Samsung Galaxy Note 2 - Moving Apps to External MicroSD Card

[Viraj Rao]

Hi,

Is it possible to move apps to external micro sd card on Samsung Galaxy Note 2. Also, can new downloaded apps be defaulted to be installed on external micro sd card.

Would like to know the process for both of them.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Raymond Tan]

You need to be rooted to move apps to external card. For the second part you can use Super App2sd.

 

[Viraj Rao]

Is it safe to root Samsung Galaxy Note 2 device

 

[Viraj Rao]

I successfully rooted my Samsung Galaxy Note 2, however I was not able to move any of my existing apps to External Micro SD Card (64 GB), using the various apps (App2SD, Move2SD etc) on Google Play.

Eventually I unrooted back my device to the latest firmware.

Need to know, whether its really possible to move apps to external sd card?

 

[SpookDroid]

OK, so this one is tricky to explain but in the end the simple answer is "Yes, you CAN move apps to SD BUT it's not simple and it does require root".

So, first the basics: Google decided to remove App installation onto SD cards from Android 4.0 upwards. Why they did this is still on debate, but alas, they did. No way around it. Main app has to be installed in the phone's memory but the app developer can implement 'extra downloads' going into the SD card (like a game, for instance, in which you download a small app and then it prompts you to download an additional 3GB of data). The problem is most developers don't bother to code this in and all that truckload of data ends up eating away your precious internal memory. Again, this was introduced with JellyBean (Android 4); anything before that is different.

As always, rooting your phone gives you access to EVERYTHING in it, and that means you can tamper with the code itself. In order to be able to use your SD card, you have to 'fool' the phone into thinking it's part of the internal memory. You do this by mounting the SD card's partition as part of the internal one. I'm sure there are guides on how to do this in the forums but, unfortunately, I don't know exactly how to do this since I've not rooted my phone (I want to keep my warranty intact for the time being).

BTW, the apps listed above all bear an incompatibility warning with Android 4, so that's probably why they don't work with your Note 2, even if rooted. (Don't know why it lets you install it, though...) And most of the apps that require root also state that they require "Busybox" installed (whatever that is).

 

[Viraj Rao]

Any apps on Google Play to transfer apps to SD and compatible with Jelly Bean 4.1.2. Busybox seems to be too complex for me..

 

[tirith]

There has been thread upon thread about this, and without swapping the internal storage for the external sd card, the simple answer is no, it cannot be done.

Honestly, 16gb is enough for me... even with 288 apps installed, I still have over 5gb of space left.

If all else fails, request the dev to put add on data on the sd...

Sent from my SPH-L900 using Tapatalk 2

 

[hopefulfarm]

Ok I'm curious if anyone knows WHY google changed it in JB so that we can't just move apps to sd (sans root)?

Seems like the American carriers (can't speak to any others) are offering phones with lower internal memory which really is just killing these phones for those who like to go nuts and use a lot of apps. I already have my Precious moving all images and other media to my SD card so I can keep my internal phone memory available for all apps.

So, why did Google decide to do this with jelly bean??

 

[tirith]

Part of it was to help prevent app piracy.

Part of it was because phones now DO have internal memory, where as back in the days of my g1 (really small internal storage), hero (a little bigger), even the evo, the most that was offered was 1 gig.

Plus, the majority of us can live with that 16gb internal... it's called app restriction by the user. As previously stated, I have 288 apps and still have 4.96 gb available on my internal. (Haven't cleared caches on them all lately...)


After clearing caches on everything, I was back to 5.13gb
~swyped from my galaxy note 2 on the now network

 

[SpookDroid]

The 'official' version is that it helps improve app responsiveness and overall performance. Since a little thing called 'Project Butter' was a huge deal in JellyBean, keeping apps in SD cards was something that had to go for things to work out smoothly (remember how apps that were moved to SD card prior to JB couldn't run widgets? There's a reason for that).

The 'unofficial' version is one that makes sense: a HUGE push to cloud services. It keeps money in the cloud service providers' pockets and keeps carriers happy by potentially forcing you to use more data to use said cloud services.

