*** How To PARTITION SDCard ***

[Guest boobloo]

I partioned a 16gb card as above but am now getting 'Phone Storage space is getting low' messages.

Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on

tmpfs 98064 0 98064 0% /dev

tmpfs 4096 0 4096 0% /sqlite_stmt_journals

/dev/block/mtdblock3 174080 162008 12072 93% /system

/dev/block/mtdblock5 169728 152720 17008 90% /data

/dev/block/mtdblock4 133120 22912 110208 17% /cache

/dev/block/mmcblk0p2 457593 55728 377451 13% /system/sd

/dev/block//vold/179:1

14993144 790272 14202872 5% /sdcard

Please advise your recommended parameters (partition sizes) and commands for a 16gb card to enable the /dev/block/mtdblock5 to increase in size. I have searched the forums and cannot find a definitive suggestion .

Many Thanks

[Guest ttom99]

There is another way to make these partitions right on PC - I used Acronis Disk Director and the job for 8 GB card was done in 3 minutes. Another software - Acronis True Image - helps to make a full backup of SD-card on PC and restore it in minutes as well (besides, this two progs together helped me to transfer all applications and data from 2 GB card to this new 8 GB). I think any software of this kind can make a job.

Can you give me a step by step Instruction for this way to change a sd-card?

greetz tom

[Guest ilbulgaro]

but it's better to use ext3 or ext4?? ext4 could cut my sd life soon??

[Guest borgfather]

I have a legend but a relevant problem

a2sd works fine the first time it sees the EXT partition

but then at the next boot it fails to mount the partition and all apps are gone

I used the ./adb shell to mount the EXT partition and copy the apps back to the data/apps

but now i have some applications that give an error

( at the moment it is the camera not sharing its system to ather apps like bar-code scanner)

i think it is an error mounting the partition but I'm not sure

[Guest bugicide]

In the second step, when I ran adb shell, I got an error:

exec '/system/bin/sh' failed: no such file or directory (2)

how do I fix it?

[Guest Yeth Mathter]

Followed these instructions to the letter on an r5 bake with A2SD+ and nothing has broken. It's late, so I'll check performance etc. over the next few days...

[Guest Raj.verma2]

Hi

Is there any way to check if partitioning is okay and is what we need?

Cheers

Raj

Firstly HUGE props to

androidandme.com (Taylor Wimberly) & 51dusty @ xda-developers.com for the Original post and threads at their relevant forums.

I mainly put this here, as i found lots of ways on the nternet, and none worked or worked as expected or properly....I started with Ubuntu, thinking it would be the best method. Probably is, but i kept getting crazy issues after having sucessfully doing it once.

It is ESSENTIAL that you create the partitions in the following order, if NOT FOLLOWING THE GUIDE:

1. fat32

2. ext2/3

3. linux-swap

Words from the guys above, edited slightly by ShokkA9 below.

Requirements before getting started:

• Cyanogen Recovery Image v1.4 or greater
  
• SD Card (Class 6 suggested)
  
• Android Device Bridge(ADB) - See attached with Shell.cmd inside to...just double click to open cmd prompt in the right place :(
  
• Android build that supports Apps2SD
  
  Recommended to do before any updating of the ROM..
  
  

  These instructions apply to both the Windows command prompt and the Mac terminal. As you can see from the screens, Windows Vista was used. You can partition your SD card at any time, but you might as well do it before you flash a new build of Android. As always, back up your data when performing any hacks. Partitioning your SD card will erase all data on it. This guide is split into 9 steps, but it is not as difficult as it looks. Read the whole thing before starting.
  
  ..All commands mentioned below, need to be typed into the command prompt window..

  
  Step 1
  Download the attached ADB.rar; extract it; open it; i am using the PC version.
  Double click shell.cmd, to open command prompt window
  Now look at the attached screen prints...the number represent the step it relates to. Easy ;)
  
  Step 2
  Connect phone to computer via USB lead.
  Reboot into Recovery Mode, via power on button whilst holding home button.
  Or use this command: adb shell reboot recovery
  Type: adb shell (after your phone has booted and on the recovery screen) in the cmd prompt window and in here every time you see Type:
  
  Step 3
  Type: parted /dev/block/mmcblk0
  Opens parted and mounts your SD card
  
  Step 4
  Type: print
  To check the size and partitions of your SD card, the example here is an 8GB card. This SD card is 7969 MB. 1 partition which is fat32. If your SD card is blank and no partitions are listed, you can skip to Step 6.
  
  Step 5
  To remove all existing partitions, use the commands below. If you have multiple partitions, remove each one at a time.

  • rm 1 (deletes partition number 1)
    
  • rm 2 (if needed. keep going till all partitions are removed)
    
  • print (check when you are done to make sure all partitions are removed)
    
    Step 6
    Creat your new partitions. You can make these any size, but the most common setup is 32 MB linux-swap partition, 512 MB ext2 partition, and remaining free space as a fat32 partition. In order to work properly, the partitions must be created in this order: fat32, ext2, linux-swap. The linux-swap partition is used for a swap file on some builds. Not all builds use linux-swap, but I create one just in case I ever need it.
    
    The ext2 partition is where your apps will be installed. I use 512 MB which gives me plenty of room but you can go larger like 1024 MB if you want. Parted only creates ext2 partitions and we can convert them to ext3 later.
    
    When using the Linux command mkpartfs, you must tell it where to start and end each partition. This can be done by taking the total SD card size and subtracting the linux-swap then ext2 partition sizes. See the following example for my 8 GB card.
    
    

    Total Size = 7969mb 'minus' 512mb(ext2) 'minus' 32mb(linux-swap) = 7425mb for fat32.

    • mkpartfs primary fat32 0 7425 (start is 0 and end is Total C)
      
    • mkpartfs primary ext2 7425 7937 (start is Total C and end is Total ;)
      
    • mkpartfs primary linux-swap 7937 7969 (start is Total B and end is Total A)
      

    Step 7

    Type: print

    To check the sizes of your partitions. If you made any mistakes you can return to Step 5 and remove them.

    Step 8

    Exit parted and upgrade your ext2 file system to ext3. For most users this is the final step, to upgrade to ext4, look at the links at the top of this post. We suggest all users upgrade to ext3. Its main advantage over ext2 is journaling which improves reliability and eliminates the need to check the file system after an unclean shutdown.

    [*]quit (exit parted and return to # prompt)

    [*]upgrade_fs (script to upgrade from ext2 to ext3)

  Step 9

  Finished. Check your work with print.

  [*]parted /dev/block/mmcblk0 (to open parted again)

  [*]print (check all your system partitions and their sizes)

  [*]quit (exit parted)

  [*]reboot (reboot your system to the operating system)

  Thats it, the next time you boot your Droid, it should move the apps to the ext3 partition.

  I had to do this, as the ones around are not clear, except this one, and the site can be down at times also, so at least it is in this forum too.

  Android rocks!!

  Big respect to Paul (main man), Cyanogen, and anyone else who makes stuff work on the Droid!!

[Guest nzstingray]

Hi, when I type: "parted /dev..." I get an error message that says "parted: not found"

I'm running winxp

Have followed the steps through till that error message.

What am I doing wrong?