One of the coolest – if unsexy – features of Android Marshmallow is its ability to use adoptable storage. This means Android can treat an SD card as additional internal storage, rather than an external device, as it has in the past. Under the hood, Android will still see two separate devices, but it will (more or less) treat it as a single storage unit. It’s almost (but not quite like) having a 2TB drive in your desktop computer, then buying a 2TB external drive and, after installing it, Windows giving you the option of treating the drives as a single 4TB unit instead of two 2TB drives. It’s kind of like that, only better, because it’s much more difficult to expand a phone or tablet’s internal storage than to do the same on a desktop computer.
Unfortunately, two of the biggest Android device makers – Samsung and LG – have disabled this feature in their versions of Marshmallow. They claim that customers would be “disappointed” in the performance of their devices, since an SD card is likely to be slower than the internal memory. This is true, but not a dealbreaker if you know that going in. They also claim that SD card failure would cause apps to break… which is also true, but it’s not the end of the world: just buy a new SD card, repeat the procedure below, and reinstall the apps in question. As someone who played around with CyanogenMod a LOT a few years back, this is not a problem at all… especially since SD cards don’t fail that often.
So this post will show you how to enable the feature. There are a few caveats, however.
The first thing – and this should go without saying – is to make sure to back up any important files you may have on your SD card before you do this. This procedure WILL ERASE the card, so data will be lost forever. Also, read the instructions below, in full, and make sure you understand them completely before you even touch your phone or computer. The time to be confused is before you start an IT project, not during the project.
Secondly, I have only tested this – once – on a Virgin Mobile LG G Stylo. It worked for me, but it might not work on your device. It might not even work on the same phone on a different carrier. Google “[your device] adoptive storage” and see what comes up. As always, there’s the possibility of wrecking your phone, so please research this before jumping in feet-first!
Thirdly, this procedure will create an encrypted ext4 partition that will fill your entire SD card. You’ll still be able to attach your device to a computer via USB and copy files that way… but you won’t be able to take the SD card out of your phone, pop it into an SD card adapter, then put it into a laptop or desktop card reader to copy files. If you haven’t already, it’s probably a good idea to look into cloud services that offer online backups of your pictures, like Dropbox, OneDrive or Mega.
Lastly, this isn’t something you can “just try out” with a spare 8GB SD card and upgrade to a 32GB card later. If this is something that interests you, go ahead and spend the $10 on a new 32GB card and be done with it.
NOTE: PLEASE READ THE ‘IMPORTANT UPDATE’ SECTION AT THE END OF THIS POST FOR ANOTHER POSSIBLE ISSUE TO CONSIDER!
That said, here’s how to enable adoptable storage on your Marshmallow device. It’s really simple: I was able to do the entire thing in around 10 minutes… while on hold with Virgin for an unrelated billing issue.
1) On your computer, go to this page on the XDA forum and download the “15 Seconds ADB installer”. I used the current version – 1.4.3 – but it might be updated by the time you read this.
2) Once downloaded, right-click on adb-setup-1.4.3.exe and choose “Run as Administrator”. As the linked page says, press Y to “install ADB and Fastboot”, Y or N to install for all users (Y) or just the current user (N), and Y to install the necessary drivers. After the last question, you should see the standard driver install dialog. Click “Yes” (or “Allow” or “OK”, I forget which) to install the Google device driver.
3) If you haven’t already, enable “Developer Mode” on your device by going to Settings > About Phone > Software Info and tapping “Build Number” seven times. You will know you’re getting close when the phone says something like “only 3 more taps to Developer”.
4) Tap Settings > Developer Options and enable USB Debugging. Click “OK” to the warning message that will appear.
5) Connect your phone to your computer via USB. A window should pop-up on your phone asking to enable USB debugging and showing your computer’s “RSA key”. Tap “Always allow from this computer” (if desired) then tap “OK”. If you don’t see this window, drag down your notification area and look for a similar debugging message and tap that.
6) On your computer, open a command-prompt in the ADB directory (which should be c:\adb).
7) Type adb devices and press ENTER. You may see your device listed, probably with a long name, like “LGLS7709e27dc19 device”. If so, skip to the next step. If you get a message about a “service not running”, the software should say that it’s starting it, but the app won’t poll your devices again. So type adb devices and press ENTER again. You should now see your device listed.
