Can't make SDXC card default camera storage on Oreo

[Android Central Question]

Greetings Android Central!

Here's my situation in a nutshell:

I bought my Nokia 6 phone in the autumn of 2017, and installed a 32 GB SDHC card on it. The Android version was most likely Nougat. I set the card as an internal storage and all the media was automatically saved on the card. Everything was fine until recently, when I ran out of space. I ordered a new 128 GB SDXC card to upgrade from the 32 GB card. What I want is to move all my old pictures and videos from the old card to the new one.

Here's what I've done so far in a chronological order:

I tried to read the old 32GB SD card through a card reader, but since it was formatted as my phone's internal storage (not portable storage), I couldn't read it on any other device. Instead, I successfully accessed all my phone's files on my MacBook Pro through a USB connection and the Android File Transfer program. However, since I couldn't tell which files were part of the phones internal storage and which ones part of the SD card, I gave up.

Since I had all the photos on an external storage device, I gave up on the old SD card and formatted it + removed it from my phone. Next, I put the new 128 GB SD card on my phone and tried to upload all the photos and videos on the card through the USB connection. Everything seemed fine until I noticed that all the media was being uploaded on the phone's 32 GB internal storage (instead of the 128 GB SD card), which ran out of space.

After this, I tried to set the camera to save all the pictures taken with the phone's camera on the SD card by default. However, in the Camera app, the option to choose the storage device is disabled (they apparently disabled this in Oreo, which I now use). Also, I tried to install third-party camera apps like MX Camera and Open Camera, but the apps would only let me choose a new folder inside the phone's internal storage, and wouldn't let me choose a folder on the SD card.

What now?

If only I could set the SD card as the default storage device for the camera. After this, the folder would probably move on the SD card and I could also dump all my old media on the SD card through the USB connection. So far, I've wasted over 5 hours trying to solve this problem, and I'm fantasizing about ordering an iPhone. Am I making a simple thing overly complicated?

Thank you!

 

[ManiacJoe]

When an SD card is formatted as internal storage, there is just storage, no internal and external. Neither you nor the apps get to pick where things are stored. Some files get put on the physical internal storage, some of the physical card, but you will never know what went where.

Before you permanently removed the old card from the phone, did you format it back to external storage, or otherwise tell the OS that the card was no longer to be used for internal storage?

 

[throwaway321]

Thank you for the answer. However, when I go to Settings -> Storage, there are two storage locations: Internal shared storage and SD card. With the old SD card, I was able to save all the media on the SD card and not on the phone's memory. I would like to do the same with my new SD card. I set the phone to forget the old card, but I did this after removing it from the phone. However, I transferred all the apps on the phone's internal memory and had all the media on an external hard drive, so I don't think I lost anything important.

 

[throwaway321]

Still looking for a solution to set my new 128 GB SD card as my default camera storage device on Android Oreo like I was able to do with my 32 GB card on Android Nougat.

 

[ManiacJoe]

If the phone thinks the SD card is formatted as external storage, having the camera app putting the pictures on the SD card is a feature (or not) of the camera app.

Newer apps that use lots of storage space (games, camera, GPS, maps) may let you put there large data on the SD card. See the settings of the individual apps.

 

[throwaway321]

Thank you for the answer. The new SD card is formatted as internal storage. On the Android camera app (on Android Oreo), the option to choose the storage location is disabled. Also, apps like MX Camera and Open camera won't let me choose the SD card as the default storage location.

This is slightly frustrating as I thought it would be a simple 5-minute thing to update my old SD card to a bigger one. However, Android seems to fight back on every step. Is there really no way to choose the SD card as the default storage device for media captured with the camera on Android Oreo?