No Micro SD card slot, no sale

[Len_A]

Only 32GB of on board memory, no micro sd card slot to expand, no sale. Period.

What are they thinking?

 

[Thom]

Welcome to Android Forums.

My pre-ordered Droid Maxx is on a Fed-Ex truck on its way to my Verizon store. To me it will be an excellent improvement to my Bionic.

32GB will meet my needs and I am looking forward to the 48hr battery and the thinner frame.

Anyone needing to swap in massive amounts of data without waiting for data transfer should stay away from it. The lack of a SD-card drawer is both bad and good.

... Thom

 

[Outatime]

My GNex didn't have an SD slot. Didn't miss it one bit. If you manage your data on the cloud efficiently, 32 gig should be WAY more than you need. Music, use Google Music. Photos, use Google+. Documents, use Google Drive.

But, that's the awesome things about Android phones. If the Droid lineup doesn't have what you're looking for, there are lots of other choices!

 

[Wolfedude88]

My GNex didn't have an SD slot. Didn't miss it one bit. If you manage your data on the cloud efficiently, 32 gig should be WAY more than you need. Music, use Google Music. Photos, use Google+. Documents, use Google Drive.

But, that's the awesome things about Android phones. If the Droid lineup doesn't have what you're looking for, there are lots of other choices!

I still think the cloud is crap. The majority of people on Verizon and AT&T no longer have unlimited data, so using your data to access the cloud all the time is a horrible idea, smart for the carriers but bad for the costumer. It would be great for people with unlimited data or if you can access wifi.

I know a lot of people can get wifi at work but a ton still cannot, I work in a factory and it is bad enough just trying to maintain a signal let alone them actually setting up wifi.

32gb is still plenty for me, also sd card doesn't matter to me either but I understand why people would want one.

I use to think the awesome thing about android was choice, but just about everyone besides samsung has moved away from sd cards, which again I understand why.

I just don't think the cloud is the solution, at least not yet.

 

[Old Member]

I still think the cloud is crap. The majority of people on Verizon and AT&T no longer have unlimited data, so using your data to access the cloud all the time is a horrible idea, smart for the carriers but bad for the costumer. It would be great for people with unlimited data or if you can access wifi.

I know a lot of people can get wifi at work but a ton still cannot, I work in a factory and it is bad enough just trying to maintain a signal let alone them actually setting up wifi.

32gb is still plenty for me, also sd card doesn't matter to me either but I understand why people would want one.

I use to think the awesome thing about android was choice, but just about everyone besides samsung has moved away from sd cards, which again I understand why.

I just don't think the cloud is the solution, at least not yet.

32GB=

7,000 songs or

1 Movie = 2-3GB so . . . that means 9ish movies or

14,540 10mp HD pictures or

More apps than you can use or

Any combination of the above.

So lets say that you have 1,000 (4GB) favorite songs, 2-3 (9GB) favorite movies and one hundred apps (5GB) and 1,000 pictures (2GB) , you will still have 11GB (give or take) to play and work with.

It does require you to maintain your phone, switching music and songs out as you get tired of them, but it is not that cumbersome. You create new playlists for your music.

While working in a place with out wifi or a good 3G/4G signal and not having unlimited data, it's really not that much of a problem.

I have unlimited data and I have a Galaxy Nexus. I have never had a space or storage issue in the 20 months that I've had it. The closest thing that I've encountered is coming within 3GB of full and I realized that I had too many backups of my ROM on my phone. Deleting a few of them freed up a ton of space.

 

[Wolfedude88]

32GB=

7,000 songs or

1 Movie = 2-3GB so . . . that means 9ish movies or

14,540 10mp HD pictures or

More apps than you can use or

Any combination of the above.

So lets say that you have 1,000 (4GB) favorite songs, 2-3 (9GB) favorite movies and one hundred apps (5GB) and 1,000 pictures (2GB) , you will still have 11GB (give or take) to play and work with.

It does require you to maintain your phone, switching music and songs out as you get tired of them, but it is not that cumbersome. You create new playlists for your music.

