[homieson89]

8.12gb to be exact is what the "other" category is taking when looking at my phones memory storage, nokia lumia 920.
Microsoft should do something about this. Any way to minimize this without hard resetting or restoring?
Thanks.

[James8561]

agree. the other category takes up 3.01 GB on mine. over 2x any category.
what is this microsoft

[jakem1]

Isn't that taken up by things like email?

[jaj324]

Mine is staying right on 1.35 gigs.
Sent from my AT&T 8x using Board Express

[jlynnm350z]

4.3 for me? ? ?

[Mystictrust]

There currently seems to be no way other than hard reset. Microsoft needs to fix this.

Source:
http://forums.windowscentral.com/win...e-section.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/win...-category.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/win...e-storage.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/htc...-5-gb-now.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/win...r-dilemma.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/win...illing-me.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/win...memory-go.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/win...ree-space.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/win...-5gig-now.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/nok...1-storage.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/htc...g-storage.html

[conanheath]

MS needs to get off their collective a$$es and get moving. If they want to put out half baked, Swiss cheese software they better be prepared to fix more than one problem a quarter. BB is going to kick MS out of the way if MS doesn't get moving with some updates. The consumers won't wait for a yearly update or one fix a quarter. MS needs to get ahead of the curve to have a chance and stay there.

[johninsj]

agree. the other category takes up 3.01 GB on mine. over 2x any category.
what is this microsoft

It's everything else that isn't broken out specifically. Could be anything you've put on your phone app wise. Email, documents, one note notebooks, app data, etc.

Oh, at least half of my Other is downloaded maps.

[conanheath]

It's everything else that isn't broken out specifically. Could be anything you've put on your phone app wise. Email, documents, one note notebooks, app data, etc.

Oh, at least half of my Other is downloaded maps.

I have over 5gb of other. I know for a fact there is more in there than my misc app data. I don't have that much on my phone. If that's all it is than MS needs to work on some compression in the OS. Or at least give access to it so we can decide what is necessary for us. This iPhone approach is the exact reason I will never own an Apple product. I want to know what is there and where it is.

[johninsj]

I want to know what is there and where it is.

Get used to disappointment.

Seriously, it's not exposed, and each app is sandboxed, so only the OS would be able to tell you, and it's not. Try a soft reset to see if it cleans up some temp data (that's when such crap is cleared off of iPhones)

[conanheath]

Get used to disappointment.

Seriously, it's not exposed, and each app is sandboxed, so only the OS would be able to tell you, and it's not. Try a soft reset to see if it cleans up some temp data (that's when such crap is cleared off of iPhones)

Soft reset doesn't change anything. So you're telling me I have to give up 5gb+ and room for OS (1.7gb if I remember) just to make this thing work? 32-7=25gb user space. I think mine was about 24gb last I checked. feel sorry for the people who bought HTC with only 8gb. I think its the HTC anyway?!?! And with SD card, can the OS off load other to SD card? With 8gb internal only and no ability to offload, I can see your phone being useless after 6months. What is the deal? If it was going to be this bloated, they should have made 16gb internal and SD slot a OS requirement.

[jaj324]

It's definitely NOT one note folders. I loaded up my 8x with OneNote folders today and my other stayed at
1.35. I think it's more likely IE history, call logs, SMS logs, etc...

It's everything else that isn't broken out specifically. Could be anything you've put on your phone app wise. Email, documents, one note notebooks, app data, etc.

Oh, at least half of my Other is downloaded maps.

Sent from my AT&T 8x using Board Express

[tissotti]

Listening above and everybody having different numbers it sounds like it could be partition for maybe installed apps? Are we sure it's actually taking any memory.

[Mystictrust]

Are we sure it's actually taking any memory.

Yes

[daelumia]

Relax, it's just the pdfs ;-)

[pdskep]

Has anyone run out of memory because of it? Maybe it's smart enough to release it if needed.

[Mystictrust]

Has anyone run out of memory because of it? Maybe it's smart enough to release it if needed.

Yep, I have. Couldn't install the Portico update because I had no space (it wanted like 450 Mb free or something). Funny that after a hard reset and subsequent restore of all the exact same apps I suddenly had tons of free space (about 3 Gb)

[GoodThings2Life]

"Other" includes any/all of the following: email account data, documents (be they attachments or storage cached from SkyDrive and SharePoint), browser history/cache, downloaded maps data, application settings/data (for example if an app downloads a lot of cached images for live tiles or lockscreen art, etc.), and pretty much all the non-categorized stuff. It sucks we can't "see" more specifics, and that's what I'd like to see improved, but my guess is you sync a lot of email data and attachments and/or maps and browser information. You could try the following:

• Settings > Applications > Internet Explorer > Delete History
• Settings > Applications > Maps > Delete History
• Settings > Applications > Search > Delete History
• Settings > Applications > Reset Office

I read a couple of the responses above and see things like "I only had 450MB free" (not picking on one person, just using an example) and think to myself, "WTF?! Remove some content, install update, and sync the content back again. YOU chose to install so many apps and content." Some of you are just complaining to complain because you want a piece of plastic and silicon to be smarter than you. "Gee, why can't I use my phone without consuming disk space?! WHAT?! YOU MEAN APPS TAKE UP SPACE?!" Good grief people, think!!

