[Guide] Link2SD (or Apps2SD) on Galaxy Tab A (SM T-580) - Samsung Galaxy Tab A series Guides, News, & Discus

Hello folks. Before going further I need to apologize. I really fighted to use Link2SD on my Galaxy tablet and I succeeded more or less. I thought that my tentative could be useful to others. So I posted this topic.
I worked a little more, and now I am convinced that I was wrong from the beginning.
The reality is that Apps2SD and Link2SD are obsolete utilities.
Forget creating a second volume on your external SD Card :
- Android/Samsung declare your SD Card as corrupted and always wants to reformat it.
- TWRP mounts the wrong partition and you have to manually unmout it and remount the good one
- The partitions need to be declared with a wrong type and this is really not clean
etc...
I suggest that you do not loose your time, forget Link2SD, and read this excellent topic:
https://www.xda-developers.com/divi...gles-fuse-replacement-will-reduce-io-overhead
My Galaxy tab A has only 11 Go available for the user. I bought a 128 Go external SD card to extend both /storage/emulated/0 and /data.
When you first install your SD Card, Android automatically mount this card as /storage/xxxx-xxxx.
This is a FAT volume extended on all your SD Card (128 GB for me).
This is fine for storing ebooks, music, video, and your backups.
But impossible for Link2SD to move your apps on this volume and put a symbolic link on the previous location, because FAT is not a UNIX file system. Link2SD (or Apps2SD) needs a second disk volume on partition 2 (/dev/block/mmcblk1p2) formatted with a UNIX file system (ext4 is fine).
Of course you need to have rooted your device. [A non rooted tablet is not better than a vulgar iPhone ]
To re-partition my SD Card I used ROEHSOFT PARTITION TOOL (SD-USB). (I tried unsuccessfully Aparted, it crashed every time I launch it). ROEHSOFT is convenient but tricky to be used by an advanced user :
- You cannot create a partition in a specific slot (for example /dev/block/mmcblk1p2): It automatically use first slot for the first partition you create, the second slot for the following partition, and so on.
- If you try to foul it, deleting a partition and recreating it in another empty space, it suddenly decides to reorganize your 4 slots. It really wants /dev/block/mmcblk1p1 to be the first partition on your SD Card, /dev/block/mmcblk1p2 the following, etc...
- You cannot create a partition at a specific offset inside an empty space.
After fighting with ROEHSOFT I finally won. I discovered too late that "fdisk" is part of BusyBox. If you know "fdisk" my advice is to use it instead of fighting with a software which pretends to be user friendly but is too limited.
OK, stop bla-bla and work.
1 - Dismount your SD Card : Parameters/Device Maintenance/Storage/Menu-Storage Parameter/Dismount
2 - Delete the only one partition
3 - For a misterious reason, my Android was not happy with his FAT volume on /dev/block/mmcblk1p1. Link2SD wants his UNIX volume on /dev/block/mmcblk1p2. So, if you use ROEHSOFT you need now to create a small dummy partition on /dev/block/mmcblk1p1. For me I created a 4 Go partition to be used by Linux Deploy. This partition needs to be declared as FAT32 (LBA) but should not be formatted as a FAT file system. EXT4 is a good choice.
4 - Create the second partition for Link2SD. I suggest not too much space for it, because you probably want a huge space for the third partion. This partition needs to be declared as FAT32 (LBA) but should be formatted with a UNIX file system. EXT4 is a good choice.
5 - Create the third partition to be used as SD extension for Android. This partition should be very large : you will store on it your music, your movies, your ebooks, and above all your backups. This partition needs to be declared as FAT32 (LBA). I formatted this partition as a EXFAT file system.
6 - Reboot. If you are lucky you will get two notifications : one saying that you have a corrupted memory card, and one saying that you are ready for media files. You will get those two notifications at each reboot.
8 - Recreate mounting scripts inside Lin2SD (or Apps2SD), and reboot.
7 - If you are a UNIX user just type "df -h" in a terminal to verify that the two partitions are mounted with correct sizes).
8 - You can look what Android think of your partitioning :
/Parameters/Device Maintenance/Storage/Menu:Storage Parameter/.
Do not try to mount the two first volumes and NEVER try to reformat them with Android. Those volumes are declared as corrupted but this is normal. Android does not expect to find a UNIX file system on a partition declared FAT32.
If one day, you forget this and ask to Android to reformat a corrupted partition you will have the terrible surprise that Android will not only erase your partition, but will erase everything and recreate one and only one big empty partition. (I guess that you keep all your backups on this SD Card, like me, so this is a really bad surprise).
Do not ask me why Android does not want his SD-Card on first partition. I have no idea. I guess that Android or Samsung reserve this partition for something else.
Do not ask why I had to declared all my partitions as FAT32 even if two of them are formatted as EXT4. I just realized that this configuration works well after fighting during a full day.
I hope that this topic will help some of you.

You really need the second partition on the SD? Or you can have only one ex4 partition that fills all the SD? (Remove the FAT and only have one ext4)

Palatosino said:
You really need the second partition on the SD? Or you can have only one ex4 partition that fills all the SD? (Remove the FAT and only have one ext4)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, I tried but it doesn't work.
I found today a very interesting topic that I will try to master and hopefully wil, understand everything better :
https://www.xda-developers.com/divi...gles-fuse-replacement-will-reduce-io-overhead
Maybe I was wrong from the beginning : perhaps LinkSD and apps2SD are historic patch that are not useful anymore. Perhaps all the burden will be fixed easily just by not using those utilities anymore.
"sdcardfs" is something very new for me who is an old UNIX fellow. This seems to be a major improvement for Android.
I will update this topic when everything will be clear for me.

