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Help The "Insufficient Storage" Problem

Photos and videos seem to take up the most storage on my phone. This morning I deleted a combination of 900 photos and videos. I am still going through them eliminating items. My kids love to take pictures with my phone once a week I try and go through and eliminate the blurry and bad ones, I cleared up a 1GB of space so far
 
I think its something in the phones cuz i got apks on my sd card and still run into that prob sometimes when got plenty of free space. Real pain in the ass cuz it aint consistent. Right now tryin to install evoland 42 meg with 675 meg free n it say no. But other bigger apps will go right in. Lifes a bitch sometimes i guess.
 
The thread has been very helpful, thanks! I have the Samsung Galaxy S5 with 16GB internal storage and 64GB SD storage. For MONTHS I've been fighting the Insufficient Storage problem and for various reasons I just lived with it and chalked it up to the fact that I had installed too many apps. My wife has the same phone but does not have the SD card and almost never installs any applications and two weeks ago I attempted to update the OS and apps on her phone and got the Insufficient Storage warning. At this point I realized that something weird was going on. She is on a trip thus I decided to dig a bit deeper using my phone.
I have "ES File Explorer" installed and use it mainly because it feels like Xporer2 that I use on my PC, however I really did not understand what it was telling me. On the main screen appears an "Analyze" button so I gave it a try, Holly Cow!!! it gave me a really good insight to what was on the phone both in the base storage and the SD.
  • I noticed that I had pictures in the base storage that should have been on my SD card, and via ESFE I was able to move about 3GB of files to the SD card
  • It also identified "Redundancy Files"(Temp files and Log files). I was able to select all (one click option) and delete them. This also freed up a bunch of space.
  • After playing around a bit more I discovered I still had a bunch of pictures in the base storage that were NOT in the original default folder (I have no idea why). These I also moved to the SD card first in test folders and after a bit more research I moved them to my PC.
  • Still I have some images (pictures) in the base storage (still looking into this)
  • The net for me was that I was able to free up several GB of storage, install all the updates that were pending. I still have more to learn but I've got other higher priority items to worry about.
  • Using Storage Truth I now have 317MB free in /system, 3.8GB free in /data and 3.8GB free in /data/enc_user. Thus until I learn more and dig deeper my issue is resolved and I have a LOT of available storage.
  • My current open question is about the images that were/are in various different areas. Because my skill level is rather low this will take me a lot of time to resolve
Again thanks for this thread and the apps.
 
In short time I've been browsing the AF,I realized that even the littlest of problems receives a big help,bravo AF,for your consideration and dedication to assist those in need of important answers for there favorite device when it ceased to function properly.
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Possible solution for the the "Insufficient Storage" Problem. At least a year ago I encountered the problem with my Samsung Galaxy S5 and could not find a solution that worked for me. I already had ES File Explorer installed and noticed that it had an "Analyze" button on the main screen, I tapped the button to see what it would do. After a few seconds it reported various findings, duplicate files, large files, recently created files, etc. Each section also had a details button which displayed more info. In the more info area some files were obvious junk and could be deleted but for the most part it contained a LOT of info that I was unsure about, however I was able to easily identify about 11GB of junk, I tapped on each junk file to select it and then tapped on the delete button. Back one screen where the summary report was displayed as I scrolled through the report I saw "Junk Files" and the button "Clean Now" which I clicked on. After a few seconds another report with the findings was displayed as well as a "Clean Now" button. Again I had the option to select various findings. By default several findings were automatically selected thus I just tapped the "Clean Now" button and a LOT of storage was released. I was then able to install additional apps and the latest Android Update without encountering the problem - thus SUCCESS!

Here are the simple instructions - About this time my wife who NEVER installs applications I encountered the problem when I attempted to upgrade her phone to the latest Android release. Again ES File Explore was already installed. I opened it, tapped the Analyze button, found "Junk Files" and tapped the "Clean Now", when the report was displayed I then tapped the "Clean Now" button and like magic I could install the Android Update.