8) Type the following commands exactly as shown, pressing the ENTER key after each one:
adb shell sm list-disks
adb shell sm list-volumes all
adb shell sm set-force-adoptable true
adb shell sm partition disk:179,64 private
adb shell sm set-force-adoptable false
adb shell sm list-volumes all
NOTE: the fourth command partitions your SD card, and may take 2-3 minutes (or longer) to complete, depending on the size of your card.
9) Disconnect your phone from the USB cable and reboot it. The reboot is crucial. Your phone may (or may not) take a bit longer to boot this time. One message board user reported that his phone appeared stuck on the Virgin boot logo for several minutes, but finally booted and has been fine ever since. My phone seemed to boot normally, maybe taking just a few extra seconds at most. Your mileage may vary.
10) Once your phone is fully booted, tap Settings > Developer Options and disable USB Debugging, clicking “OK” to any messages that may appear.
11) Go to Settings > Storage & USB and tap your SD card. Tap the three dots in the upper-right corner and choose “Migrate data”:
12) A wizard will appear, telling you that photos and media files will be moved to the SD card, and that in the future they’ll be saved there, too. Tap “Move”:
13) After the move, you’ll see that although Android reports the size of each device individually, you have a total of x space. In my case, it’s 37.33GB:
14) Go to Settings > Apps and tap on an app. Tap “Storage”. At the top of the resulting window you should see “Storage used: Internal storage”. Tap the “Change” button and choose your SD card, like so:
Not all apps support being run from the SD card. Not surprisingly, most of Google’s own apps can’t be moved. Most can though, and you’ll get a simple, two-step wizard to move the data. If you don’t see a “Storage used: Internal storage” option, the app cannot be moved. Also, if you use Spotify, you will need to tap Storage > Clear Data. This will reset the app, so you’ll need to log in and download all your offline music again. If you don’t do this, the app will open and immediately close (no matter what you do) until you clear data.
15) Repeat as necessary for other apps. Note the overall amount of space used on my phone is the same, but internal storage usage has decreased while SD storage has increased:
If this sounds a bit like my old article on expanding storage on the LG Tribute… it’s almost exactly the same thing… only this time it’s using tools built-in to Android to do so. Also, root is not needed in this case, so apps that complain about root status will stay quiet.
* * *
IMPORTANT UPDATE (03/12/2016): This may (or may not) be related to adding adoptive storage to my phone, but I just wanted to let you know about a possible issue that might happen, and offer a strange workaround if it does.
The issue is this: after adding adoptive storage, you might notice that the “None” and “Swipe” options are disabled in the Lock Screen options, with the message that it has been “disabled by administrator, encryption policy, or credential storage”:
I work from home most days, and almost always leave the lock screen on swipe, since there’s little need for security in my own home. I went out the other night, and since I was running late I quickly set the option to PIN and didn’t notice the two other options greyed out. But then I came home and tried to switch back and found that I could not.
Now, my phone might have been like this for weeks, and I only just now noticed it. My carrier upgraded the phone from Lollipop to Marshmallow early January, and it’s possible that this could have happened then. That’s the point: I just don’t know. I’ve been an IT guy long enough to know that coincidences are rare… but they do happen from time to time.
So… how do you fix it? I don’t know. I haven’t found anything that’s worked yet. One solution offered is to go to Settings > Security > Certificate Management and click “Clear Credentials”. But this has not worked for me.
I have, however, found a strange workaround that won’t let you select swipe, but will enable it anyway:
1) Go to Settings > Lock Screen and choose “Pattern”.
2) Choose a pattern, then choose a PIN if you don’t already have one.
3) Lock the phone, then enter the WRONG pattern five times. You will get a message that says something like “You have incorrectly entered your pattern 5 times. Please try again in 30 seconds”. You will also see a box in the lower right corner of the lock screen that says “Backup PIN”. Tap it, and enter your PIN.
4) Until you change it, your lock screen should now be on swipe, even though it’s not an option you can select (just like my screencap above).
As I said, my phone could have been like this for weeks, and I only just noticed it after adding the adoptive storage. I read several articles and how-tos online on the subject, and not one of them mentioned anything about the lock screen, so I’m inclined to think it’s just a coincidence.
Huge thanks to AndroidForums member stanton renna, who actually typed all this up in a handy post. He (or she) did all the real work – I just wrote it up in my own words and added a bunch of screencaps!
Thank you so much for your step by step instructions. I am not a techy, but I think I can follow these steps. Thanks again!
