how to reduce size of Other Storage!!!

[Digibrush]

Hi, I am new here. Using Lumia 640 xl for few days, installed 64gb microsd. Other storage of my phone occupied more than 12gb of external storage. I there any way I can free that?

 

[ttsoldier]

hard reset is the only way

 

[Digibrush]

Thanks for your answare. Is there any file manager that I can access those file from my pc?

 

[Derausgewanderte]

You could also try to format the SDCard instead of hard reset. You'd have to backup everything from the card first of course.
There is a way of accessing hidden windows folder on the sdcard, but it would require you to interop unlock your phone and use a file manager to dig. If you don't know what you are doing you may render your phone useless though.

A hard reset may be your best option if the format doesn't work.

Curious why 'other storage' on the SDCard got that large - odd. Even if a temporary OS download gets interrupted it shouldn't take more than 2Gb.

 

[Digibrush]

Thanks you for your answer in detail. ' interop unlock' is not my way because i am just a noob.
Actually I m using a 32 gb sd card for few days, but I decide to chage it to 64gb. I move back all the apps from SD to phone memory, all documents and photos tranfer to PC. Switich off the phone, insert new 64gb sd, switich on the phone and move all apps to SD and all other files tranfer back to SD from my PC.
I noticed SD card other storage took 5+gb then...but after using for few days its reach to 12+ gb.
I clear temporary files but its only reduce few MBs.

Almost same story about phone merory other storage also,Its took 500+mb, but after clearing temporary files it reduce to 190mb.

 

[Derausgewanderte]

well, it seems then that one of the apps' isolated storage is taking up a lot of space for something - maybe maps? do you have a 3rd party map app installed (like waze, copilot)? If it was my phone I'd try to get to the bottom of this by uninstalling apps that are on the SDCard one-by-one and reboot each time to see when that 12Gb goes down. You may find the culprit that way. If you do you can reinstall the other apps again.

good luck

 

[Digibrush]

Thanks.
No, I am not using 3rd party map app. Only using this phone for about 20 days. Install few apps like Fresh Paint, Vlc,Google,Comicana, Whatsapp and few Lumia camera apps. I dont even install any game still now.
Ok I will Do the same as you advice and reinstall all apps later. But one question should I uninstall those app came with the phone ? Or only what I downloaded?

 

[Derausgewanderte]

I suggest only the ones that you downloaded first. Some of the apps that come with the phone are difficult to find in the store and difficult to re-install once they are gone. Maybe move the ones that came with the phone back to the device.

btw. are you running 8.1 update 2 or latest build of windows 10 mobile?

I highly recommend installing the latest build. W10M will be released soon. Your problem may disappear with the update.

 

[Digibrush]

Thanks!
I am running 8.1 update 2. Always wanted to upgrade to win 10. But the risk factors thats what I afraid for. Is it easy? what should I do If anything bad happen?

 

[Derausgewanderte]

Thanks!
I am running 8.1 update 2. Always wanted to upgrade to win 10. But the risk factors thats what I afraid for. Is it easy? what should I do If anything bad happen?

It is easy. Install Windows Insider, subscribe to Fast Ring (right now the latest build is available on both fast and slow), reboot the phone and go to updates. It will update your phone to W10M 10586.11. It will take some time to get all your apps updated.

You also may decide to wait until it is officially released OTA within the next couple weeks.

If something bad happens you can go back to 8.1 update 2 via windows device recovery tool.

 

[Digibrush]

Thanks for those info. Dont think that I would have enough courage to go through with it. But If I update with W10M 10856.11, will my phone(forgive my ignorance) also get final official realase too?

 

[Digibrush]

Surprisingly this morning I found other storage of my SD card reduce to 9+GB from 12+GB. I just did nothing between this exept adding few movies on SD card.

 

[Derausgewanderte]

hmm, maybe the OS is dynamically adjusting that space for whatever reason. Interesting. PS. I believe we should be able to simply update to the final release build of W10M once available. Maybe a hard reset is required.

 

[Digibrush]

Thanks. So you suggest me to hard reset now, or before upgrade to final release build of W10M? I dont face any other issues.

 

[Derausgewanderte]

Thanks. So you suggest me to hard reset now, or before upgrade to final release build of W10M? I dont face any other issues.

if you decided to wait for the final release and you think the other storage on the SDCard is not a major issue I suggest you just wait until the release goes OTA. Just observe do nothing else.


If the other storage is a problem for some reason (e.g. running out of space, the card doesn't take any more data etc.) then I suggest you do the steps suggested above in order of pain level. I think it's easy to try and uninstall or move some apps to see if it is really an app causing the other storage on the SDCard to go up. If nothing is left on the SDCard I would try the format (while in the phone, using the storage app). If that all doesn't solve the problem the next step is to do a hard reset.

You still want to wait for the final release of W10M. You do not have to do a hard reset do get the update. It may be recommended to do a hard reset if you have issues after the W10M update.

Currently I have no problems on W10M on my and my wife's 640XL

cheers

 

[Digibrush]

Things are getting better...
Today I found other storage of my sd is taken only 2.88gb space. I exactly doing nothing.
It was 9.29 on 27th and 12+gb on 26th.

 

[Digibrush]

Finally SD card other storage is zero bytes now :excited:

 

[Derausgewanderte]

cool, it's the ghost in the machine

 

[Digibrush]

cool, it's the ghost in the machine

Lol!