While working in a place with out wifi or a good 3G/4G signal and not having unlimited data, it's really not that much of a problem.

I have unlimited data and I have a Galaxy Nexus. I have never had a space or storage issue in the 20 months that I've had it. The closest thing that I've encountered is coming within 3GB of full and I realized that I had too many backups of my ROM on my phone. Deleting a few of them freed up a ton of space.

Trust me, 32gb is plenty for me, but you will lose anywhere from 5-10gb for OS and other stuff. I thought i read that the X had about 22 or 24gb free. I could honestly make it work with 16gb but I prefer 32gb. I understand the need for some users to need more.

 

[Jersey Tom]

Only 32GB of on board memory, no micro sd card slot to expand, no sale. Period.

What are they thinking?

Must be thinking that there are a lot of customers out there who are in my situation where I'll never come close to using all of the 32 gig of onboard data.

 

[Whatstreet]

It appears that there is a SIM tray.

From the Users Guide under Assemble and Charge.

"Your SIM card is pre-installed in your smartphone. If you need
to replace your SIM, pull the volume keys/SIM tray out of the​

smartphone as shown in step 1."

 

[wise_guy69]

It appears that there is a SIM tray.

From the Users Guide under Assemble and Charge.

"Your SIM card is pre-installed in your smartphone. If you need
to replace your SIM, pull the volume keys/SIM tray out of the​

smartphone as shown in step 1."

I think they are talking about lack of Micro-SD card expansion, not the SIM card. All VZW LTE phones will have a SIM card slot (as far as I have been told).

 

[Whatstreet]

Sorry about the moment of confusion.

 

[OutOfPhase]

Sorry about the moment of confusion.

No need to apologize we all have them. Some of us more then others.

 

[Lucky Armpit]

While my opinion isn't as strong as "no MicroSD slot, no sale", I do have to agree with the "What were they thinking?" sentiment. Unfortunately most hardware manufacturers have gone away from MicroSD card slots... probably due to the ever-constant desire to make phones thinner, as well as keeping costs down. It seems that your only choice now is Samsung, as they are one of the only manufacturers who continue to put MicroSD slots in their phones.

I don't understand the trend either, or the advice of smart cloud management. The vast majority of customers are probably on AT&T and Verizon, both which have long-ago axed unlimited data plans. I much prefer to have my music stored locally on my device. I can listen to whatever I want, whenever I want, and use 0 data while doing so.

And we all know that just because a phone has 32GB of internal storage doesn't mean the user has 32GB available to them. I'm guessing that there will be ~24GB of storage available to the user on the Droid Maxx. And for someone like me that has almost 17GB of music, that leaves me ~7GB of free space for pictures, videos, etc. I hate having to "manage" my music but it looks like I'll have to do just that when I get this phone. Frustrating, but it is what it is. Really wish they would have made a 64GB option or just stuck a MicroSD card slot in the thing.

 

[doogald]

IIRC, Google deprecated sd cards with ice cream sandwich in aosp. The manufacturers still supporting it are doing it with custom frameworks. It was always a bit of a kludge and confusing to non-technical consumers IMHO, as people couldn't understand why a phone with a 16 GB memory card gave out of storage errors after installing too many apps (which took up much less than 16 GB.)

The great news about android is that it's not one size fits all. If you want or need sd card support, somebody offers that.

 

[krouget]

I don't understand the trend either, or the advice of smart cloud management. The vast majority of customers are probably on AT&T and Verizon, both which have long-ago axed unlimited data plans. I much prefer to have my music stored locally on my device. I can listen to whatever I want, whenever I want, and use 0 data while doing so.

Ironically, the trend is a bit backwards, in that we moved away from local storage, as data limits have started to tighten. However, you can't really do much about that, as cloud storage and services do have very real benefits, while the carriers have responded to the market by milking it for what they can.

That said, I utilize wifi pretty heavily these days, but also use a lot of data. Even then, I can't imagine storing a significant amount of movies on my phone, because it's just a really odd method for watching them and I have a tablet for that. I can easily store my entire music collection on 32 gigs worth of space, and more photos than I honestly care to look at. Even with some of the more loaded ROMs, actual storage space was never the weak link in my chain, but everyone is different.