I didnt have this problem on android 6, but on android 7 . My phone wants to use ext4 as data partition and says its corrupted, link2sd detects this second partition normally, but my data partition fat 32 detected on phone settings and its says its ready but there is no option to mount it.
As far as i understand from this tutorial i need to make 1 fake ext4 partition say 1mb, then second partition ext4 for use with link2sd, and third partition fat32 for use as data storage ??
My phone is samsung j7 2016
So i did follow this , but now my phone wont detect fat32 and link2sd didnt detect 1 of other ext4 partitions

Looking for a definitive way to Root and use link2sd to have my SM-T580 use the SD as a primary parition for apps and data. Been researching and trying a dozen different methods already to no avail. Bonus if there's a way to roll it back easily. Am on the latest android release.
Thank you for all replies.

larpoux said:
I hope that this topic will help some of you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're my saviour, thank you ! I've been fighting on the same issue for days and didn't think about that trick to declare an ext partition as FAT32 !

I know you probably won't see this, but I just wanted to tell you how much I appreciated this guide.
I have a Galaxy Tab S3 and every since going to a custom rom, I haven't been able to get this working which was such a pain with less than 23 gb of storage. The Rom improved my performance far too much for me to change back and every guide I attempted pointed me in the wrong direction but finally, I'm able to use my 120 gb SD card which has made my tablet worth using again.
To anyone who may attempt in the future,
I'm using Android 9 + Magisk. Using the Advanced type Mount script was the only way it get it functioning but I've had no issues with linking apps and no message regarding a corrupted SD card. It can take a few minutes on boot for everything to properly load in, but the apps all update and there's no performance/loading time issues.
Thanks again!

Related

Jesus freak 1.5 apps to sd help?

i just installed jesus freak 1.5. i also purchased a 16gb micro sdhc card. I would like to know how to get apps to sd running correctly. I have followed another method and messed up the sd card. so i purchased a brand new one and before i even take it out of the package, i would like to talk to someone that has had sucesssful experience.
Thanx in Advance
A2SD in a Nutshell
the essence of apps2sd is:
1) creating a vfat/fat32 partition for storing user data
2) creating a second partition, ext2 to hold your apps and caches
3) creating directories within the ext2 partition on the SD to house your caches and apps
4) copying your apps and caches to the SD within the appropriate directories on the ext2 partition
5) rebooting within recovery console and deleting the original app and cache directories, AND
6) symbolically linking the ext2 apps/cache folders on the SD to the appropriate system partition folder names
7) rebooting to android and testing apps to determine which need to be reinstalled or reconfigured
your ext2 partition need not be very large relative to the volume of the SD; half a gig is normally adequate
pre-requisites:
you will need regular access to an OS that supports the ext2 filesystem, like linux. this is important because if your ext2 partition ever becomes damaged, the linux system has the tools to fix the ext2 filesystem errors.
you will need to know the commands for creating partitions on your SD
you should know how to use ADB to connect to your G1's shell, though this is optional
you need to know how to (re)boot to the recovery console and use its shell
you need to be familiar with the commands required to copy directories, create and delete directories, and create symbolic links
There are other Threads that have other programs and tutorials, but I used this one the other day on a JF 1.5 and it worked well.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=512743
Only issue I had was I had to move JF Updater back to Phone from SD , but that could have been a glitch when the phone checked for an update. The two apps used AppstoSD2 and a2sd pretty much do everything for you , very minimal command line required on your part.
Only thing to make it better would be an interface to either move the apps back to phone or integrate it so it would ask you when you install an app where to put it. But I am very happy with it. 16GB might be over kill , I have a 8 GB but they say not to go over 1.5 GB with the Ext2 partition, so while you will have 6.5 ( relative ) GB of space for Movies,Images, MP3's, Uninstalled apps, you are really limited to the 1.5GB for apps , well plus internal phone memory I guess. But for phone apps that's probably way more than enough.
question: how do you partition a 16gb sdcard? all the numbers and all that. ive done an 8 gb sd card and that was easy cause i was working with mb's. now with gb im lost. i got to parted and i typed up print and got 16.1gb if you could help me with the numbers for fat32,ext2/3,linux-swap. i would greatly appreciate it...
Personally, I would reccoment switching to a Cyanogen ROM. It's based off the same source as JF, but one of the features it has is automatic Apps2SD. This means you but have to push files here and there, whuch believe me can be a pain. It does still require an ext partition which you would have to format your self, but after that it will work without and modifications.
Do no more then 512 MB for your ext2(3,4) partition
Follow this guide for the card partitioning. Flash CM's rom and it will do apps2sd for you automatically.
Your other card is most likely not all lost and could be salvaged still, I would look into it if I was you, 16gb cards are not cheap.
And for the last time: it is Jeusus FREKE not Jesus Freak, Have some respect for the one who layed the foundation for us, at least enough to spell his name correctly.
AdrianK said:
Personally, I would reccoment switching to a Cyanogen ROM. It's based off the same source as JF, but one of the features it has is automatic Apps2SD. This means you but have to push files here and there, whuch believe me can be a pain. It does still require an ext partition which you would have to format your self, but after that it will work without and modifications.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I second that, and also jf won't be doing ROM any more :[
http://jf.andblogs.net/

