[Q] Items deleted from internal phone storage - Atrix 4G Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hi,
I recently got an atrix [Bell Canada] and have been a happy user. However couple of days ago, I encountered a very strange problem. My phone has lots of free internal storage and a small 1GB memory card. Few days back, when I was taking pictures from the camera [default storage: internal], I noticed that the camera wasn't saving the pictures at all. It would take the picture, I'd hear the shutter sound thingy but the picture wasn't saved [there was no error message]. Upon further inspection, I noticed that all my previous pictures as well as all the songs were gone. I was travelling at that time and just switched the storage location to memory card and camera started saving pictures.
Today when I got home, I connected the phone to pc and my internal storage area is almost empty [just 71MB used by some applications]. I've lost all my pictures and songs from the storage and apparently there's no trace of them. I'm definite that I was listening to music and viewing pictures at least one day before I noticed this problem, and in between I didn't see anything strange on the phone.
Has anyone any clue what might be the cause and if there's a way to recover the old stuff? Searching the forums/google didn't yield anything. Here's the version num etc.
System Version: Blur_version.0.37.23.MB860.BellMobility.en.CA
Android Version: 2.2.2
Baseband version: N_01.77.15P
Kernel Version: 2.6.32.9
Build Number: OLYLA_U4_0.37.23
It is a stock froyo with yet locked bootloader and no root.

I've had the problem where the internal sdcard periodically gets wiped.
I know two causes for this problem:
1. A defective app. The first time it started happening to me was right after I had installed Go Launcher. I saw another user posted about it, and I uninstalled it - and after that, the problem dropped almost completely.
2. If the volume itself is damaged, Android will either attempt a repair, or wipe the entire volume. This most likely will have occurred when people are in the habit of just pulling the USB cable out without properly unmounting the volumes from the PC first. The best way to deal with this is to format the volume (full format, NOT quick format) and make sure to always unmount the drives before pulling the cable. Note that when you format a volume for Android (whether it's the internal sdcard, or the external one), it's best to use a 32k allocation size.

My SD card seems intact. I did plug the phone with the PC but I didn't mount internal storage [selected None in the USB Connection notification]. Also I didn't have any launcher installed. All the apps I had looked pretty harmless [all very common and/or by well known publishers]. Anyway, it seems like the problem would remain a mystery. Everything seems normal now. Thanks for your answer.
Side question: Is it safe to format the internal storage? I assume OS, apps, and other critical data is stored on the ROM which is separate.

faisaliqbal said:
My SD card seems intact. I did plug the phone with the PC but I didn't mount internal storage [selected None in the USB Connection notification]. Also I didn't have any launcher installed. All the apps I had looked pretty harmless [all very common and/or by well known publishers]. Anyway, it seems like the problem would remain a mystery. Everything seems normal now. Thanks for your answer.
Side question: Is it safe to format the internal storage? I assume OS, apps, and other critical data is stored on the ROM which is separate.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
First of all, how are you determining that your SD card is intact?
Second, I wasn't pointing at launchers specifically, nor did I say anything about malicious software or shady developers. Go Launcher is a very common app by a respected developer. I wasn't pointing at malware, I was pointing at applications with a bug - which can be any app whatsoever. If all this started happening after you installed something specific, it bears looking at - that's all.
As for your question, it's perfectly safe to format the internal sdcard, just make sure to look it over first, and backup anything you want to keep. Your camera may store the photos you take there, for example. Or Tasker stores the documentation it downloads there, etc... You're not going to harm the system itself in any way, but that doesn't mean there isn't something you'd miss. Just give it a look before you format.

It happened to me again, once again all the data was erased from internal memory. This time, I'm quite confident it was WinAmp app unless my phone has defective hardware (slim chance).

faisaliqbal said:
It happened to me again, once again all the data was erased from internal memory. This time, I'm quite confident it was WinAmp app unless my phone has defective hardware (slim chance).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Even if it was WinAmp, it's probably not a bad idea to reformat the internal sdcard partition. If you choose to do this, I would recommend a full (not quick) format, using a 32k allocation size.

Ok, I formatted the internal storage as you said and then also updated to Gingerbread. I hope it doesn't happen again. It's just a pain in the a$$ to recover all the deleted media.

Keep your important stuff backed up to the external sdcard.

