Is 4GB enough? How many apps can you have?

[kittshelby]

I want to buy the 8S for my sister. She's not a big app user but I heard that of the 4GB, only 1.6GB or so is available. That's VERY LIMITED. Can someone who has the 8S let me know if you are finding the 4GB to be limiting? Have you used it all up already?

I could also buy my sister the newly announced Nokia 620, but I think the 8S looks much better.

 

[Aliandren]

apps don't take up much space by themselves, but you will still have a hard time loading a lot on this phone. I've loaded up a lot of apps on my 8x and this is how my storage looks:

Base: 16 GB
Formatted: 14.56 GB
Music: 8 GB
Apps: 700 MB
System: 1.93 GB
Other: 1.96 GB

That leaves me with about 2 GB free for flexibility with new items i'll want to add. On an 8s, after formatting and OS you'll be left with just 1.6 GB free. This doesn't give you much room to load apps/email, and will make it next to impossible to download offline maps for a GPS navigation app. At least with the SD card slot you'll be able to save your music, pictures, and video straight to that.

Overall I'd say it is possible to get by with a 4GB WP8 as long as you put a micro-SD card in proportional to your media demands. If you're **** bent on getting this phone it won't be the worst decision you ever made. Though if you're just looking for a budget phone you'd probably be better served with a Lumia 620 or reduced cost WP 7.8 capable device.

 

[richard_c]

I made a post on another thread about what you could fit on the 8S. Here is a list of apps I will be having on my 8S.
ve gone through the Windows Store and looked at all the apps I want if I choose to switch from my iPhone 4 to the HTC 8S and wrote down the size of each app I want. Here is a list of all the apps and the total space they would take up.

ALARM CLOCK 8MB
BBC NEWS 1MB
METRO 1MB
WEATHER 4MB
TRAVEL 3MB
WEAVE 3MB
FACEBOOK 4MB
ROWI (TWITTER) 3MB
INSTAGRAM (DAS IMAGE, METROGRAM, MTERO.AM) 3MB
FLIXSTER 1MB
LINKED IN 1MB
BACONIT (REDDIT) 1MB
EBAY 2MB
FLASHLIGHT 1MB
WHATS APP 4MB
PAYPAL 5MB
GUITAR TUNER 2MB
REMOTE 2MB
SAT NAV 4MB
UK DEALS 2MB
METROTUBE 1MB
SOUNDHOUND 2MB
IMDB 1MB
WIKIPEDIA 2MB
TV GUIDE 1MB
TED 1MB
AMAZON 2MB
ALL RECIPIES 6MB
DOMINOS PIZZA 1MB
ARTIST INFO 1MB
WPCENTRAL 1MB
NEXT BUS 1MB
TV SHOW 2MB
WIKITUDE 2MB
FOODSPOTTING 1MB
DRAW SOMETHING 7MB
WORDS WITH FRIENDS 8MB
ANGRY BIRDS 20MB
CUT THE ROPE 31MB
FRUIT NINJA 19MB
DOODBLE JUMP 7MB
PLANTS VS ZOMBIES 82MB
TETRIS 10MB
GRAVITY GUY 20MB
GEO DEFENSE SWARM 4MB
BULLET ASYLUM 16MB

As you can see that total 305MB, now I know with the SatNav download maps will make it more and im guessing games will cache information too. So 47 apps and its taken up less than the 1.6GB free. The thing that will make this phone a no go is if you like having alot of games on your phone

 

[Aliandren]

Games, or email & files. You cannot download email attachments to the media card (security feature as the media card does not natively support encryption). This is a pretty decent phone for low end cost but if you plan on keeping it for a few years I'd seriously look at paying the extra $200 to get an 8x. Storage is kind of a toss up since you won't get micro-sd slot, but you won't have to pay for a micro-sd either. Mostly I'm thinking as the 8s gets long in the tooth you'll be missing that extra 512 RAM and increased CPU speed. It's still a solid phone overall though & WP8 OS is very smooth.