Thanks! But be sure to read the “Important update” at the end of the post BEFORE you do anything,
Forgive me if this is a dumb question, but is there a way to reverse this back to portable storage? I’m only asking for curiosity’s sake.
yes
Works on g4 beat?
No idea. Like I said, I’ve only tried this, once, on an LG G Stylo. I can’t imagine it WOULDN’T work on a similar LG, though.
Quick question: if I change the SD card from the phone after doing those steps, what commands in the CMD should I run again? All of them?
Yes. You can convert an existing SD card back to Portable Storage by tappping Settings > Storage > [your SD card} > three dots > Format as Portable. You may (or may not) be prompted to move the data back to internal storage (reversing step 12 above).
But yes, if you swap SD cards, you’d need to repeat the entire procedure.
After “adb shell sm list-disks” command gets “java.lang.illegalargumentexception” error. How can i fix it?
Tried on a Sony Z3, Seemed to work, but the camera app could not save to internal storage. So reverted back to the portable mode for now. Any thoughts on that?
Thanks mate . perfect
Thanks a lot. works with my LG G4 Stylus.
Thanks, it worked with my LG K8.
Although I had to use a Windows 7 PC as my Win10 laptop didn’t support the adb software.
Is there a way of doing this from a Mac? I use an Apple for computer work, but prefer the LG for my phone.
Jim, in regards to your important update. As far as I know, all of the payment apps require screen lock of some sort. So, if you are using Android Pay or an individual cards android payment app those choice will be greyed out per the apps security features.
Just my two cents.
Thanks, but I didn’t have Android Pay or PayPal (or any other type of banking software) on the phone.
Just as a note to everyone: the phone on my Stylo started acting “wonky” (the screen started appearing “wavy”, like an LCD with a bad capacitor). I bought an LG Stylo 2 to replace it. Since the Stylo 2 has 16GB of storage space, I don’t have a need for adoptable storage any more. So I’m not going to put any more work into researching this issue. Thanks for stopping by! 🙂
For lg k350 work ?
it doesn’t work when i tape adb shell sm partition disk:179,4 private , that show : error : java.lang.illegal etc …
have you an idea ?
thanks and sorry for my awfull english
Kindly replace 179,4 with the output you receive in first step.
Responding to David:
David says:
November 8, 2016 at 11:38
Is there a way of doing this from a Mac? I use an Apple for computer work, but prefer the LG for my phone.
I got this to work on my Mac by doing the following (I’m simplifying to keep this short. Make sure you research each step and read thoroughly):
1. Installing the Android Studio thus adding ADB onto my Mac
https://developer.android.com/studio/index.html
2. Launching terminal from the folder in which ADB is installed
http://lifehacker.com/launch-an-os-x-terminal-window-from-a-specific-folder-1466745514
3. Following all the commands above but just adding a “./” before each command
WINDOWS: adb shell sm list-disks
MAC: ./adb shell sm list-disks
So far, everything seems to be working for me. Hope that helps!
Hi, thank’s a lot, it Worked on my LGK8 !! But Once my internal memory (8Gb) is almost full, it won’t let me install more apps and tells me to make room on me internal storage, even tho i migrated all my apps on the “new interal storage SDcard”, some files stay in the internal memory and can’t be moved. I’m at 7Gb and it won’t let my instal a big app…. Anyone else has that? Can anyone help me, my LGK8 says i used 7Gb out of 37ish but i can’t instal more apps !!
Okay, now to clarify a few points in this tutorial:
First, if your phone refuses to be shown in adb devices in Windows 10 (a known issue with LG K8 and others) change USB connection type to MTP to PTP to force it to read your computer’s RSA key. It’s useful if you have Windows 10.
Second, the fourth command will likely fail if you follow the tutorial. Get the value of your storage given in the first command, substract one, and then put it into the fourth command for it to work.
Does it work on an LG Pheonix 2?
I’m t tho dio this but when i get tho the 3rd out 4th step i get an error something tho do with the code or something…. I’m not on my computer right now but I’ll post the exact error later… Another blog said that you needed tho download a c++ library… Do i ave where ave what exactly do i need.. Ion running Windows 10
I’m getting a java error on the 4th command… anyone else have that problem or know what I need to do to get around it?
Error: java.lang.IllegalstateException; command ‘1105 volume partition disk; 179,64 private’ failed with ‘400 1105 command failed’
Worked for my LG X Power (Brazilian K220). Thanks so much!!!
