How can I have the phone automatically save to MicroSD?

kwitel

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Ever since I started using Google Photos, I have noticed a huge slowdown with my phone and its because I am now suing about 90% of the internal storage.
Does Google photos save photos locally as well or is it just cloud?

Regardless of the above question, is moving all photos and video to an external card the smartest move to quicken the phone and if so, how is that done?

Thanks in advance.
 

B. Diddy

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Google Photos doesn't save photos on its own, unless you download a photo from your Google Photos cloud directly to your phone. Google Photos acts like any other Gallery app in that it displays any images that are saved to your phone's storage areas (as long as they're not in a directory that contains a file called ".nomedia"), as well as any photos that have been uploaded to your Google Photos cloud. If you have Google Photos Auto Backup turned on, and all of your photos are safely backed up to the cloud, then there is an option in the Google Photos settings menu to Free Up Device Storage. Google Photos knows which of your locally saved photos and videos have been backed up, and can delete those photos from local storage. If you want any of those photos locally saved again, you can always re-download them from the cloud.

If you want the Camera app to save all photos to the SD by default, then open the Camera's settings menu, and look for the option to set default storage location.

What's the breakdown of your internal storage usage? Show us a screenshot of the Settings>Storage​ menu.
 

kwitel

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Google Photos doesn't save photos on its own, unless you download a photo from your Google Photos cloud directly to your phone. Google Photos acts like any other Gallery app in that it displays any images that are saved to your phone's storage areas (as long as they're not in a directory that contains a file called ".nomedia"), as well as any photos that have been uploaded to your Google Photos cloud. If you have Google Photos Auto Backup turned on, and all of your photos are safely backed up to the cloud, then there is an option in the Google Photos settings menu to Free Up Device Storage. Google Photos knows which of your locally saved photos and videos have been backed up, and can delete those photos from local storage. If you want any of those photos locally saved again, you can always re-download them from the cloud.

If you want the Camera app to save all photos to the SD by default, then open the Camera's settings menu, and look for the option to set default storage location.

What's the breakdown of your internal storage usage? Show us a screenshot of the Settings>Storage​ menu.

Screenshot_20160910-194724.jpg
 

B. Diddy

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To answer one of your original questions it should be reasonably simple to move the photos to your SD card or to your computer's hard drive. Connect the phone to your computer via USB, then use Windows Explorer to navigate to the /DCIM/Camera directory (although, if I remember correctly, the M8 might have photos saved in the /DCIM/100Media directory). Then select all of the photos you want to transfer, and Copy them to either the microSD card or to your hard drive. Don't use the Move command, because the original files will be deleted as soon as the operation is complete, which can be a problem if something goes wrong with the move operation. Once you've confirmed that all files copied correctly, then you can delete the originals from Internal Storage.
 
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kwitel

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To answer one of your original questions it should be reasonably simple to move the photos to your SD card or to your computer's hard drive. Connect the phone to your computer via USB, then use Windows Explorer to navigate to the /DCIM/Camera directory (although, if I remember correctly, the M8 might have photos saved in the /DCIM/100Media directory). Then select all of the photos you want to transfer, and Copy them to either the microSD card or to your hard drive. Don't use the Move command, because the original files will be deleted as soon as the operation is complete, which can be a problem if something goes wrong with the move operation. Once you've confirmed that all files copied correctly, then you can delete the originals from Internal Storage.

Thanks B. Diddy.

So youre saying, use Google Photos as my primary "photo viewer" within my phone and/or move my existing photos to the SD and have all future (taken) photos saved there as well?

As an aside, does my storage breakdown look "normal" to you?
 
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B. Diddy

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So youre saying, use Google Photos as my primary "photo viewer" within my phone and/or move my existing photos to the SD and have all future (taken) photos saved there as well?

That's what I would do. Google Photos should be able to display photos on your SD card. The main thing that can be confusing, though, is that the main Google Photos screen combines photos from your local storage and your cloud, and doesn't categorize them as such. In order to browse photos that are just on local storage, you have to tap Menu, then Device Folders.

Another thing to understand about Google Photos is that if you delete a photo on the main screen, it gets removed from the cloud and your local storage. But if you're in the Device Folders screen and you delete a photo, it only deletes from the local storage, and not from the cloud.


As an aside, does my storage breakdown look "normal" to you?

10 GB for System files is fairly high, but not unheard of, because it also includes preinstalled bloatware (both from HTC and the carrier). This can vary depending on your carrier--some carriers are more notorious than others (I'm lookin' at you, Verizon and AT&T). Which carrier did you get yours from? Unfortunately, you can't remove preinstalled apps unless you root the phone.
 

B. Diddy

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That explains it. According to this article, "Of the 32GB of internal storage, 23.73GB is available to users out of the box. There's a good amount of bloatware onboard courtesy of Verizon—over 10 Verizon-branded apps alone that range from useful, like Visual Voicemail, to unnecessary, like Verizon Tones. Verizon also puts its own messaging app front and center, forcing you to dig around in a 'Tools' folder to find the default SMS app. There's a folder for the six Amazon pre-loads, including apps like the Amazon Appstore, Audible, and Amazon Kindle.":-\