[Q] Format SD card to ext2

I bought new SD card i want to wipe my phone completely and install Darkys Rom. I formated my new SD card to ext2 in Ubuntu but my phone didn't recognize the file system. Then i used Clockwork to format my (external) SD card and what i did i formated my internal SD card. I'm completely failed. Can somebody give me step by step tutorial how to format external SD Card to ext2 or ext4. Also i would like to know if i will be able to copy data under windows when the phone is connected through USB.
Thank you
Sorry for my English
Hi! Please tell me why do you want to format your SD card to ext2 or ext4? There is no need for that. Just format it tu FAT and that's it. If you want to apply lagfix then do it under recovery with the lagfix option under advanced features.
Greets from Croatia.
DanXo said:
Hi! Please tell me why do you want to format your SD card to ext2 or ext4? There is no need for that. Just format it tu FAT and that's it. If you want to apply lagfix then do it under recovery with the lagfix option under advanced features.
Greets from Croatia.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would like to have option to transfer bigger files than 4GB.
+1
how do I format my external SD card to ext2? I have Samsung Captivate. I got Cygwin, since I use Windows. Does anyone know what commands to type in cygwin?
I want to put files larger than 4GB on my card as well.
I think this will be useful for a lot of people.
I found a thread http://android.modaco.com/content/h...an-i-bind-mount-e-g-system-sd-xxx-sdcard-xxx/
But I am a noob in Linux, and it would be GREAT to have step by step commands I would have to type in to format my external SD card, while its in the phone, etc
Possible problem I see is that the phone might not recognize external card if its ext2/3/4 . We might have to have small FAT32 partition on there as well? Or may be Froyo has that ability...
I'm looking into doing this myself, in my case so I can use symlinks to copy apps "data" folders (not the "data" partition, but the folders in /mnt/sdcard where apps put different things) onto the larger, external sdcard. It seems like it could be possible, just need to make sure the /etc/fstab file is updated properly, and of course make sure your kernel has the ext2 and/or ext4 modules loaded and running (which you probably will if you have a lagfix installed). I will play with this and post back my results here...
I have been looking for this myself for a while aswell, but on 4 different kernels and CWM v2.5 and CWM v3.0, I couldn't find any option on how to change the ext. SD to Ext4. If anyone knows how to then please post it here!
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA Premium App
So, progress report...
Still no success in this matter, although I have learnt a bit today about Android's internal workings. After backing up my system with CWR, I first tried formatting my ext sd card with gparted on my computer. Bad choice... Even though no config files were stored in it as far as I could tell, Android "panicked" and decided to restore all my configs to default, severely crippling my system and making a lot of apps force close when I restarted the phone.
At that point I thought, since it is now broken, might as well play with it So the next thing I tried was formatting my internal sd card (only the vfat partition that gets mounted in /mnt/sdcard) to ext2, but this time using the "busybox mke2fs" command, on the terminal emulator on the phone. This seemed to be successful, and I could read and write to the new ext2 partition, although for some reason, I got the feeling that apps kept resetting their settings (not sure what caused this, didn't really looked into it much). So once that was up and running, I decided to modify the /etc/fstab file, like I would do in a normal linux environment, to automount this partition on boot, as ext2.
At this point I rebooted the phone, but hmm... Android converted the partition back to vfat. Not good. This leads me to believe there must be some kind of "recovery" commands run on startup, in case the system detects the partition is not the default file system, or something along the lines of that. At this point it got kinda late, so I decided to document my progress, restore (which thankfully left my phone the way it was at the beginning of the day) and call it a day.
So, things that I still need to find out:
1) How does the system convert the partition back to vfat on startup and how could I avoid it from doing it? Maybe by having a small vfat partition to fool it into thinking all is good and normal?
2) When I had my partition as ext2, I couldn't see it on my computer when connected via USB (I'm on a linux system so the fs being ext2 is not a problem). Wonder why...
3) If I had a small vfat partition, how would I go about mounting the ext2 partition on the same mount point after the system checks the vfat one? Maybe by binding it? Gotta look into that as well.
4) Finally, have to check why the apps couldn't maintain their settings after a certain amount of time (for example, if I opened terminal emulator and changed the colors, these would stay if I closed and opened the app again right away, but if I closed it for a while, say half an hour, and opened again, it would be back to default...)
I'm on a Galaxy S btw. If anyone has any insight on any of these matters, would be much appreciated!
Any progress? Would really like to use +4 GB files.
morow said:
I would like to have option to transfer bigger files than 4GB.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is immpossible because of hardware limitations of the SD card And often if the file is big it just fail!
Hristov1 said:
It is immpossible because of hardware limitations of the SD card And often if the file is big it just fail!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not true, read the rest of the thread before u post! Its not a hardware limitation, its because Android uses fat32 as filesystem.
hello everyone,
I just wanted to check to make sure that there is no solution for this 4gb limitation with Android yet? I too have been looking for something besides resizing files.
thanks
uki
I have ext2 on my external 32GB SDCard, just formatted it on my PC and put it in the phone, working without any problems. I just watched a full length 720p movie with DTS sound on my phone without having to re-encode the mkv
I'm using CM7.1 on my phone which auto-mounts the SDCard even with ext2. It won't work on stock ROM, but any kernel that has ext2 support should be able to read ext2-formatted cards but they might not auto-mount the sdcard.
On my PC I had to install a ext2 file system driver (google ext2fsd) for Win7 to be able to read the card when attaching the phone to the PC.