Related

Installed apps disappear

Hi, i'm having a problem with my installed apps. Some apps disappear from my app drawer, and in menu installed apps this apps have a system logo and system name, they are still installed but do not work.
I guess it might have something to do when I disconnect phone from PC USB, apparently internal storage is not mounted back correctly and corrupts apps, some time after the apps go back to original working state, and some others break. Did this happen to anyone? Does anyone have a clue about what's happening?
Many thanks in advance.
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
this happens to me sometimes but after i reboot my phone, everything shows up but ya it does happen time to time
Are you moving apps to the sd card? I've experienced similar problems when doing so....so I just stopped moving apps to the sd card.
con_ritmo said:
Are you moving apps to the sd card? I've experienced similar problems when doing so....so I just stopped moving apps to the sd card.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Had the same problem and used the same fix
Had the same problem once, restarting phone or launcher fixes the issue...
This problem is also for Galaxy S2.
I think that the problem born because you have 2 sd on the phone.
This problemi in my Atrix is very annoying.
In Titanium Backup, go into Batch>Move/Integrate and make sure that all user apps are on the Internal memory. Chances are your "disappearing" apps are on the external sd.
So if there is any number other than 0 next to "Move user apps to internal memory," run that batch operation, reboot and you shouldn't have the issue. My XDA app installs to external by default, which is stupid, and I have to redo this process for that app after every titanium restore.
Try going to the android market on a laptop or desktop. If you are loved in it will say if it is compatable with your device.
This problem happens often with ADW launcher for me. For some reason the launcher doesn't update its app list instantly and restarting the launcher is needed. I haven't researched the problem though.
It used to happen on my old phone (dell steak) it was not mounting and un mounting properly, even downloads were disapearing no matter what rom. Or computer I tried it still didn't work and it turned out that my SD card was f#$ked
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
disappearing apps
I noticed this on my Atrix when running Titanium backup. Rebooting the phone will restore the missing apps. If there are a lot of apps missing it may take 2 reboots, but they will come back along with their icons.
I just had to restart the launcher, then all is back.
I had similar problems in the past. My solution = Don't restore apps + data from titanium backup. This also caused 'rogue' apps that prevented my phone from sleeping. Would have to charge my phone at least twice a day. Completely wiped my phone and went back to Wet Dream and haven't used Titanium Backup since. Both issues were fixed.
I had this same problem once I started using jokersax's CM9 alphas. It turned out that, for whatever reason, a few apps were being installed to the SD card. Rebooting the phone or connecting to my PC (basically any time the SD card was mounted/unmounted) would break those apps.
So I can confirm that if the app has disappeared from the app tray, but you can still find it in Manage APPs (with a system icon and probably it's pacakge name (like "com.appname.something")) then your best bet is to uninstall the app, reinstall it, and double check from Manage APPs that it's installed to the phone (bottom right button will say "Move to SD card" rather than "Move to phone").
[tl;dr - apps don't like being on SD card, install to phone]
I've been having this problem for a long time now. Searched the web everywhere, xda, lot's of forums. I have not found a solution to this yet, because i have come the conclusion that it's an internal android problem. This happens to everyone that has many apps on their phone, but they don't realise that it's happening until they look for an app they know that is installed but can't find it.
This happened to me with:
Android:
* stock 2.2
* stock 2.3
* blur mod roms
* cyanogenmod
Launchers:
* Launcher pro
* ADW
* SPB Shell
* Go Laucher
* Blur Launcher
Root:
* When rooted
* When not rooted
It seems that the problem is that the internal drive, when mounting does not take the enough time to mount all of the installed apps, that's why if you plug you phone to the USB, after it get's unmounted and mounted back, the status of your apps change (people who had this problem, know what i'm talking about).
The only solution I found so far is with Cyanogenmod, becuase it's the only rom i tried that has the possibility to unmount the internal drive (as you can always do with the external SD card).
If you have this problem that you check the installed apps in the configuration, and you see that some correctly installed apps have the system icon and not the correct one, the unmount the internal drive and mount back, you will see all apps appearing correctly.
horsage said:
It seems that the problem is that the internal drive, when mounting does not take the enough time to mount all of the installed apps, that's why if you plug you phone to the USB, after it get's unmounted and mounted back, the status of your apps change (people who had this problem, know what i'm talking about).
The only solution I found so far is with Cyanogenmod, becuase it's the only rom i tried that has the possibility to unmount the internal drive (as you can always do with the external SD card).