 

[richard_c]

I dont see the 512MB RAM a problem as I have an iPhone 4 that has 512MB and it runs everything and I expect the same from WP8. As for e-mails. I genereally delete e-mails as I read them on my phone because I have no need to keep them I think the phone will need you to keep on top of apps and file management with the limited amount of space but I think for the price its a great mid range phone, better than any android mid range phone.

 

[MrJibe]

I just bought the HTC 8s. I'm really dissapointed with the storage, only 1,3 GB available. The most important app on my old HTC Radar is the GPS app Navigon Europe. I'm not able to download the maps because of the storage limitations!

 

[richard_c]

Do you have to download the maps? I use free satnav apps on my iphone and never need to download the maps.

 

[MrJibe]

Europe is different. I live in Belgium and in half a hour driving I can be in 2 other countries. Data connection is quite expensive abroad, so I need a solution with offline maps.

 

[JimboJones2268]

Can you not store the maps on an SD Card? Seems like something that might be possible...?

 

[kittshelby]

I made a post on another thread about what you could fit on the 8S. Here is a list of apps I will be having on my 8S.
ve gone through the Windows Store and looked at all the apps I want if I choose to switch from my iPhone 4 to the HTC 8S and wrote down the size of each app I want. Here is a list of all the apps and the total space they would take up.

ALARM CLOCK 8MB
BBC NEWS 1MB
METRO 1MB
WEATHER 4MB
TRAVEL 3MB
WEAVE 3MB
FACEBOOK 4MB
ROWI (TWITTER) 3MB
INSTAGRAM (DAS IMAGE, METROGRAM, MTERO.AM) 3MB
FLIXSTER 1MB
LINKED IN 1MB
BACONIT (REDDIT) 1MB
EBAY 2MB
FLASHLIGHT 1MB
WHATS APP 4MB
PAYPAL 5MB
GUITAR TUNER 2MB
REMOTE 2MB
SAT NAV 4MB
UK DEALS 2MB
METROTUBE 1MB
SOUNDHOUND 2MB
IMDB 1MB
WIKIPEDIA 2MB
TV GUIDE 1MB
TED 1MB
AMAZON 2MB
ALL RECIPIES 6MB
DOMINOS PIZZA 1MB
ARTIST INFO 1MB
WPCENTRAL 1MB
NEXT BUS 1MB
TV SHOW 2MB
WIKITUDE 2MB
FOODSPOTTING 1MB
DRAW SOMETHING 7MB
WORDS WITH FRIENDS 8MB
ANGRY BIRDS 20MB
CUT THE ROPE 31MB
FRUIT NINJA 19MB
DOODBLE JUMP 7MB
PLANTS VS ZOMBIES 82MB
TETRIS 10MB
GRAVITY GUY 20MB
GEO DEFENSE SWARM 4MB
BULLET ASYLUM 16MB

As you can see that total 305MB, now I know with the SatNav download maps will make it more and im guessing games will cache information too. So 47 apps and its taken up less than the 1.6GB free. The thing that will make this phone a no go is if you like having alot of games on your phone

Just to you let you know, I'm pretty sure that's not how it works. Yes, you add up the app size, but many apps also download data (news, TV Show app, etc) and will actually take up much much more memory than their original size. For example, the TV Show app is only like 2 MB or so. But once you add your shows (I don't know how many shows you have, but I have like 15 tv shows, so once I add in all my shows, that will probably be up to 50 mb or more I suspect). Likewise with news apps, when they download news articles and pictures, it's going to take up much more room. So your 300MB of apps/games may end up taking up a lot more than just that. And that is why I'm worried about the 1.6GB left in the 8S.

As I posted, I'm buying this for my sister, and the 8X is too big for her. The only other solution would be the new Nokia 620, but who knows when that going to be released here in Canada?? She really wants a phone this Christmas.