Partition SD card on Windows for people who can't be bothered to do it properly ;)

Firstly, BlaY0 has a great tutorial on how to do this properly, I suggest you do that to learn something.
Secondly, I cannot confirm that this is 100% safe. BlaY0's method should be 99% safe, I don't know about this as it is all automatic. BlaY0's method is tried and tested, this is not. I only used this method as I had a new SD card and I was in a hurry (exams coming up ) and I didn't have time to remind myself of BlaY0's method, and CWM only allows you to create up to 512mb partition. Also, I had a new computer, and I don't have time to set up ADB all over again.
Anyway, this is a method for people who don't want to use ADB to partition their SD card for A2EXT or DATA2EXT (a.k.a. apps2sd, etc etc), and are using Windows. If you're running linux, you could use something like gParted to partition it, not sure about OS X though. This method will allow a Windows user to create an EXT partition on their SD card alongside the FAT partition.
1) Download and install Minitool Partition Wizard, from here.
2) Open the program and delete all partitions from the SD card (which you will have inserted into the computer using an adapter or something). DO NOT DELETE THE PARTITIONS FROM THE HARD DISK! MAKE SURE YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DELETING. Oh, and make sure the SD card is backed up
3) Create a FAT32 primary partition. You decide how big you want it, but I'd advise you leave 1024mb (1gb) for the EXT partition.
4) Create an EXT2/EXT3/EXT4 (you decide) primary partition. Use up the rest of the space on the SD card.
5) Click assign/OK/whatever and wait for it to complete
6) You now have your partitioned SD card ready for an A2SD ROM!
7) You need to assign a drive letter to the FAT32 partition. Not sure about the EXT partition. At first I forgot to do this and my card didn't show up in Windows, though Partition Magic can still see it.
Like I said, do yourself a favour and use BlaY0's method here, but if you're lazy or you don't have time or ADB doesn't work anymore, use this.
Nice one m8. You mentioned that CWM doesn't offer adding partitions bigger than 512 MB. Well, you're right but that's why I made a customized version of fake-flash that can do bigger... to 1 GB. It can even add second ext partition for some exotic types of data2ext. On top of that I added auto block alignment which is described in my guide (the manual one) so no more calculations and manual labour
Sent from my HTC Legend
BlaY0 said:
Nice one m8. You mentioned that CWM doesn't offer adding partitions bigger than 512 MB. Well, you're right but that's why I made a customized version of fake-flash that can do bigger... to 1 GB. It can even add second ext partition for some exotic types of data2ext. On top of that I added auto block alignment which is described in my guide (the manual one) so no more calculations and manual labour
Sent from my HTC Legend
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ah, I didn't know about your customized CWM, I think I'll just use that next time
BlaY0 said:
Nice one m8. You mentioned that CWM doesn't offer adding partitions bigger than 512 MB...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I remember some version had the ext menu up to 4GB
BlaY0 said:
On top of that I added auto block alignment which is described in my guide (the manual one) so no more calculations and manual labour
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Didn't know that, good to know, for those of us still using data2ext, this is important...
Wish this was up earlier, spent an hour repartitioning my card using parted.Couldn't upgrade to EXT3 and ended up using CWM 3.0.2.8 to do it instead lol
What CWM is using under the hood for partitioning is actually parted.
Sent from my HTC Legend
Tried it but it didnt work not sure what the problem is...
formatted my SD to FAT 32 and reserved 1G for EXT3 both as primary partition in the Mini Partition Tool
Plugged it in my phone,
Ran ADB shell
# a2sd --enabled, rebooted
on reboot nothing seemed to have changed... went back to ADB shell
tried a2sd --free it says A2Sd is not active ...
a2sd -- enabled again and it says it is enabled but not active
so im guessing it cant read or recognize the EXT3?!
Any clues... i didnt want to move my Dalvik to SD ... should I try EXT4 or even EXT2?
QkSi1ver said:
Tried it but it didnt work not sure what the problem is...
formatted my SD to FAT 32 and reserved 1G for EXT3 both as primary partition in the Mini Partition Tool
Plugged it in my phone,
Ran ADB shell
# a2sd --enabled, rebooted
on reboot nothing seemed to have changed... went back to ADB shell
tried a2sd --free it says A2Sd is not active ...
a2sd -- enabled again and it says it is enabled but not active
so im guessing it cant read or recognize the EXT3?!
Any clues... i didnt want to move my Dalvik to SD ... should I try EXT4 or even EXT2?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Take me through what you did, step by step. You say you reserved 1G for EXT3, but did you actually format it as another partition?