 

[TheOtherBill]

There are several threads here on this exact same topic (moving apps to SD card). Take a look at those, in a couple of them I have already posted a link to an article here on AC which quotes a Google engineer explaining it.

 

[n13l5]

The push to the cloud only makes sense for Google and Cloud companies.

For users, its horrific given ever increasing censorship and surveillance on the internet in the interest of corporations and spooks.
The government could shut down public access to the internet entirely whenever they feel like it. Recent changes made to U.S. laws not only mean that Obama can kill any citizen (foreigners anyway) without warrant or trial, but they also empowered him to call martial law any time he sees fit, eliminating the need for congressional approval. This is the exact same 'empowerment' that started Germany into the 3rd Reich. There is nothing that would force martial law to end at any given time, he can keep it up indefinitely.

Worse yet is, that Google has cut Micro SD cards from all devices it sells now, so we're being rounded up like cattle to put our stuff on the internet, which isn't always accessible. Only city slickers who never travel have continuous always-on internet access.

So, I'm not buying any more of Google's Nexus devices, and I'll be looking into mobile Ubuntu OS, where they won't want (nor even be able) to mess up my ability to manage my local storage.

 

[zeuswsu]

For users, its horrific given ever increasing censorship and surveillance on the internet in the interest of corporations and spooks.
The government could shut down public access to the internet entirely whenever they feel like it. Recent changes made to U.S. laws not only mean that Obama can kill any citizen (foreigners anyway) without warrant or trial, but they also empowered him to call martial law any time he sees fit, eliminating the need for congressional approval. This is the exact same 'empowerment' that started Germany into the 3rd Reich. There is nothing that would force martial law to end at any given time, he can keep it up indefinitely.

Lol.... So just to be clear you think everything being stored in the cloud is a bad idea?

Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk 2

 

[tirith]

That's why my own computer is my cloud...

~swyped from a galaxy (note 2) far far away

 

[stewart rogers]

Yes please

 

[Gussie G]

Del

 

[Gussie G]

Lol.... So just to be clear you think everything being stored in the cloud is a bad idea?

Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk 2

Dude why are you trying to ridicule N13L5. The person is clearly saying that in relation to what's happening in us and indeed global politics, i.e. The pervasive and persistent destruction of civil liberties and the centralization of control over ordinary citizens, the global desire to push people away from direct control of THEIR data to cloud is concerning because well, lets face it your not in control of it. Why are you trying to ridicule them its a valid point.

 

[tirith]

Or it CAN be viewed as people need self control. You don't need 8gb of music or movies on a phone. You don't need 11gb of apps. It's a portable alternative, yes, however, it isn't meant to be a be all end all device.

~swyped from a galaxy (note 2) far far away

 

[RichardAHill]

Or .. maybe YOU need to step back and remember that this is a forum to help people not to shove your views down their throats
I have a Note II, just got it, and somehow missed the restrictions that the (imho idiots) at Android crippled 4.1 with.
I can no longer add folders as shortcuts (want a separate folder for each mail account - I hate combined icons - that is me - ymmv), cannot add apps to and/or default ALL downloaded data to external my sd card, and the current 'launchers' are just visual shells - there are no code overwrites to 'fix' the above two issues the way there were in 2.35 - and 2.3.5 is not available for the Note II. I already tried rooting the Note 2 (been there done that, returned to touchwiz and default OS as I still could not get the above behavior to 'stick' between sessions).

Now ... do you want to lecture me too (will decidedly ignore you) or do you have any help to offer in this assistive forum ?, e.g. where to go or how to hack my preferences into 4.1 ?
If you wrote in asking how to cripple your choices, I'd ask why and add a sentence or two of my opinion, and then I'd answer your question.

It's a matter of user control. :-X

Primetechie

 

[tirith]

I have shared numerous times helpful insight on the topic, and I wasn't bashing anybody. I was just saying that a lot of us aren't new to android. Yes, I had the option to move apps2sd natively on froyo. Did I use it? No. Instead, I'd clear caches and only keep useful apps on my phone. It isn't going to kill you to delete apps you aren't going to use...

~swyped from a galaxy (note 2) far far away