If you have this problem that you check the installed apps in the configuration, and you see that some correctly installed apps have the system icon and not the correct one, the unmount the internal drive and mount back, you will see all apps appearing correctly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the advice!!!
Greetings.
Fast Boot option may be the culprit
This is actually a long-standing problem in Android OS, going back at least two years (donkey's years in this technology!)
Something about the interaction of the OS and an sdcard formated for holding apps creates odd behaviours.
Lots of complicated suggestions have been made, including reformatting sdcard, reinstalling ROMs, changing launchers (the one suggested here) and such.
None of these approaches seems really to solve the problem even in most cases.
Mentioned here is internal phone storage -- I NEVER use it for anything related to apps or downloads (from what I can tell it can be much less reliable than an sdcard and much less portable or capable of being backed up in a timely way). I only use phone memory & sdcard, yet I have the same disappearing app problem everyone else has here. Avoiding apps on sdcard is not an option for me -- my phone memory is too limited for that (and again, I don't trust internal phone storage).
Also, worries about Titanium Backup mentioned here. But other backup apps and ROMS that move apps to sdcard appear to have the same problem. I have had no problems myself with Titanium Backup Pro, but I have experienced disappearing apps after mounting sdcard as a disk when USB cabled to a PC. Others have reported the same. I would bet the problem lies with the mounting process, not backups or ROMs
So ... What seems to be working for me (at least for the last week or so) is the following very simple tweak.
CUT TO THE SOLUTION BELOW -- SEARCH FOR ////
Some (not all) of my apps moved to SD (all by Titanium Backup Pro) have begun to disappear and (sometimes) reappear without warning after I began to add and delete large Virtual Machines created in QEMU from my 16GB SanDisc class 10 microSD card on my HTC Droid Incredible running rooted stock Verizon Android Froyo 2.2.3. I know this thread is far from my phone's "home base", but from what I can tell this problem with disappearing apps located on an sdcard is NOT determined by hardware or even Android version.
I also happen to use LauncherPro by Federico Carnales instead of the built-in HTC Sense launcher. I noted elsewhere on XDA that a user had suggested that because at least some (maybe all) launchers start before the SD Card that this may be a problem, especially if changes are made to the sdcard that the launcher did not perform, or was not active during their performance by other apps such as Titanium Backup. That fits my situation, because I unmounted the SD, physically removed it to a PC, and added/deleted large VM files to save (lots) of time. No problems of this sort before I did this, so there must be some connection.
I noted that other users have tried reformatting SD, substituting different brands of SD, using newer/older SD etc. None of these reliably helped. So I skipped these options.
//// The (simple!) solution I tried that SEEMS to work (only time will tell!) is buried in the main Android Settings (accessed from the Menu button while in Home screen). Under "Applications" there is a setting "Fast Boot" that I checked long ago and forgot about (it seemed like a good thing to do at the time). The text warns "Turn off to use some Market apps" (that shows the age of my 2-yr old used phone and Android OS -- ohmygosh!-- because it refers to Market rather than Google Play Store!) Anyway, I unchecked the option and rebooted the phone.
Yes, it took a bit longer to boot (maybe a whole minute!), but after waiting about another minute ALL my home screen apps had normal icons and loaded properly. Titanium Backup Pro batch scenarios confirmed there were no apps in a forced uninstalled state (i.e. I had not done the deed, the system somehow had done it or at least rendered the apps "invisible" to Titanium, which decided they needed reinstallation).
The only odd behaviour was that auto brightness was turned off after I unchecked Fast Boot and rebooted. Going into Android Settings > Display and rechecking "auto brightness" took care of that. No other oddities or strange behaviours thus far (but it has only been about an hour).
I will report anything further on this thread only (Samsung Fascinate > Fascinate Q&A > What just happend? apps on sdcard) if anything else requires reporting. Silence implies success!
link: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1873670
(I am copying this post to other relevant threads, but will not post anything further elsewhere -- only there. This is a bit arbitrary (especially now that the chosen thread no longer is the most recent active one on this topic), but I hope this approach pleases the XDA sysops/admins) :angel:
kirkers said:
:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have not posted it here but before I forgot. I have found an app that has solved this issue at least the 95% of the time. Also if an app disappears, reboot, when comes back, move to internal and back to sd with this app, always. This app moves apps differently from other app2sd's apps.
It's called link2sd.
Can be found in Google play store and XDA forum.
A great life saver, for an unsolvable problem. Not the super solution, but the best I found so far.
Regards
Enviado desde mi MB860 usando Tapatalk 2