QkSi1ver said:
Any clues... i didnt want to move my Dalvik to SD ... should I try EXT4 or even EXT2?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It has been mentioned here like a gazilion times, boot up your device with logcat and see the first few lines...there is your answer!
Google how to wait for the device with logcat
1) Downloaded and installed Minitool Partition Wizard from your link. I got the free home edition
2) backed up my SD card and Open the program and delete my SD card partition ( which is in a card reader)
3) Created a FAT32 primary partition of 69xx MB and left the rest 1024 MB for the other unallocated space
4) Right click on the Unallocated Space to create an EXT3 as primary partition with the default cluster size.
5) At this point, it showed 2 partition on my SD, one with the drive letter for windows FAT32, and the 2nd one Ext 3 with 1GB and Primary. Clicked OK and Apply and wait for it to complete.
6) once complete , put it in phone, plugged usb and ran adb shell
7) ran a2sd --enable, it said reboot phone.. i made a mistake to reboot by adb the first time but then did the whole process again a 2nd time using reboot from the phone....
Tried logcat using this command "adb -d logcat>mylogfile.txt"
couldnt find the file anywhere ... if i dont redirect to the txt , it goes too fast to read and there's soo much debug messages what do i need to look for?
I thought it would save me time to get it done through windows... but its taking me as much time it w0uld probably get me with the manual way...
i'll give it a try tomorrow...
8) rebooted fine, and i was still low on space.. so went back in adb sheel to check a2sd --free but this is where it says not active..
QkSi1ver said:
1) Downloaded and installed Minitool Partition Wizard from your link. I got the free home edition
2) backed up my SD card and Open the program and delete my SD card partition ( which is in a card reader)
3) Created a FAT32 primary partition of 69xx MB and left the rest 1024 MB for the other unallocated space
4) Right click on the Unallocated Space to create an EXT3 as primary partition with the default cluster size.
5) At this point, it showed 2 partition on my SD, one with the drive letter for windows FAT32, and the 2nd one Ext 3 with 1GB and Primary. Clicked OK and Apply and wait for it to complete.
6) once complete , put it in phone, plugged usb and ran adb shell
7) ran a2sd --enable, it said reboot phone.. i made a mistake to reboot by adb the first time but then did the whole process again a 2nd time using reboot from the phone....
Tried logcat using this command "adb -d logcat>mylogfile.txt"
couldnt find the file anywhere ... if i dont redirect to the txt , it goes too fast to read and there's soo much debug messages what do i need to look for?
I thought it would save me time to get it done through windows... but its taking me as much time it w0uld probably get me with the manual way...
i'll give it a try tomorrow...
8) rebooted fine, and i was still low on space.. so went back in adb sheel to check a2sd --free but this is where it says not active..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Tbh I'm really not sure. One thing I forgot to mention in the guide is that you should assign a drive letter to the FAT32 partition or it won't show up in Windows. I didn't assign one to my EXT4 partition though, and DATA2SD is working great for me. Try deleting all partitions from the SD card and start again. It'll only take 10 minutes, and if it still doesn't work just use the manual way.
Sorry.
alexhtclegend said:
Tbh I'm really not sure. One thing I forgot to mention in the guide is that you should assign a drive letter to the FAT32 partition or it won't show up in Windows. I didn't assign one to my EXT4 partition though, and DATA2SD is working great for me. Try deleting all partitions from the SD card and start again. It'll only take 10 minutes, and if it still doesn't work just use the manual way.
Sorry.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah i assigned a drive letter to FAT32...
Also the FAT32 , was my first block allocated partition, the 2nd partition was EXT3... i will redo the whole process and recreate EXT4 instead.
"DATA2SD is working great for me" ... you mean "A2SD working great for me" ... right? unless i'm missing something else that i needed to run..
ps: I recalled, after it was not working, i took out the sd and put it back in the reader to open MiniTool, it showed EXT2 instead of EXT3 ( which i was sure i chose )... and what's weird is it was reporting used space like 41MB... so obvisouly, the ROM wrote something on it...
Formatting it again to EXT3, didnt delete the 41 Used space, but it did convert it back to EXT3 ...probably nothing but mentioning as well
QkSi1ver said:
Yeah i assigned a drive letter to FAT32...
Also the FAT32 , was my first block allocated partition, the 2nd partition was EXT3... i will redo the whole process and recreate EXT4 instead.
"DATA2SD is working great for me" ... you mean "A2SD working great for me" ... right? unless i'm missing something else that i needed to run..