[johninsj]

Soft reset doesn't change anything. So you're telling me I have to give up 5gb+ and room for OS (1.7gb if I remember) just to make this thing work?

I'm saying you've used 5GB of space for app data that isn't one of the categories specifically broken out. But it's your data. If you hard reset your phone (clear it back to out of the box condition) then Other will be pretty much nothing. I'll post a shot when my refurb arrives next week, if you don't want to do it on yours.

You're not giving up anything, you're using the device.

[socialcarpet]

MS needs to get off their collective a$$es and get moving. If they want to put out half baked, Swiss cheese software they better be prepared to fix more than one problem a quarter. BB is going to kick MS out of the way if MS doesn't get moving with some updates. The consumers won't wait for a yearly update or one fix a quarter. MS needs to get ahead of the curve to have a chance and stay there.

Honestly this is one reason I am kind of happy to see Blackberry coming out swinging. I think it will press Microsoft to resolve some lingering issues and strive to innovate even more with Windows Phone. Competition almost always benefits the consumer.

[conanheath]

I'm saying you've used 5GB of space for app data that isn't one of the categories specifically broken out. But it's your data. If you hard reset your phone (clear it back to out of the box condition) then Other will be pretty much nothing. I'll post a shot when my refurb arrives next week, if you don't want to do it on yours.

You're not giving up anything, you're using the device.

I do understand it is my data but is it necessary? Or is it cached data since I got phone which is no longer necessary? I have android at work and use it far more than I do my 920 for far more tasks. Pictures and video, Skydrive, one note, email stored locally. You name it and I do about 10 times as much on Razr. It does create about 5000 folders, subfolders and files for this data, but no where near 5gb of data. It may have 1gb of data give or take. I've checked thanks to a fully featured file explorer. The other category can not just be misc app data. 5gb is a whole lot of data!!!Either there are software, apps or OS, that are not clearing this data or this OS is going to be very limited. $10 MS or devs can fix this and one day we are going to see far less other data. I'm not willing to factory reset my phone because I can just dump music but some people don't have this option.

[Keith Wallace]

Mine is currently at 4.21 GB of data, and I'm convinced it HAS to be related to the number of installed apps. I'm sure a chunk of it is related to Nokia Maps (I have 251.3 MB of maps installed on my phone), but that's it. I just went (after looking at the size of "Other") and deleted my browsing, search, and maps history like was suggested, along with resetting my camera and Office. It dropped it to an exact 4.00 GB, so there is SOME blame there. However, that is still 4.00 GB that's not fully accounted for.

I've got the 251.3 MB of data from my installed maps (of IL and MOP), but I don't know about the rest. I have a Lumia 920 though, and am at 5.32 GB of free space, so I am not too concerned about a storage crunch, but I'm pretty sure it has been mentioned that uninstalled apps leave something behind before, so I am wondering if we need something like Android, where you can manually go in and delete all data related to a specific app.

Whatever the cause, they definitely need to give people the ability to see what it is. I have a lot of games on my phone, but their saves should not make up 3+ GB when the probably 50+ games on my Xbox 360 probably don't take up that much.

[Mystictrust]

"Other" includes any/all of the following: email account data, documents (be they attachments or storage cached from SkyDrive and SharePoint), browser history/cache, downloaded maps data, application settings/data (for example if an app downloads a lot of cached images for live tiles or lockscreen art, etc.), and pretty much all the non-categorized stuff. It sucks we can't "see" more specifics, and that's what I'd like to see improved, but my guess is you sync a lot of email data and attachments and/or maps and browser information. You could try the following:

• Settings > Applications > Internet Explorer > Delete History
• Settings > Applications > Maps > Delete History
• Settings > Applications > Search > Delete History
• Settings > Applications > Reset Office

I read a couple of the responses above and see things like "I only had 450MB free" (not picking on one person, just using an example) and think to myself, "WTF?! Remove some content, install update, and sync the content back again. YOU chose to install so many apps and content." Some of you are just complaining to complain because you want a piece of plastic and silicon to be smarter than you. "Gee, why can't I use my phone without consuming disk space?! WHAT?! YOU MEAN APPS TAKE UP SPACE?!" Good grief people, think!!

So you're saying this is normal behavior. I see

[rdubmu]

So you're saying this is normal behavior. I see

I believe it is also your email. Change it to sync only 7 days.

[masterchief1984]

MS needs to get off their collective a$$es and get moving. If they want to put out half baked, Swiss cheese software they better be prepared to fix more than one problem a quarter. BB is going to kick MS out of the way if MS doesn't get moving with some updates. The consumers won't wait for a yearly update or one fix a quarter. MS needs to get ahead of the curve to have a chance and stay there.

couldn't have said it better myself