[Q] Media Storage acting up abnormally on stock ROM

A few days ago while I was on ICS 4.0 on my SGS3 (can't remember whether 4.0.3 or 4.0.4 - international stock ROM either way), I noticed that my phone was not displaying pictures correctly. For example, I took a picture with my camera and it automatically saved it to my SD card, after which it would say the picture cannot be opened. I then transferred my photos to the internal memory as I felt my SD card was getting corrupted, however the music on it still worked fine. Then I noticed a huge increase in battery usage, mostly consumed by the 'Media Storage' application (60-70%). I then updated my phone to JB 4.1.2, and my pictures would not show up at all (music was alright). After some research I found out that there could be a faulty Media Storage app, but it only mentioned the rooted ROM version for people wanting JB earlier than the release date. I did what the instructions I found told me and cleared the data on the Media Storage app (around 4 GB). This solved the problem momentarily but the data keeps going up and using the battery. Now I'm stuck with the Media Storage disabled since I need my battery, however it's annoying to hear a full ringtone for a simple notification, not to mention I want to listen to my music.
What I want to know is, is it a problem of a faulty SD card, corrupted (music) files, or a faulty Media Storage app?
I haven't tried removing the SD card and leaving it to see if it still consumes battery but I just formatted it and am looking to see what happens.
With the Media Storage off, there have been HUGE improvements on battery life! Wow.
istetz said:
A few days ago while I was on ICS 4.0 on my SGS3 (can't remember whether 4.0.3 or 4.0.4 - international stock ROM either way), I noticed that my phone was not displaying pictures correctly. For example, I took a picture with my camera and it automatically saved it to my SD card, after which it would say the picture cannot be opened. I then transferred my photos to the internal memory as I felt my SD card was getting corrupted, however the music on it still worked fine. Then I noticed a huge increase in battery usage, mostly consumed by the 'Media Storage' application (60-70%). I then updated my phone to JB 4.1.2, and my pictures would not show up at all (music was alright). After some research I found out that there could be a faulty Media Storage app, but it only mentioned the rooted ROM version for people wanting JB earlier than the release date. I did what the instructions I found told me and cleared the data on the Media Storage app (around 4 GB). This solved the problem momentarily but the data keeps going up and using the battery. Now I'm stuck with the Media Storage disabled since I need my battery, however it's annoying to hear a full ringtone for a simple notification, not to mention I want to listen to my music.
What I want to know is, is it a problem of a faulty SD card, corrupted (music) files, or a faulty Media Storage app?
I haven't tried removing the SD card and leaving it to see if it still consumes battery but I just formatted it and am looking to see what happens.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You could try formatting your SD card, if this doesn't work it may be the case that your SD card has bad sectors.
If you want to know wether that is the case, you can try this:
Click Start and then Run. Type cmd and then click OK. Type the following:
chkdsk [sd card drive letter] /r
That will scan for bad sectors on the card and repair any found.
on the PC, that is

[Q] Long-Term memory handling problem, please help!

This problem has got to the point of forcing me to register on XDA forums. I have a Samsung G II running android 4.1.2 (jelly-bean of course) and over the past week the memory (storage) handling has gotten really bad. It's as if the OS has given up on storing items now. Problems include-
After taking, receiving or downloading a photo (generally over whatsapp but it occurs to other apps like wallbase) The photo will be stored on my phone for the day until i turn off my phone, now after turning it back on however the photos are gone just leaving a blank space which displays "unable to load" in the gallery.
Next issues is that my apps i now install get installed in the next dimension because they don't appear to be on my phone even when i do a file search or plug in the device into my computer. But here is where it gets crazy they are on my phone and do take space up, but it's no where to be found.
The OS now presumes i have an SD card even though i don't have one plugged in. Because of this! big games and Apps now now try to use this fake SD that doesn't exist and this causes them to give me errors along the lines of "Sd is full or inaccessible". Pffft
Please someone help me, this issue is annoying me so badly and is rendering my phone useless if it can't store data.
I appologize you were forced to register here @ this great forum and though you still might find your answer here,ironic,anyway.Have you tried wiping cache,dalvik and fixing permissions,are you even rooted?I did'nt see you mention that,so i have no idea,also,you might want to back up what you want to keep and format and partition your sd card,not sure how big your sd crad is either,so you might need a bigger sd card for all your stuff.I myself use a 32GB Sandisk,class 10 and it works great,never ran out of space or had any speed issues on my OG EVO.
Diablo67 said:
I appologize you were forced to register here @ this great forum and though you still might find your answer here,ironic,anyway.Have you tried wiping cache,dalvik and fixing permissions,are you even rooted?I did'nt see you mention that,so i have no idea,also,you might want to back up what you want to keep and format and partition your sd card,not sure how big your sd crad is either,so you might need a bigger sd card for all your stuff.I myself use a 32GB Sandisk,class 10 and it works great,never ran out of space or had any speed issues on my OG EVO.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Rooted? yes. I've deleted all the caches under the sun and still no results. And i have over 4Gb of free internal storage according to my phone. I have my data backed up but i'd rather have a direction to go before starting anything. :crying:
I'm not seeing anything for your phone except this... http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2192122