ps: I recalled, after it was not working, i took out the sd and put it back in the reader to open MiniTool, it showed EXT2 instead of EXT3 ( which i was sure i chose )... and what's weird is it was reporting used space like 41MB... so obvisouly, the ROM wrote something on it...
Formatting it again to EXT3, didnt delete the 41 Used space, but it did convert it back to EXT3 ...probably nothing but mentioning as well
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I suggest you start over, something seems to have gone wrong.
A2SD is where the apps are stored on the EXT partition.
DC2SD is where the dalvik cache is also stored on the EXT partition.
DATA2SD is where the entire /data partition on the phone is stored on the EXT partition of the memory card.
Partitioning the SD card with a FAT32 partition and EXT partition is done first, then you decide which one is for you. DATA2SD does have one or two issues, such as the risk of corruption - you'd then have to completely reinstall the ROM. A2SD and DC2SD are fine but I still found myself running out of internal memory.
i gave up and used ROM Manager to create my partition ...i couldnt set it to 1G because 512MB is maximum but it was painless to create.
it asked me to create a swap partition... i've read somewhere that swap partition is useless or barely used in newer android os? do you guys have any swap partition if so how big are they?
Also, did you move Dalvik cache to sd? isnt it slower on SD? i mean shouldnt dalvik cache be on RAM whihc i assume is faster than any external sd?
thanks for your insight
QkSi1ver said:
i gave up and used ROM Manager to create my partition ...i couldnt set it to 1G because 512MB is maximum but it was painless to create.
it asked me to create a swap partition... i've read somewhere that swap partition is useless or barely used in newer android os? do you guys have any swap partition if so how big are they?
Also, did you move Dalvik cache to sd? isnt it slower on SD? i mean shouldnt dalvik cache be on RAM whihc i assume is faster than any external sd?
thanks for your insight
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I used the full DATA2SD, which includes Dalvik2SD.
ok so sorry for a double post but im having an issue partitioning.
32 gb card san disk brand new
primary Fat32 10gb
primary Ext2 rest of space
once mini tool is done it sats successful but shows the sd card as Bad disk?!?
is there somthing im doin wrong? is used this guide here http://forum.xda-developers.com/wiki/SD_card_partitioning
all help deeply appriciated
Acer Iconia Tab A110 rooted, Cwm, 4.1.2
Can you actually have a 22gb ext partition? This might be something to look into to see if you can do it.
Edit: this got me interested so I searched myself, yes you can but apparently it depends on the chosen block size and hardware limitations, so u may have an issue with either.
Sent from my Legend using xda app-developers app
alexhtclegend said:
Firstly, BlaY0 has a great tutorial on how to do this properly, I suggest you do that to learn something.
Secondly, I cannot confirm that this is 100% safe. BlaY0's method should be 99% safe, I don't know about this as it is all automatic. BlaY0's method is tried and tested, this is not. I only used this method as I had a new SD card and I was in a hurry (exams coming up ) and I didn't have time to remind myself of BlaY0's method, and CWM only allows you to create up to 512mb partition. Also, I had a new computer, and I don't have time to set up ADB all over again.
Anyway, this is a method for people who don't want to use ADB to partition their SD card for A2EXT or DATA2EXT (a.k.a. apps2sd, etc etc), and are using Windows. If you're running linux, you could use something like gParted to partition it, not sure about OS X though. This method will allow a Windows user to create an EXT partition on their SD card alongside the FAT partition.
1) Download and install Minitool Partition Wizard, from here.
2) Open the program and delete all partitions from the SD card (which you will have inserted into the computer using an adapter or something). DO NOT DELETE THE PARTITIONS FROM THE HARD DISK! MAKE SURE YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DELETING. Oh, and make sure the SD card is backed up
3) Create a FAT32 primary partition. You decide how big you want it, but I'd advise you leave 1024mb (1gb) for the EXT partition.
4) Create an EXT2/EXT3/EXT4 (you decide) primary partition. Use up the rest of the space on the SD card.
5) Click assign/OK/whatever and wait for it to complete
6) You now have your partitioned SD card ready for an A2SD ROM!
7) You need to assign a drive letter to the FAT32 partition. Not sure about the EXT partition. At first I forgot to do this and my card didn't show up in Windows, though Partition Magic can still see it.
Like I said, do yourself a favour and use BlaY0's method here, but if you're lazy or you don't have time or ADB doesn't work anymore, use this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hahah! Thanks for you detail guide. It is so helpful for me!

