Samsung a01 sd card as internal storage

The budget Samsung A series models such as A01, A11 & A21, A02s, A03s, A20, A12 have limited internal memory. On Samsung A11 out of the total 32GB internal storage, around 21 GB is the actual usable space.

It does offer an external SD card slot but you cannot install the Apps & Games on the memory card. Over a period of time, this limited space gets filled up and the phone slows down.

The solution to this problem is the “Adoptable Storage” feature. It’s available on Samsung Android devices but needs to be enabled via USB Debugging. After partitioning the SD card as internal storage, you can move the internal storage data to the SD card and make it the default storage space for apps & games.

Let’s see how to move apps to the SD card on Samsung A10, A11, A02s, A21, A51, etc as follows –

How to move Apps to SD card on Samsung A01, A11, A21, A12, A20, A02s, Tablet

Warning:

• Take a full backup of the internal storage data before moving ahead. I’m not responsible for any data loss.
• After partitioning the SD card you need to keep it inserted all the time to avoid app crash errors.
• The camera app may not work. You need to download a 3rd party camera app from the Play Store. 

First of all, we need to pull out the Samsung A11 SIM tray using a SIM ejector tool.

Place the Micro SD card in the respective slot as shown above. You should use a high-speed Micro SD card to use as internal storage.

Now, pull down the notification panel and tap the “Settings icon” to launch the Settings app.

In Settings, Go to “About Phone” > “Software Information”.

Now, tap the “Build number” 7 times.

A confirmation text flashes at the bottom – “Developer mode has been turned on”.

Let’s go to the Developer options page to enable “USB Debugging”.

Hit the back button 2 times to reach the “Settings” page.

The last option on this page is “Developer Options”. Click on it to open.

Now, look for “USB Debugging” and turn it on.

Approve the “Allow USB Debugging” request by tapping “OK”.

Now, we are ready to connect our Samsung device to the computer.

Use a USB Type-C cable to connect your Samsung phone to the PC.

Tap “Allow” to approve the USB Debugging request. We are authorizing the connected PC for USB Debugging.

Now, wait for the Samsung ADB Interface Drivers to install.

You can check the installation status in the “Device Manager” on your computer.

Now, we are going to use the “Minimal ADB & Fastboot” tool to write the ADB command.

Download the tool from the below link and install it on your PC –

DOWNLOAD

Now, run Minimal ADB & Fastboot.

Write the first command to check the ADB connection.

Type adb devices and hit enter.

The output of the above command is R95N8058RRJ device

We are ready to partition the SD card.

Write the next ADB command adb shell sm list-disks 

The output is disk:179,64 

This disk name may vary according to the memory card used. Make note of it. It may be disk:179,128 or something else in your case. We are going to use it in the command line a few steps later.

The next ADB command is adb shell sm list-volumes all 

Type the above command and click enter.

Now, to turn on adoptable storage write the command –

adb shell sm set-force-adoptable true

Now, comes the most important step. We are going to partition the whole SD card as internal storage or reserve some space as external storage.

If partitioning 70% space as internal and 30% as external the command line would be

adb shell sm partition disk:179,64 mixed 70

When partitioning the whole SD card space as internal storage, the command would change to

adb shell sm partition disk:179,64 private

NOTE: Make sure to use the correct disk name in the above command. It’s disk:179,64 in my case.

After partitioning the SD card we are going to move the internal storage data to the SD card.

Write the next ADB command –

adb shell sm list-volumes 

The output of the above command contains the UUID code af3bfe92-be9e-48f7-88f2-2ba71f81455c

Using this code we are going to write the next command line.

Copy the UUID code as shown above. It’ll be different in your case.

Using the UUID code the next command line to move the internal storage data to the SD card is

adb shell pm move-primary-storage af3bfe92-be9e-48f7-88f2-2ba71f81455c

The output of the above command is “Success”.

We have successfully moved Apps to the SD card on Samsung device. Now, the SD card is the default storage space for Apps & games.

The notification on the phone screen says –

“Content transfer is done – Content moved to SD card”

Let’s check the Internal Storage.

Pull down the notification panel and tap the settings icon.

In the Settings app, Go to “Device Care” > “Storage”.

Select the last option on the Storage page – “Advanced”

You can see the Device Storage space is increased from 32GB to 40GB.

Now a part of the SD card is being used as internal storage.

To revert the changes format the SD card as external storage

If you do not like “Adoptable Storage”, you can format the SD card again as external storage.

Tap “SD card” as shown above.

Now, hit the “3 dots icon” at the top-right corner and select “Format as portable storage”.

Now, click “Format” to erase the SD card partition.

Now, the complete SD card space is available as external storage.

How practical do you think is the adoptable storage feature? It is stable enough for regular usage? Please share your experience in the comment section below.

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