Thanks for the instruction. I got it to work on my LG g pad 3 8.0 (Canada) with Nougat 7.0. This model is similar to LG g pad X 8.0 in the USA.
Ugh. So, I’ve obviously gone wrong somewhere. I got through all of the steps without issue, but after I rebooted my phone (an LG Stylo 2), the SD card displayed as corrupted and I was given the option to reformat it. Reformatted, but it’s displaying that there’s only 15.97MB on my SD card – it’s a 32GB SD card. Is it a lost cause, or can my SD be saved? Any ideas?
I know this article is pretty old but I followed this and in the Settings it recognizes that the internal storage is using the SD card but apps don’t seem to. I should have over 100 GBs of free space but I only have about 700 MBs (that’s what my internal storage is at). Is there a way to fix this?
Hi Jim,
Thanks or this! I’m not all that tech savvy with cell phones but you have done an awesome job showing screenshots and providing detailed instructions so much so that I believe you’ve helped me to be on my way to resolving my storage issues IF I become confident enough to do this, I will follow your directions to the letter. Yours are the best I’ve found online so far. I used to work with computers some, not an expert but above average knowledge, so with your help I should be able to do this. I just want to know that everything will function properly when I’m done as long as I follow your steps. I need this adoptable storage on my LG Stylo 2 Plus so badly because 16gb is not enough for my apps and my phone began to malfunction. I have spent many hours trying to figure this out so thank you again soooooo much for making this seem like a task I can successfully complete!
Have a great day!
Tammy. ?
My adoptable storage went away and tablet(LG) now shows internal and sd card and most of my apps are greyed out… if i try one, it says “App isn’t available”. Help!!
Thanks it works perfectly on G4 Beat. Only a few app (like twitter) causes issues when moved to adopted storage. Adams?n Jim reis!
Worked great on an LG Stylo 3 Plus (TP450). Added a 64GB U3 speed card. I now have 90 GB to use.
Thanks I got my LG class(LG-F620) to recognize the card as internal. migration is still ongoing and it seems to take bit too long but so far it seems to work. such a savior for phones with tiny internal memory!
I know this is an old article. Though the reason you lost the ability to have no password or swipe is because the SD was encrypted. On every Android version that I have tested if you encrypt the SD in anyway you will be forced to use authentication.
Thanks, Jamie!
worked fine on an LG rebel-2 which came from SimpleMobile with Marshmallow
Its a life-saver as phone only has 8Gb, 65% used out of the box
No significant slowdown as far as I can tell (yet), I used a 32G PNY speed=85M/s
but its a simple slow phone anyway.
Most apps would not migrate, bun uninstall & reinstall works
Thanks, this has worked a treat on LG K8 & LK K3, I even have a 64gb card as adopted in my K8 when the specification says 32gb max. I actually left adoptable storage TRUE on & have had no issues.
This worked for me today on my LG X Charge running Nougat 7.0. I had to install drivers from the LG Website in order to obtain adb driver. In addition to turning on USB debugging, you must also turn Oem unlocking on. THANK YOU for this awesome tutorial!
Hey there! I have an LG K10 running Android 7.0. Since it appears that the manufacturers disabled the ability to do this with just a few buttons, I want to try this workaround using a 32 GB SD card. But before I do, I could use some help! My phone’s Internal Storage has quickly filled up because I have some pretty big apps installed, but attempting to move them to my SD card, when formatted as Portable Storage, does not fully move all of the data over. It says it works, showing my SD card as the location for the app, but my Internal Storage usage decreases just barely or not at all, and I can tell only part of it has been moved. I have read that this is because, as you said, some apps don’t support being moved to the SD card, and the developers limit them to Internal Storage only. To my understanding, the Adoptable Storage feature (the one that can be activated by following the steps above) is supposed to fix this by essentially formatting the SD card as part of the Internal Storage so that any and all apps can be stored there. Physically, the SD card and the Internal Storage disc will still be separate, but your phone will treat them as the same, showing that you have a total of 48 GB (16 from Internal + 32 from SD card now formatted as Internal) available in your Internal Storage. Is that understanding correct? Or is this not a fix for my problem? Ah, I hope my question made sense. I’d appreciate any help. Thank you in advance. 🙂
That’s correct. I’ve moved on from my LG phones, but my new ZTE phone won’t even show “Move to SD card” as an option unless and until you format the SD card as adaptable storage.