I highly suggest this method. If you don't already have ES File Explorer installed then it is necessary to clean/remove some of the junk/applications on your phone. If you remove applications, just make a list of what you are removing and reinstall if you really want them.
 
I'd also add that the clean button removed several of my personal apks from my sdcard one time because it felt they were redundant...
 
scary alien said:
Thanks for that, John!

I would caution that some folks have reported that ES File Explorer might be routing your information to places unknown to you--one reason I no longer use that particular file manager :(.
Click to expand...
I just ran a search for this and cannot find any thing about ES routing your info. That does not mean it is not doing it but I was not able to find anything about it.

I also just looked at Solid Explorer but was confused as to what the heck I really need to install. I saw too many apps for Solid Explorer and reading the details on some they stated that I needed to install something else that was related to Solid Explorer first. Sorry but the Android world is very confusing for me.
 
Lordvincent 90 said:
I'd also add that the clean button removed several of my personal apks from my sdcard one time because it felt they were redundant...
Click to expand...

It is possible that ES has removed something that it should not have for me as well, if it has I'm not aware of it. I did notice that you really need to look at what the report is stating, if you select the wrong section and let it delete stuff it would be a real problem in that stuff you did not want to delete will be deleted.
 
John Terdik said:
I just ran a search for this and cannot find any thing about ES routing your info. That does not mean it is not doing it but I was not able to find anything about it.

I also just looked at Solid Explorer but was confused as to what the heck I really need to install. I saw too many apps for Solid Explorer and reading the details on some they stated that I needed to install something else that was related to Solid Explorer first. Sorry but the Android world is very confusing for me.
Click to expand...

Lots and lots of threads and pages "out there" with questions. Here's some here at AF:

But let's keep that discussion to a different, other thread since this one is about insufficient storage :).
 
My phone was acting up yesterday and a lot of the aps would not work. So I turned my phone off and back on. I realized I lost the FB Messenger. It just uninstalled itself. So I tried to reinstall it and got the "insufficient storage" warning. I freed up as much space as I can, but still no go in my LG L31L. I even tried the ES file explorer. Then I realized I don't even have an SD card. So I guess I am off to the store to get one and ask how in the heck to install it. I need an android book for dummies!!
I'll let you know how it goes after I get the SD card.
 
The SD card works, but I still can't down load the FB Messenger app. It looks like its on the Messengers end. So I e-mailed them and waiting for a reply........
 
The funny thing is, it doesn't matter weather you have an SD card or not. Android is weird and "sneaky" in a way that it has 2 partitions (drives). One is usually called "0" and another is usually called "emulated" or "sdcard" these are both on top of your inserted as card. When you "move app to SD" (because it automatically will only install on device) it doesn't go to the SD card you inserted.

Essentially your ad card you inserted is good for videos, and file storage ect.


TLDR:
The best thing to do, especially on these kinds of devices, is to clear all the cache and app data you can and try to reinstall. Cache takes up a lot more space than you may think, especially when it's not something you think about.
 
What this lacks is a recommendation of which app to un-install.

I find Google is best, removing it just removes the update, reverts to the base rom image, that uses no ram. It never seems to complain about free space when being upgraded after the rest have installed.
 
Androids Crib said:
Hello. You said atleast 512 MB of free space but I can install a 40 MB app with just 200 MB left on my internal storage
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's not a hard-and-fast rule for every device or every version of Android and it seems to just be a limitation imposed by the Play Store (or old Market) app (i.e., I could still side load an app using adb even when I only had just enough space for the app).
 
scary alien said:
Thanks for that, John!

I would caution that some folks have reported that ES File Explorer might be routing your information to places unknown to you--one reason I no longer use that particular file manager :(.
Click to expand...

What file explorer app would you recommend to use now? Is there something similar like ES File Explorer?

Does "ES File Explorer might be routing your information to places unknown to you" mean that they can steal password and files/information on the phone?

I like the ES File Explorer, after I uninstall an app, ES will popup to ask me to delete useless folders related to that app.

I only knew about the security problem when I saw this thread, maybe you should leave a review at the playstore app page to warn others.

Thanks
 
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