Android & Moving Apps to SD Card?

Noel Gallagher · 18 Dec 2012 at 11:49

Hi

I have a cheapo android tablet, it's nothing special but I have a 8gb SD card for it and was wondering how to move apps from the tablet to the SD card?

I know under apps in settings theres an option to "Move to SD card" but this moves it to /mnt/sdcard which is onboard memory and not /mnt/extsd which is the actual sd card itself?

its all very confusing

I am new to android so any help would be appreciated

Myshra · 18 Dec 2012 at 12:00

This is because onboard memory is, as you've found out, the default mnt/sdcard and the external is mounted (usually) under /mnt/sdcard/external_sd (but the last folder name changes a lot

). This is google's "Vision" of having no external cards which is why you don't see them on nexus devices.

I personally think it's stupid but if you want to fix it you're going to need to root and get yourself over to XDA to find the app that puts these on the sd card for you sorry. I think they usually just link it to /sdcard/external_sd/apps and slap them there along with a checker to make sure the card is mounted before running the apps.

Noel Gallagher · 18 Dec 2012 at 12:03

Really is stupid!

I actually (finally) rooted it last night, took ages but got there in the end! Not had a chance to play around with it since. Do you have any idea what this app is called?

thanks

Liquid_Entity · 18 Dec 2012 at 12:05

What is your device?

You probably better off putting a new ROM on, such as Mildwild or something. What HBOOT did you go with?

Noel Gallagher · 18 Dec 2012 at 12:07

I used one of these simple one click root programs.

Its only a cheap chinese brand, I checked the other day it was an "softwinner a13-mid" and the rom it said thats currently on it is "nuclear"?

Rusty! · 18 Dec 2012 at 12:13

Why do you want to move the apps to the SD card exctly?

I presume the manufacturer has configured it correctly, so that the internal 8GB is used for both apps and as the internal SD card?

Liquid_Entity · 18 Dec 2012 at 12:17

I thought it might be like a HTC Desire where no matter what you put in, it still uses system space to install apps, even though most apps install to the actual sd card

Noel Gallagher · 18 Dec 2012 at 12:17

Because the tablets only 4gb, as you can imagine in reality thats like less than 2gb

Rusty! · 18 Dec 2012 at 12:21

Oops, dunno where I got 8GB from.

Still, if that 4GB (or whatever it really is, check in the storage settings) is set up right, then it will all be usable for apps as well as being an SD card, so space shouldn't be a huge issue. Just keep music, pictures and videos on the 'proper' SD card.

To do what you want is going to require some re-partitioning one way or another, I suspect. Unless Link2SD from the Play Store will do it.