IMPORTANT MISSING STEP!!!!
You need to install the DEVICE DRIVERS for your phone on your PC or ADB will not see your phone. You can usually get the drivers directly from manufacturer and/or carrier.
It may also help to set your android USB config to PTP or RNDIS instead of MTP for some phones… this is under developer options:networking.
Will this work on a LG Aristo 2, aka LM-X210MA? I have tried this 3 times and it keeps corrupting my SD card.
Hears a strange one… Huawei P9 lite, 32GB SD card. All seems to have worked fine, except that it’s saying I now have a 64GB card, and -5,27GB free. It *seems* to be working … so far ….
Thanks a lot!
It works on ASUS Zenfone Max Pro M1.
Thank you so much for this! Seems to work just fine on an Asus (Android 7.0)
Very good tutorial on adoptable storage for Marshmallow (6.0.1). I own a Tracfone ZTE Zmax Champ (Z917VL) running Marshmallow (6.0.1). I can’t root it. Tracfone has the bootloader locked down tight. Your tutorial on adoptable storage was the only way I could get apps to install to external storage (SD Card).
Hi! I followed these steps and successfully made my sd card as internal storage but when i opened my camera app today it wouldn’t take pictures and when taking a video i got the error message “warning recording failed”. Can you tell me the source of this error and if i can fix it??
Tried with my Moto X4 running Android Pie. On the last step it tells me “private:179,66 unmountable”.
Any known solutions?
Thanks a million!
the fourth command adb shell sm partition disk:179,64 private might give you a java exception error. I had to use my result from the first command adb shell sm list-disks which was something like disk:179,124. The author neglects to mention that this may vary for your device.
Hello, thank you very much for the instructions. I tried for LG K8 and it worked! But I want to ask you … After adoption is complete, why does the data system on SD cards change frequently? for example, after being adopted, the system data is 44.04 mb .. then we use several applications and the data system changes … I’ve been to minus so many and all applications suddenly stopped. do you have a solution?
I did your step by step and it works for me. Thanks!
However, I lost Google Maps functionality to storage off-line maps. Does anybody know some workaround for my new problem?
thanks!!!
thanks! but only problem i have now is my device is showing that my sd card is of 64 gb while actually it is of 32 only.but not a big issue.
Hello, perform the steps as you indicate but when I make the last step to see the list of volumes I still appear
C: \ Users \ lbustama> adb shell sm list-volumes all
private mounted null
public: 179.1 mounted 1BBC-0BF9
emulated mounted null
that is, the command I use “adb shell sm partition disk: 179.0 (is my ID) private” is not working.
I copy the entire sequence
C:\Users\lbustama>adb shell sm list-disks
disk:179,0
C:\Users\lbustama>adb shell sm list-volumes all
private mounted null
public:179,1 mounted 1BBC-0BF9
emulated mounted null
C:\Users\lbustama>adb shell sm set-force-adoptable true
C:\Users\lbustama>adb shell sm partition disk:179,0 private
C:\Users\lbustama>adb shell sm set-force-adoptable false
C:\Users\lbustama>adb shell sm list-volumes all
private mounted null
public:179,1 mounted 1BBC-0BF9
emulated mounted null
C:\Users\lbustama>
I have no luck. Punch in everything as stated (copied below). At the very end i get “public:179,1 mounted 82A1-5539” and no ability to adopt sd card shows after reboot. Can not migrate data.
PS C:\adb> adb devices
adb server is out of date. killing…
* daemon started successfully *
List of devices attached
LMG710TM198aa95f device
PS C:\adb> adb shell sm list-disks
disk:179,0
PS C:\adb> adb shell sm list-volumes all
private mounted null
public:179,1 mounted 82A1-5539
emulated mounted null
PS C:\adb> adb shell sm set-force-adoptable true
PS C:\adb> adb shell sm partition disk:179,64 private
PS C:\adb> adb shell sm set-force-adoptable false
PS C:\adb> adb shell sm list-volumes all
private mounted null
public:179,1 mounted 82A1-5539
emulated mounted null
PS C:\adb>
Dear Jason,
Hi. I’m still attempting this on my phone. I’m not sure if it’s working for me, as its still waiting on step 4 “adb shell sm partition disk”
I think I know what your problem might be, though. Instead of entering “adb shell sm partition disk:179,64 private”
type “adb shell sm partition disk:179,0 private”
I noticed that when you enter “adb shell sm list-disks” your Command Prompt says “disk:179,0”. So the command you should enter must be the same except replace 179,64 with 179,0.
