Smart First Phone and only 2GB of storage?

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mattwnz

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#191164 26-Jan-2016 13:52

I purchased one of these basic phones for a family member who just needed a simple basic smartphone, and it does the job. However after installing a few apps, the phone came up with a message that it had used up all it;'s storage. I thought that was odd, as it was supposed to have 4GB of storage in it, and this was confirmed on the website. However looking in the settings, it is only showing 1.98 GB total space, with only 248MB free. Also the space used doesn't look right, as it says only 12.66MB is used for apps, when there is probably closed to 500 MB of apps on it. It is a stock phone, nothing done to it. Is this phone faulty, or is this phone incorrectly advertised. I have pasted a photo, and from that it looks like only 20% of the storage is actually in use. Anyone know what could be causing this? I am guessing that the best thing to do is to do a factory reset to see what it then shows.

robjg63

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#1479033 26-Jan-2016 13:53

model etc?

My phone shows it has 16GB total storage - it is the 16GB galaxy Note 2.

System Memory - 5.7GB is used by - the minimum amount of space required to run the system

Used Space 3.94 GB - used by apps etc

Cached data 228MB

Misc File 426MB

Available space - 5.64GB

So if your phone did have 4GB in total - the OS has probably used a fair bit of that - unless they have their phone organised a bit differently (than samsnung) and have partitioned the OS and the other area. Anyway - could it be the 4GB has quite a bit of its space used by the OS?

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RunningMan

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#1479035 26-Jan-2016 13:56

Make / model / where purchased?

mattwnz

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#1479038 26-Jan-2016 14:07

RunningMan:

Make / model / where purchased?

It is call the Vodafone Smart First, believe it only has two models, black and white. Purhcased from Warehouse Stationary about 1 month ago.

andrew027

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#1479039 26-Jan-2016 14:09

It looks identical to one of Vodafone's "Smart" branded phones - perhaps, from the thread title, it's the Vodafone Smart first.

Except, from the spec.s on the VF NZ site, that phone only has 512MB device memory, while the Smart prime has 8GB and the Smart ultra has 16GB, whereas yours apparently has 4GB, so not matching any of the VF models. Where did you see that yours should have 4GB?

Edit: OK @mattwnz, just saw your last reply. Yes, Warehouse Stationery website does say it should have 4GB. Worth checking with Vodafone whether it does though - their website says different so may be grounds for returning it if WS have misrepresented the spec.s.

mattwnz

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#1479044 26-Jan-2016 14:12

robjg63:

model etc?

My phone shows it has 16GB total storage - it is the 16GB galaxy Note 2.

System Memory - 5.7GB is used by - the minimum amount of space required to run the system

Used Space 3.94 GB - used by apps etc

Cached data 228MB

Misc File 426MB

Available space - 5.64GB

So if your phone did have 4GB in total - the OS has probably used a fair bit of that - unless they have their phone organised a bit differently (than samsnung) and have partitioned the OS and the other area. Anyway - could it be the 4GB has quite a bit of its space used by the OS?

I have a galaxy running a custom lollipop rom with 16GB, and that is only showing 11GB of storage, so the OS is using a lot of the unaccounted space. However it doesn't have the large dark greyed out area to the right of the calculated space on the graph. The smart first appears to be miscalculating the space used for things like apps, and there is the large greyed out area (which I thought may have been the OS), to thr right. The smart first runs Kitkat, but it is the same type of graphics to show the space used..

mattwnz

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#1479046 26-Jan-2016 14:13

andrew027:

It looks identical to one of Vodafone's "Smart" branded phones - perhaps, from the thread title, it's the Vodafone Smart first.

Except, from the spec.s on the VF NZ site, that phone only has 512MB device memory, while the Smart prime has 8GB and the Smart ultra has 16GB, whereas yours apparently has 4GB, so not matching any of the VF models. Where did you see that yours should have 4GB?

512MB is the memory, 4GB is the storage. The full specs are at https://www.vodafone.co.nz/MEDIA_ProductCatalog/m780017_Product_Datasheet_1_14_V695.pdf

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andrew027

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#1479049 26-Jan-2016 14:17

mattwnz: 512MB is the memory, 4GB is the storage. The full specs are at https://www.vodafone.co.nz/MEDIA_ProductCatalog/m780017_Product_Datasheet_1_14_V695.pdf

Sorry - my mistake. I saw the data sheet but misread it.

sbiddle

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#1479053 26-Jan-2016 14:23

It's normal on many devices to show the space free excluding the OS - so the device may have 4GB but 2GB is reserved for the OS leaving 2GB free.

IMHO anything with less than 8GB storage is a total waste of time for anybody who does anything but use their phone for SMS/calling. The minute you even install a moderate number of apps and/or take photos you'll fill up the device.

mattwnz

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#1479088 26-Jan-2016 15:09

sbiddle:

It's normal on many devices to show the space free excluding the OS - so the device may have 4GB but 2GB is reserved for the OS leaving 2GB free.

IMHO anything with less than 8GB storage is a total waste of time for anybody who does anything but use their phone for SMS/calling. The minute you even install a moderate number of apps and/or take photos you'll fill up the device.

I agree for my own use, but this is just for basic use by someone who will mainly use it for calling and listening to radio and pandora, and it works well for that. Also runs Kitkat which is modern enough for latest news apps. It does also allow you to add an SD card to expand the storage. To be honest, I was really impressed with the phone for this price point. If someone wanted a cheap audio streaming device to run pandora through an amp, and never use it as a phone, it is excellent value.

But the readings on this phone look to be way out. Just adding up the Space used out of the remaining 2GB of free space excluding the OS which I now presume are using the other 2GB

Apps 12.66MB

Pictures/videos 0.06MB

Audio 0.148MB

Downloads 0.08MB

Cached Data 7.85MB

Misc 0.628MB

Free Space 248MB

The total used space is just 21.43MB used, which isn't right (about 10% of the graph) as is shown .

Yet it says there is only 248MB available. So I am guessing the filesystem is corrupted to produce a false readings of the used space. I think the best thing is a reset to se if that fixes it.