I'm just curious as to how much content people store, because they can, as oppose to how much they actually use on a regular basis. After all, it's still a mobile device, meant to be an extension of regular activity. It's a similar thought to people who have hundreds of apps, but only really use 15, day to day.

And we all know that just because a phone has 32GB of internal storage doesn't mean the user has 32GB available to them. I'm guessing that there will be ~24GB of storage available to the user on the Droid Maxx. And for someone like me that has almost 17GB of music, that leaves me ~7GB of free space for pictures, videos, etc. I hate having to "manage" my music but it looks like I'll have to do just that when I get this phone. Frustrating, but it is what it is. Really wish they would have made a 64GB option or just stuck a MicroSD card slot in the thing.

Currently, my GNex has 28.13 available for usage, down from 32.

Managing anything can be a chore, but if your music takes priority, why not load it up and use cloud/web services for the rest of your content? Using something like an online photo album, with an app to accommodate, will use much less data. And if you're like me, you don't keep and actively watch more than 1-2 movies on your device for long periods of time, anyway (tablet, in my case).

 

[Lucky Armpit]

Ironically, the trend is a bit backwards, in that we moved away from local storage, as data limits have started to tighten. However, you can't really do much about that, as cloud storage and services do have very real benefits, while the carriers have responded to the market by milking it for what they can.

That said, I utilize wifi pretty heavily these days, but also use a lot of data. Even then, I can't imagine storing a significant amount of movies on my phone, because it's just a really odd method for watching them and I have a tablet for that. I can easily store my entire music collection on 32 gigs worth of space, and more photos than I honestly care to look at. Even with some of the more loaded ROMs, actual storage space was never the weak link in my chain, but everyone is different.

I'm just curious as to how much content people store, because they can, as oppose to how much they actually use on a regular basis. After all, it's still a mobile device, meant to be an extension of regular activity. It's a similar thought to people who have hundreds of apps, but only really use 15, day to day.


Currently, my GNex has 28.13 available for usage, down from 32.

Managing anything can be a chore, but if your music takes priority, why not load it up and use cloud/web services for the rest of your content? Using something like an online photo album, with an app to accommodate, will use much less data. And if you're like me, you don't keep and actively watch more than 1-2 movies on your device for long periods of time, anyway (tablet, in my case).

That's good information, thanks very much. I had a GNex but had all kinds of problems with it so Verizon swapped it out for a Razr Maxx. The Maxx has 16GB internal but it was chopped up into 2 x 8GB partitions, meaning that the user only had 8GB available. It's my understanding that it was done this way due to Gingerbread, as that's what the phone was originally released on. Unfortunately, the storage space is still chopped up that way so while I have 7.5GB free, there's no way that's enough for pics, movies, music. So that's why I'm hoping it's one gigantic partition on the Maxx.

I agree that cloud storage has its place; it's just not for me. AND GET OFF MY LAWN!

 

[doogald]

That's good information, thanks very much. I had a GNex but had all kinds of problems with it so Verizon swapped it out for a Razr Maxx. The Maxx has 16GB internal but it was chopped up into 2 x 8GB partitions, meaning that the user only had 8GB available. It's my understanding that it was done this way due to Gingerbread, as that's what the phone was originally released on. Unfortunately, the storage space is still chopped up that way so while I have 7.5GB free, there's no way that's enough for pics, movies, music. So that's why I'm hoping it's one gigantic partition on the Maxx.

I agree that cloud storage has its place; it's just not for me. AND GET OFF MY LAWN!

My Maxx is listed as 25.48 GB of storage, currently with 22.75 available. (Android OS takes 6.52 GB according to settings->storage.)

 

[krouget]

That's good information, thanks very much. I had a GNex but had all kinds of problems with it so Verizon swapped it out for a Razr Maxx. The Maxx has 16GB internal but it was chopped up into 2 x 8GB partitions, meaning that the user only had 8GB available. It's my understanding that it was done this way due to Gingerbread, as that's what the phone was originally released on. Unfortunately, the storage space is still chopped up that way so while I have 7.5GB free, there's no way that's enough for pics, movies, music. So that's why I'm hoping it's one gigantic partition on the Maxx.