Worked perfectly on a Nougat 7.1.1!
Device: BQ Aquaris X5 Plus.
Thank you so much 😀
Thanks for a great guide.
Wen I follow the stpes everything seems fine but when I reboot my phone it says that the SD card is corrupt and that I have to format it.
Can’t format to internal.
My phone is a Samsung Galaxy S9
Any ideas?
Worked for LG Stylo 5. Android ver9. However I am not able to redirect the downloads folder to the SD card nor can I switch the Gallery to use the SD card for image and video storage.
I finally Got this to work on my LG Aristo 4+. Honestly, I’m thinking of moving on from LG.
Anyway, I can move Apps over and they work fine and the data amount is all Correct however; it won’t migrate my data so I can save Media Files. It keeps saying “Settings Stopped Working” whenever I try.
I’m going to keep digging and see if I can’t resolve this on my own. And help will be much appreciated.
THANK YOU SO MUCH !!!! This works for boost mobile LG Stylo 5 x phone . One note to add if you get an error in power shell that says adb not recognized … simply add .\adb so the commands would look like this for each one …
.\adb shell sm list-disks
.\adb shell sm list-volumes all
.\adb shell sm set-force-adoptable true
.\adb shell sm partition disk:179,64 private
.\adb shell sm set-force-adoptable false
.\adb shell sm list-volumes all
you will then see
private mounted null
emulated mounted null
emulated 179,66 unmounted null
Reboot as described above and continue
everything then works fine . I just finished changing files over to sd card .
I forgot to mention i am on Android 9 pie
Thanks! I got this to work on a Stylo 5+ from AT&T. Phone is on Android 9. I had to download the device driver from LG to get the phone to show up in ADB.
Hello,
I had the problem of my command “adb sm partition” getting stuck.
I fixed it by going into Windows Disk Management. There I found my SD card and deleted its partition.
It will delete all data on the card! Be very careful that you are touching your SD card only. Make sure you are looking at the SD card by comparing its drive letter. They must match EXACTLY. (E.g. it can be G:\ but it is different for every computer)
My SD card became a blank card that must be formatted to use. Then I put it back in my phone.
My phone told me it must be formatted as external storage before the card can be used, but I can just ignore it.
Then I ran the same commands from the article, and my SD card was made into internal storage. However, on my phone my settings app crashes when I try to do Migrate data. I can still move apps to the external storage by going to the App manager in settings.
You might be able to use an MP3 player as an SD card reader (I used it).
I couldn’t get the migrate data to work. But I can still move apps individually. (the full app moves to the SD card, vs before most of the app didn’t move)
I found out that the Migrate data crashing might be a bug with Android.
I read there is a command that can be run to do the same thing as Migrate data, but it seems a little sketchy considering how we have to pretty much hack our phones to get this adoptable storage to work.
I read it here, but please do your research before you decide to try it. (if your Migrate Data crashes like mine does) I didn’t do it personally, I just let it be. https://www.reddit.com/r/lgg6/comments/8vg8ur/adaptive_storage_works_after_oreo_upgrade/
Hi, Sorry if this message came a little too late but whenever I try to migrate my data all that comes up is that the System has shut down and I can’t access the details of my app as it just shuts down. Any solutions?
THIS MIGHT COME HANDY IF YOU ARE FACING PROBLEMS ON STEP 4:
On step 8, the fourth command adb shell sm partition disk:179,64 private might give you a java exception error. I had to use my result from the first command adb shell sm list-disks which was something like disk:179,124. The author neglects to mention that this may vary for your device.
Device: LG Stylo 6 (2020)
Carrier: Cricket Wireless
Application used
minimal_adb_fastboot_v1.4.2_setup.exe
Issues:
Instructions fail to mention you need to download device driver from official maker website.
Migrate data screen crashes…maybe a result of using 1.4.2 instead of listed one. This doesn’t affect storage of app option… so currently not a worry
Camera Solution
So I have no idea why it fixed it, but go into apps -> camera -> then force stop it after you done listed steps above. Then click open after that seems to resolved problem even after restart.