[Q]Galaxy Ace S5830 Storage Space Issues CM10.2

Hello Everyone.
I own a Samsung Galaxy Ace (S5830) and until 2 days ago i was running a CM7 on it until it suddenly just stopped working and the phone hung in some kind of boot loop. That's when i decided to "upgrade" to a newer version of CM and searched for everything necessary.
I tried some CM11 alpha but since it's pretty unstable (at least the version i had was) i tried others until i settled for a stable 10.2 version (cm-10.2-20140309-UNOFFICIAL-cooper++). So far i am pretty happy since it actually is running very smoothly on my phone and i did not expect that at all. But then i ran into the same issue that basically everyone owning this phone runs into - it's very limited internal space.
Fact is i do need some google apps since i'm using gmail and synchronizing my contacts through it. Also i want to use Whatsapp, basically the only reason for me having a smartphone right now. I Installed the Dolphin Browser aswell since a decent browser is also something i'd like to use from time to time, but it seems to be full on external anyways so it should not count towards the internal storage.
Problem is now, all that is already too much for the phone's internal storage to handle since whatsapp has to stay on internal - at least that's my experience - and the google-play services that are needed aswell are placed on internal too without option of moving them.
I tried some things but basically all of them failed on one or another weird way..
- titanium backup - uninstalled system apps that i am not using (radio, browser, google play voice things, etc.) but after a reboot they were all back again. Even before rebooting, uninstalling them seemed not to open up space at all.
- Link2SD - tried linking whatsapp to my SD card, failed since whatsapp wasn't running very stable anymore. If anyone has a solution for this i'd love to hear it!
- App2SD - didn't even show any internal apps, and wasn't helping at all.
Also something i've tried, i have a message backup for whatsapp that's ~14mb but lies on my SD card. Problem seems to be that Whatsapp on recovering these messages put's them somewhere on the internal storage, at least it takes those ~14mb away from it after it recovered them. I tried to change the path whatsapp uses for internal storing of data with the app 'FolderMount' (like i found tutorials on the internet for exactly this issue) but wasn't even able to locate the internal stored data :/ Not because i just didn't find it, but because it seems not to exist...
I know i can't really increase the size of the internal storage but i think there has to be something i can do. I can't even update whatsapp since i am just living on the edge of the "low storage space" message with 20-15mb left.
What i am hoping now through this thread is to get some ideas or options how i could free up some space, move some apps around to SD maybe (utilize Link2SD correctly) or in the end basically have the things i need but some free storage on internal so that i can use my phone, maybe even install apps on SD (without them touching internal space) and have some room to update the important apps like whatsapp.
Regards,
ThePatchelist

Root causes for OTG memory issues?

I am using a 64GB Sandisk Memory Stick via USB and OTG adapter on a Oneplus 6. For backups, pictures, data, etc., and Titanium Backup. Works fine, unless every few weeks, even days, the phone reports that the external memory is corrupt and offers to "fix it", whereas the fix is really just formatting the memory, erasing everything on the external memory.
When this happens (and I don't fix/format), I can still read the memory stick on PC, but sometimes find corrupt files that can't be read.
I do eject properly, close all apps before, etc. Have tried all options in that directions.
What is the root cause for this?
- A defective memory stick?
- A defect in the phone?
- An Android issue?
- Something else?
As its very hard to reproduce the issue, I couldn't get my hands around it so far. Have others experienced similar? I have tried different adapters, but not yet different USB memory
CoffeeMachineSwitch said:
I am using a 64GB Sandisk Memory Stick via USB and OTG adapter on a Oneplus 6. For backups, pictures, data, etc., and Titanium Backup. Works fine, unless every few weeks, even days, the phone reports that the external memory is corrupt and offers to "fix it", whereas the fix is really just formatting the memory, erasing everything on the external memory.
When this happens (and I don't fix/format), I can still read the memory stick on PC, but sometimes find corrupt files that can't be read.
I do eject properly, close all apps before, etc. Have tried all options in that directions.
What is the root cause for this?
- A defective memory stick?
- A defect in the phone?
- An Android issue?
- Something else?
As its very hard to reproduce the issue, I couldn't get my hands around it so far. Have others experienced similar? I have tried different adapters, but not yet different USB memory
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, its pretty normal. For an example i had a memory, my phone was finding it as corrupt, even trough i could see and edit its content, it shouldnt be a problem...
DankMemz said:
No, its pretty normal. For an example i had a memory, my phone was finding it as corrupt, even trough i could see and edit its content, it shouldnt be a problem...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Memory card*

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