[Q] HELP TY

CM7 can make you install apps on the sd card, how does it differ from app2sd or app2ext? i have been trying to decide if i should partition my new sd card or its not necessary. There must be an advantage to have app2ext right?
Thank you.
CM7 basically allows you to move all applications using Froyo's app2sd mode. Even ones that have disabled it (like live wallpapers and widgets as those won't work when installed that way).
app2sdext works differently as it will install apps directly to an ext partition on your sdcard (that you manually have to set up). This functionality is NOT build into CyanogenMod, but is easily added with a number of different apps/scripts. This will give you a lot more free space on your phone, and all apps can be installed there regardless of whether they have widgets or have services running. Most app2sdext options will also give you the option of moving the dalvik cache to the sdcard which will save you a substantial amount of space on your internal memory.
Basically, if you want a lot of memory intensive apps, your only decent option with a Nexus One is an app2sdext solution. (I have it with a 1GB partition, and I will soon either need to resize it or delete apps... adding app2sdext was the second best thing I ever did to my phone behind installing CyanogenMod on it.)
bassmadrigal said:
CM7 basically allows you to move all applications using Froyo's app2sd mode. Even ones that have disabled it (like live wallpapers and widgets as those won't work when installed that way).
app2sdext works differently as it will install apps directly to an ext partition on your sdcard (that you manually have to set up). This functionality is NOT build into CyanogenMod, but is easily added with a number of different apps/scripts. This will give you a lot more free space on your phone, and all apps can be installed there regardless of whether they have widgets or have services running. Most app2sdext options will also give you the option of moving the dalvik cache to the sdcard which will save you a substantial amount of space on your internal memory.
Basically, if you want a lot of memory intensive apps, your only decent option with a Nexus One is an app2sdext solution. (I have it with a 1GB partition, and I will soon either need to resize it or delete apps... adding app2sdext was the second best thing I ever did to my phone behind installing CyanogenMod on it.)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
why didnt i think of that? thank you for your reply... now i should decide whether to do it now or wait till i have reached maybe about a hundred apps. by the way does it have any effect on the speed of the phone if you do that?
I am on cm7 and decided to put cache apps on sd card using ta utility is there any other new apps like that? ta
Can you do this with rooted stock?
lolobabes said:
why didnt i think of that? thank you for your reply... now i should decide whether to do it now or wait till i have reached maybe about a hundred apps. by the way does it have any effect on the speed of the phone if you do that?
I am on cm7 and decided to put cache apps on sd card using ta utility is there any other new apps like that? ta
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have a class 4 32GB card, and I didn't notice any appreciable difference in speed. I have moved my apps and dalvik cache to the sdcard using DarkTremor's a2sd. I currently have 260 apps installed on my phone, and that is pushing the internal phone space and the 1GB partition I set up for ext. I am about to bug danger-rat for his instructions on how he resized his internal partitions to give the data residing on the phone more space (I will basically shrink the cache partition and I am looking at resizing my ext partition to 1.5GB or 2GB.
I couldn't live without this anymore. I don't know how I went so long without it. It is so nice to just browse the online market and click install on countless apps without worrying about your space.
If you want to try and move the app data (resides in /data/data) to the sdcard, I have heard that it is recommended to have a class 10 card to keep up with speed requirements. I am not sure how many apps support that.
brettbellaire said:
Can you do this with rooted stock?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I believe you can. You would have to have a custom recovery. The main thing I am not sure is if it will mount the ext partition. If you have a custom recovery, do a nandroid backup (just in case it doesn't work), flash the zip for DarkTremor, and reboot the phone (the first boot will take longer).
brettbellaire said:
Can you do this with rooted stock?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes you can.
bassmadrigal said:
I have a class 4 32GB card, and I didn't notice any appreciable difference in speed. I have moved my apps and dalvik cache to the sdcard using DarkTremor's a2sd. I currently have 260 apps installed on my phone, and that is pushing the internal phone space and the 1GB partition I set up for ext. I am about to bug danger-rat for his instructions on how he resized his internal partitions to give the data residing on the phone more space (I will basically shrink the cache partition and I am looking at resizing my ext partition to 1.5GB or 2GB.
I couldn't live without this anymore. I don't know how I went so long without it. It is so nice to just browse the online market and click install on countless apps without worrying about your space.
If you want to try and move the app data (resides in /data/data) to the sdcard, I have heard that it is recommended to have a class 10 card to keep up with speed requirements. I am not sure how many apps support that.
I believe you can. You would have to have a custom recovery. The main thing I am not sure is if it will mount the ext partition. If you have a custom recovery, do a nandroid backup (just in case it doesn't work), flash the zip for DarkTremor, and reboot the phone (the first boot will take longer).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks for the reply i think i read on darktremors post class 4 will do for the data2sd. I have class 4 16GB sd card would 1GB good for the ext? ty
It really depends on how much you think you will be installing. I did a 1GB partition on mine, but now that I install most of the Amazon free daily apps, that space is dwindling quickly. I have programs that will resize the partition for me, but most will have to wipe the card and partition it manually. I do have the install location set to automatic, so it allows developers to specify whether they want it in the "internal" (really it is on the sdext partition, but to the phone it is internal) or external using the froyo method. The Angry Bird apps all default to install on the sdcard, so my installed app base is even larger than 1GB.
bassmadrigal said:
... adding app2sdext was the second best thing I ever did to my phone behind installing CyanogenMod on it.)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I second this
Sent from my Nexus One using XDA App
is it true that cwm sets the partition to ext3 by default? unlike in ra recovery where you still need to convert it? ta
I have heard that it creates it in ext3, but right now, DTa2sd is showing that it is a ext2 partition. I can't figure out how to find out for sure while the card is in the phone. Either way, it is getting mounted as an ext2 partition.
temasek said:
I thought CWM will create ext3 by default? Your steps are ok, np.
Anyway when u read the ext partition type in android, most likely u will see ext2 if u are using official DT script cuz of the auto syntax it uses.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
then it maybe so, this was posted on the darktremor thread
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=14134665#post14134665
Well, whether or not it is formatted as an ext3 partition, Android is still mounting mine as an ext2 partition.
Code:
mount | grep ext
NOTE: the "|" is called a pipe. On the keyboard it is the shift option on the backslash key "\". I don't know exactly where it is on the stock keyboard, but on swype it is located under the "D" key when the keyboard has the shift key pressed and you access it by longpressing.
To get your sdcard to ext3, you just need to turn on journaling. You can do this through adb while in the recovery (because you need the partition unmounted to do this).
Code:
adb reboot recovery
adb shell
mount system
e2fsk /dev/block/mmcblk0p2
tune2fs -j /dev/block/mmcblk0p2
reboot
Supposedly Android should auto-mount this as ext3 on boot (which you can check with the first command). At that point, I don't think it will matter what a2sd shows. As the writing of the journal (the big thing with ext3, since it helps minimize write errors on a bad shutdown) is done at the OS level, not the a2sd level.

[Q] Convert SDCard to MainMem so External_SD becomes SDCard?