Note: I had to run cmd.exe as an administrator for adb shell commands to work
I’m on an LG tribute Royal with Android 9 – Followed steps. Under storage SD card shows up – can move apps that allow to SD – BUT – cannot “migrate data”. SD card does NOT show up in any file explorers. SD card does not show up on PC when I connect via USB. Tried third party camera app but will not store pics or video on the SD, even when I choose those options. Seems I need to get the phone to allow access for things OTHER than moving apps over to it – any suggestions? What am I missing?? Help!! Moving the apps w/o being able to also store pics and vids doesn’t really solve my storage problem unless I constantly down load them manually myself off of main storage as I take them.
Thank you Jim this work around made the stylo 5 a usable phone again I need apps for both personal use but mainly for work and my job requires some large apps I was having to use another phone run on a Hotspot off of this one to get my work done I was just about ready to give up and buy another new phone
Followed the steps here, but when I try to migrate data, it says Settings has stopped. I’m using an LG H850 model with Android 8.0.0 if that helps. Can anyone help me out?
My wife is having these issues in her style 5. Before I even attempt something like this, will the style 5 allow this particular change ?
Thanks a lot, dude!
You saved me and my poorly sized tablet :).
Cheers!
PLEASE HELP!
Some background on my phone.
I have a LG Stylo 5 through Metro by T-Mobile.
Android version 10
Software version Q720MS20a
Model Number LM-Q720MS
I completed all of the steps, and once I got to step 12:
(12) A wizard will appear, telling you that photos and media files will be moved to the SD card, and that in the future they’ll be saved there, too. Tap “Move”;
Once I load this screen on my phone, I press migrate date, AND that screen loads for a split second and then disappears. I have tried pressing the “Move” button as quick as possible, doesn’t work.
What do I do?
Email is Keenadarling3@gmail.com
PLEASE help! I just got a 128 GB SD card just so I can transfer APPs over to the SD card and this is driving me crazy!
Can’t seem to get this to work. Followed all the steps, by all accounts it should work. But for some reason my disk 179,32 stays private and the last one stays mounted. Can’t wrap my head around why this doesn’t work, followed everything perfectly and didn’t seem to have anything awry.
Duuuude…
thanks.
LG Leon 4G LTE – works perfectly. It is a pity none of the junk applications that LG loaded will move or are deletable. But the phone is usable again after running out of space. Many thanks!
I had this problem with LineageOS 17.1 (on a Moto E 2015 LTE) and struggled with many workarounds (Link2SD etc) to the apparant lack of Adoptable storage but your solution worked for me – thanks
Hey Jim, I could really use your help. My SD card that I formatted as adoptable internal storage with your guide a few years ago ended up falling out of my LG K7 and now it is unrecognized by my phone. When I tap on the notification about how the inserted SD card is unavailable, the only option it gives me, of course, is to format it as portable storage. My computer cannot read it with a USB SD card reader and CHKDSK says “cannot open volume for direct access” which I am thinking is because of either the encryption (as I recall you explaining it would be no longer possible to view the SD card without connecting the phone to the computer via USB, which also is not working for me) or because it is corrupted. I would say there is no hope, but I was able to at least once insert the SD card in my phone, turn it on, and briefly see the photo albums I had and the numbers of photos I had in them even while it said the SD card was not available or mounted. .. So I guess I am wondering if there is anything you know of that can be done about this. Is there any way to get the phone to recognize the SD card without formatting it? Is there any way to, er, break or bypass the encryption or something like that? I hope all this made sense and thank you in advance for any help. I would really hate to lose this data.
Sorry, make that a K10. I always forget for some reason.
I successfully went through all of the step up until step 11. My moto g power said my sd is card was corrupt and needed to formatted in order to be used. However, it still doesn’t give me the option to format as internal storage. So I’m right back where I started with an sd card formatted as external storage. Can someone please help?
I can’t believe this worked! I have a Verizon TCL Tablet, I followed all the steps and it worked perfectly 6 years after this was published. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!
Ty!! Worked on my Lenovo Tablet m10 gen 3.
In my case was disk:179,128 vs. disk:179,64
Found this page from here:
https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/189516/format-as-internal-storage-option-no-longer-available
(My 2nd try worked, after first formatting card on the tablet to portable/external. First time though may have failed for another error on my part.)
Didn’t work on my Samsung tablet. Still shows public:179,65 mounted after I try to partition with adb shell sm partition disk:179,65 private command.
I’m getting “inaccessible or not found” on list-volumes command. I’m wondering if the fact that it’s an unrooted phone is the problem, but I’d really like to get this working, since I’ve learned that Android 12 did away with the internal storage option for some stupid reason.