I agree that cloud storage has its place; it's just not for me. AND GET OFF MY LAWN!

Ah, I vaguely remember reading about that issue, but I didn't realize it was the Razr Maxx. Understanding that, yes, that's an absurdly low limit, so here's hoping this isn't the case with future products.

Good luck with that 17 gigs of music + video, you may end up needing this!

 

[Lucky Armpit]

My Maxx is listed as 25.48 GB of storage, currently with 22.75 available. (Android OS takes 6.52 GB according to settings->storage.)

That helps, thanks very much!

Ah, I vaguely remember reading about that issue, but I didn't realize it was the Razr Maxx. Understanding that, yes, that's an absurdly low limit, so here's hoping this isn't the case with future products.

Good luck with that 17 gigs of music + video, you may end up needing this!

Heck no! I got rid of one of them as soon as I had an Android phone that had enough storage for all my music - was tired of carrying around two devices!

 

[Sportster]

Had Googlerola included 64gb internal, a sale would have been made. As it is with a meager 32gb that gets half used up with apps and other crap on the phone without me touching it, it wouldn't be nearly enough space. Presently on my Droid Razr Maxx I have 80gb sd and internal. I like that. Using the cloud is inconsistent and unreliable and them forcing everyone to their PAID cloud using PAID data with no sd is criminal, IMO.

 

[tspangle88]

Had Googlerola included 64gb internal, a sale would have been made. As it is with a meager 32gb that gets half used up with apps and other crap on the phone without me touching it, it wouldn't be nearly enough space. Presently on my Droid Razr Maxx I have 80gb sd and internal. I like that. Using the cloud is inconsistent and unreliable and them forcing everyone to their PAID cloud using PAID data with no sd is criminal, IMO.

I'd prefer an SD slot too, but "criminal" is overstating things just a tad. You don't have to buy this phone, after all. If the SD card slot is that important, get a GS4.

 

[rabidhunter]

That's what WiFi is for really. Play Music allows for local storage of music. I can download and delete as much as I like when I'm at home. I just take along the songs I'm interested in using. I got a tablet for everything else. I'm coming from a phone that had 356 MB of memory, I made it work. I have found little need for a microSD card.

 

[Lucky Armpit]

It's all about what works for some folks won't work for others. It's all good. I'm not happy about no MicroSD card slot but I can make 32GB on onboard storage work... especially since there's over 24GB available to the user initially. Having a Motorola phone is much more important than having a MicroSD card slot if that means my only option is Samsung. Been burned too many times by Samsung's terrible build quality and non-existent customer service. Plus, I really, really, REALLY don't like TouchWiz. <insert puking smiley here>

 

[Ninjak]

Here's an option for those that don't mind a tiny dongle (smaller than a US quarter). it works on the Razr Maxx HD and I expect will work on the Droid Maxx. Just ordered two for my Droid Maxx and Nexus 7. Been following Meenova since I heard about this on Kickstarter and pre-orders just went up today:

https://shopmeenova.appspot.com/st/p/m3r.html

 

[distortedloop]

You're not going to get an SD card on any Motorola or HTC phone in the future, I suspect. Samsung still bucks the trend with an SD card; I'm not sure about LG.

Don't necessarily blame the carriers. Google is pushing for no SD cards (which is why Motorola won't use them in the future). There's always been that issue with mounting the SD card on the computer resulting in apps that needed it having problems. They're pushing MTP as a solution to let the phone and computer share access without issues. Yes, a large internal memory with an SD card for would be great (my Note 2 has 32 GB internal and 64 GB sd card), but all my non-SD card phones with 32 GB have never had space issues once I realized I didn't have to keep all the music ever made on my device...

I'll never buy a phone with less than 32 unless it has an SD card slot, but 32's room enough for lots of photos, tons of video podcasts, audio books, some local music, etc.

 

[Optimus Prune]

My s3 has killed three sd cards. My wife's has killed two. I'm done relying on micro sd expansion in phones.