 

[richard_c]

I understand what you're saying but from my understanding and I may be wrong but that kind of information isn't stored. Like with the BBC news app, you need to be hooked up to the internet to get the information, to knowledge you may be using data to download the information onto your screen but surely that information isn't stored on your phone? A news app like that has new news all the time so its loaded as and when you use the app and then after that its gone, because that would mean overtime an app like the BBC news app could take up gigs if you used it for years and even a 16GB phone wouldn't have enough storage?

Also with the TV app its just a streaming app to watch live TV, I'm not downloading anything to be stored on my phone per say, I'm just streaming the video and then when the apps closed its gone.

I bought an 8S today and ill app all the above apps as report back on how it goes.

EDIT: Oh ****, Ive just checked my iPhone and yeah apps do hold more data as they use them which sucks balls, may have to return the phone as 1.3GB is bloody tight for apps and I dont use a lot of apps as shown above.

 

[richard_c]

Also is there a way to delete app data if it does that?

Would deleting the app and then reinstalling it get it of all the stored data?

 

[kittshelby]

I understand what you're saying but from my understanding and I may be wrong but that kind of information isn't stored. Like with the BBC news app, you need to be hooked up to the internet to get the information, to knowledge you may be using data to download the information onto your screen but surely that information isn't stored on your phone? A news app like that has new news all the time so its loaded as and when you use the app and then after that its gone, because that would mean overtime an app like the BBC news app could take up gigs if you used it for years and even a 16GB phone wouldn't have enough storage?

Also with the TV app its just a streaming app to watch live TV, I'm not downloading anything to be stored on my phone per say, I'm just streaming the video and then when the apps closed its gone.

I bought an 8S today and ill app all the above apps as report back on how it goes.

EDIT: Oh ****, Ive just checked my iPhone and yeah apps do hold more data as they use them which sucks balls, may have to return the phone as 1.3GB is bloody tight for apps and I dont use a lot of apps as shown above.

Some news apps, like Weave, will cache the current news for offline reading. They will be deleted once new news comes in so it won't store all the news forever, but cached news will still take up memory.

 

[kittshelby]

Also is there a way to delete app data if it does that?

Would deleting the app and then reinstalling it get it of all the stored data?

Also, out of curiosity, did you get your HTC 8S from Virgin Mobile in Canada?

 

[richard_c]

Also, out of curiosity, did you get your HTC 8S from Virgin Mobile in Canada?

I got my phone from Phones4U in the UK.

 

[richard_c]

So today I have been loading apps and downloading a few games onto my new HTC 8S. So far the phone runs really smooth and fast.

I got 1.26Gb of psace left when I got the phone but deleted some built in HTC apps which I wont need to free up more space.

Ive amanged to install: facebook mobile, rowi, baconit, bbc news, weave, weather, ebay, paypal, metrotube,flixster, tv guide, sound hound, flashlight, screenrush, wikipedia, ted, vattery metre, alarm clock, guitar tuner, cut the rope and 3 other free games. So far I have 522MB free.

Going how much it drops down with a weeks use to see if this is a phone I want to keep, didnt think it would be this limited app wise.

 

[richard_c]

So the phone went back and I got a full refund. The phone and OS were excellent but the 1.3GB of storage took the piss. HTC really f**ked up with this one.

 

[corsica]

i wonder why it's not possible to install stuf onto the sd card. would solve everything for this phone

 

[richard_c]

I wish for that too but sadly it cant be done :-(

It annoys me when people say this is a low end phone because its not. Its a mid range phone but HTC gave it a low end phone amount of storage which is stupid! I don't even get what a low end phone would only get 1.GB of free space. **** even if after install the OS you have 4GB of actual space that would be enough. Its really annoying me as I want a Windows Phone but they are all the size of house bricks! The only 2 with a 4" screen are the 8S and W1 but both only have "4GB" of storage.

 

[corsica]

well there's hope for the lumia 620, although, by the time it actually released, the next generation of wp devices is on the horizon...