Hi there,
Is there a way to make the add the internal SD card to the main memmory? So that there would not be an internal SD card anymore?
I do not mean swapping the moutpoints around so my External_SD becomes my primary and my internal my second....
I want to get rid of the internal one alltogether (adding it to main memory).
I figure that I'll have to format the storage in a certain way... would that do it?
Can someone tell me step by step what to do?
I do have CW-mod installed.
I did search the forum, but couldnt find anything conclusive. Just hints that it should be possible...
If there already is a thread where all this is explained, please point me to it, because I couldn't find it.
Thanks,
Pfeffa-rah
I don't think this is possible , never heard of someone who did it
I have no idea how to do that. My question is... why would you want to do that?
Having an internal_sd partition adds the benefit of having big app data (such as those in Gameloft games) sit in a very fast partition and still be called "sddata".
Also, it's mountable via PC so everything in there can still be backed up. So it's best of both worlds really.
This was discussed some time ago in this thread: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1013575
There were ideas on how to remount the cards at boot. I myself come to the conclusion that since more phones start to behave in this way, app developers will have to start dealing with it. It just sucks they are mostly slow on the uptake. My main problem was the Spotify cache location being hard coded so I resorted to hack the Spotify apk.
PS. salisbury_steak: What is it with people like you that every time someone has a question on how to do something, your immediate response is "But why would you want to do that?!".
sorech said:
PS. salisbury_steak: What is it with people like you that every time someone has a question on how to do something, your immediate response is "But why would you want to do that?!".
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That was actually an honest question.
I wanted to understand why he wanted to do it. (i.e. What would be the advantages of it.) There was no supposed sarcasm in there.
how about the ability to install 5x more applications?
Having that stupid 5gb partition as sd card and the real sd card as a sub folder is retarded...
My 32GB class 10 cars is a lot faster than the internal one.
The internal 5gb memory is MUCH TOO SMALL!!! Most apps don't allow you to store data on the external card. If you like me and many others install some games that download aditional data + a nav app that downloads maps for europe + some streaming music app like wimp that can cache music for offline play then you are ****ed with LG's setup.
The setup CM7 uses solves the main problem but effectively wastes the 5gb by mounting it at emmc where like 0,0001% of apps are able to access it.
So adding those otherwise wasted 5gb to the main memory would be great. But i have not seen any solution to that yet :-(
Thank you Gensplejs for explaining that to them. I had no idea how to reply to that since it seemed so obvious to me.
This thread was ment to be a question about how to do it and not to discuss the usefullness of it. That is where I lost the way in other threads...
So, thanks for your replys all (realy).
But now, back On-Topic:
How would I do it?
Sent from my LG-P990 using XDA Premium App
Please don't blame me if you tried it and you screwed up your phone.. It's your choice...
Well, I don't know if this would work, but this is how I would do it (accepting the fact that I'd loose almost 2GB of /data's free space):
1. Format your internal sd card to the same file system as your /data partition is (ext3 or ext4)
2. Copy every file from /data 1:1 to your sdcard (cp -R /data/* /sdcard)
3. I don't know when and where the partitions are mounted (maybe init.rc??)...anyways change the target there and let /data point to the internal sd card partition (so it is ensured that it is mounted automatically to the new location)
4. Reboot and keep your fingers crossed
I think i figured how to do it in theory. First we need some free space at our microsd to cp /data. Then we should repartition with fdisk /dev/block/mmcblk0p8 and p9 into one partition and change vold.fstab to mount only externalsd at /sdcard as we do when we swap partitions. In theory it should work but i cant test it right now or make a script since ve gone vacations and i dont have a pc to restore in case of error
I agree.. certain apps wont store to sdcard.. its better to use the whole 8gb as phone storage, and use external sdcard as default sdcard.
Sent from my LG-P990 using XDA App
What ive found till now is that sd swapping is easy. You can do it by tweaking only vold.fstab. But repatriationing is a pain in the ass. Looks like lg has "faulty" partitions or something and to do it you must mesh up with with almost half partitions.
I had to rebuilt boot lgdrm recovery data and sdcard to make em half work. So it probably isnt worth the trouble. Also I think init.rc is built on the boot. So just remounting internal sd to /data wont work either.
sectors is not space
it says 7996, so thats 8GB
i saw it in hurry. the brain sometimes belives whats he want to belive
sorry
New to XDA
Hello everybody,
I'm new to android and i'm trying to find out how to solve the problem posted in this thread.
I see you've got the awnser but i don't know how to do this.
I've been searching google and XDA for ever but i just can't find the awnser.
Could you make a step by step howto or point out to a post how to do this.
I mean converting your external sd to ext4 and change the mounting points.
I'm a complete nood, i didn't get adb to work on my pc, ext4 recovery is not for the p990 2x.
I've read something abbout changing fstap for swapping te mounting points for sdcard and emmc, witch is also ok for me, but formating to ext4... wel i frankly don't know how to do this.
I'm quite stuk on this.
The only partitioning experience i've got is Gparted in Ubuntu or repartitioning in Windows 7.
Thans in andvance!
Greetz,
JMG
http://android.modaco.com/topic/347...-partitions/page__gopid__1821791#entry1821791
check this
you can expand data partition , but there is a limitation of 1.75gb
Thanks davjan
Thanks davjan,
As far i can see it's indeed not worth it.
I wil have to go on and try to find out how to change the filesystem to ext4 and swap the internal and external sd.
That way i get more usable space instead of a big datastorage witch cannot contain program data.
But thanks for the quick reply.
Jean Michel Gaar said:
Thanks davjan,
As far i can see it's indeed not worth it.
I wil have to go on and try to find out how to change the filesystem to ext4 and swap the internal and external sd.
That way i get more usable space instead of a big datastorage witch cannot contain program data.
But thanks for the quick reply.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
what rom are you using? is your phone rooted?
swapping internal with internal sd is very easy
and most of the roms here on xda are ext4 , if you instal one of them they autoconvert to ext4
Jean Michel Gaar said:
Thanks davjan,
As far i can see it's indeed not worth it.
I wil have to go on and try to find out how to change the filesystem to ext4 and swap the internal and external sd.
That way i get more usable space instead of a big datastorage witch cannot contain program data.
But thanks for the quick reply.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I you read the link provided you'll see that it makes what you want: grow internal filesystem = lower SDcard usable space. The only thing is that it doesn't seem possible is to use the whole space: system limitation. 75Markus tried high /system and /data values and phone didn't work.
See in his Mediafire Folder, 'Nvflash + guide for changing Partitions:
http://www.mediafire.com/75markus
Ext4 is now common with custom ROMs (in fact all of them).
You should search in sd-ext partition system, which was designed to artificially expand filesystem on older phones using an 'ext' partition. I didn't heard anybody using this on O2X.
If you use CyanogenMod based ROMs, your external card will be mounted ad /sdcard by default.
Switching internal and external SD
Thanks guy's,
I'll check it out.
I've been using cyanogenmod 7.1 stable with vorkkernel 20110208.
But that gave me batterydrains while using maps and nextvid ate the same time (while i'm driving).
Now i'm trying MIUI 1.11.11 with latest swift extreme.
But MIUI is very buggy so i'm thinking of going back to CM.
The only thing is that my phone won't boot with the latest vorkkernel.

Categories

Resources