?
 
Thanks for the info! When he gets back later I will try using the My Files app.

Yes I moved all the "download" folder pictures/videos to the SD card and cleared app data for most of the apps.

There is nothing in the DCIM folder or subfolders.

I just need to convince him to get a new phone with more internal memory.
 
Storage was showing the pictures/videos on the SD card and internal storage. When I unmounted the SD card there is only around 15kb on the phone.

The used space is being taken up by apps. I removed some of the larger ones to clear space.

Thanks again for your help. I really appreciate it.
 
swishin13 said:
I just need to convince him to get a new phone with more internal memory.
Click to expand...
I tend to agree. Even mid-range smartphones now have some pretty decent hardware specs so if he's just doing basic tasks like phone calls and taking photos there's just so much more he could be doing with a newer phone.
 
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