Smart Ultra 6 Marshmallow Disaster

[Curmudgeon]

The Marshmallow upgrade for the Smart Ultra 6 is a disaster. First, it is no longer possible to have apps installed on SD card. My SD card is now near redundant, and I can't fit all my apps in the phone memory. Worse, the Marshmallow feature to use SD card as an extension to phone memory IS NOT ENABLED ON SMART ULTRA 6.

Worse still, the apps that were previously installed on SD card WILL NOT WORK WHEN RE-INSTALLED IN PHONE MEMORY. I've figured out how to make them work again but it's a pain in the ##~##. Happy to share the method with anyone who asks.

Worse worse still, WiFi is MASSIVELY slower after upgrade.

Bottom line: if you have a Smart Ultra 6 and you haven't updated to Marshmallow, DON'T.

My Smart Ultra 6 is on borrowed time. A fix to the Marshmallow disaster is needed SOON.

[BandOfBrothers]

Hi @Curmudgeon

That sounds frustrating.  

Personally I don't download enough apps onto my s7 edge to fill up the main 32gb onboard memory minus what's taken up for Nougat. My phone has the option to move App's to Sd Card but I'm not too keen as I've heard that a Sd Card needs good speed specs on it for them to work well and some have experienced issues such as lag or the app not wanting to play properly. 

I see from the online specs your phone has 16gb of onboard storage minus what's used by Marshmallow. I'm sure you've done this already but when I was using an iPhone with 16gb of onboard  storage minus what iOS took up I was forever micro managing as space was a premium with no Sd option available. 

This I did by deleting old Calendar entries>Notes>emails & attachments>Music>Rarely or unused apps>Unused Tones>Pictures>Video>Browsing History>App Caches>Mms Texts>SMS Texts>Old unused Contacts> Etc. 

My advice to people after having to micro manage myself is to look at onboard memory specs and take into account what the Operating System takes up from that and opt for the largest storage a person can.

And to look at if the phone allows the movement of Apps from onboard storage to a Sd Card and if it does then go for the best spec Sd Card they can afford. 

Why the feature of moving App's from Onboard storage to Sd Card has been removed is beyond me as clearly it works ok going by your usage pattern before upgrading. 

Vodafone Tech Teams read all posts on the Community Forum so I'm sure they'll feed this back so hopefully a patch of some sort can be pushed out in the near future to re introduce this function you say is no longer available to you. 

Regarding the slow wifi issue. May I ask if you've tried a Factory Reset after creating a Back Up which is a generic tip if a phone is behaving not as it should after a Firmware update. 

If you have already performed this then if the phone is still under it's 24 month warranty then a Vodafone Store could send it away to have some diagnostics run on it. 

[hrym]

The ability to move apps to an external card seems to come and go in different versions of Android and I always thought it was a core Google thing rather than something manufacturers/networks modify.

If you have a lot of apps and limited storage, I can see how it would be necessary, though it might be a question of having a hard look and deciding what you really need.   I also think that 32mb is becoming a base minimum unless you're a very light user app-wise (it is for me, by my wife is rattling round in 16mb).

I assume you've been into each app in Settings and checked the move option individually?   Some will and some won't and there doesn't seem to be a definite pattern.

[Curmudgeon]

Thanks for your replies folks.

Having a 16Mb device wasn't a problem when I bought it, I have a large SD card and many of my apps were installed on that - and yes they all worked just fine.

The option to move apps to the SD card no longer exists, not for any app.

Where an app was previously installed on the SD card, it will no longer work when re-installed in 'phone storage.  It is necessary to do the following:

1. Install the app

2. Don't launch the app, instead go to settings and delete all its data.

3. Uninstall the app

4. Re-install the app.

As with any Android feature, it's up to the device manufacturer whether to keep it, modify it or edit it out.  There is a new feature in Marshmallow to format an SD card as an extension to the 'phone storage; Android would then be entirely agnostic as to where an app physically resides, it's all just storage.

However, it seems that, in its infinite wisdom, Vodafone has decided to remove this feature.  So unless you store loads of photo or music files (I don't) this all but renders the SD card redundant.

I take two morals from this story:

- buy a device with loads of built-in storage so you will never need to rely on a SD card for apps

- if you have your device working as you want it, DON'T ALLOW THE MANUFACTURER TO UPGRADE IT!!!

[Lunario1]

Since marmallow SD card need to be formated as internal storage and not portable device so it functions only as local storage to be able to install apps

[Tash]

Thanks for raising this with us @Curmudgeon, we've now fed this back internally. 

[hrym]

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@Lunario1 wrote:
Since marmallow SD card need to be formated as internal storage and not portable device so it functions only as local storage to be able to install apps

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I'm not clear whether the OP has the card formatted as Adopted or External Storage.   Both types ar available.   If it's the latter, then the card wouldn't be seen as effectively a separate device by the OS, so the "move to card" option would (I assume) go.  However, the phone should manage the whole storage pool (internal and card) by itself.

Adopted storage was introduced mainly for inexpensive devices with seriously limited storage, mainly in emerging markets (as they're known).   It has two disadvantages: 1) Cards can be slower than internal RAM, 2) a card formatted in this way can't be transferred to another device - so you can't transfer content (music, photos etc) just by moving the card.

If you have the card formatted as adopted storage, just let the OS go about its task.   If, however, you want to be able to manage it yourself, back up your content and reformat the card as external storage - remembering that you have no idea what is where, and what will survive the process.

If the apps were on the card (formatted as External Storage), and were recognised by the OS, you'd either need to move them to Internal or uninstall and re-install simply so that their settings had the correct paths for their data.  If you have apps on a card and then move that to anotehr device, you need to reinstall them so that the OS knows the correct locations.   The same may apply to an update.

As regards space, I've found that 16mb allows a pretty good selection of apps (total used a bit over 15mb), with content all on a card.   I'd still go for 32mb for preference, though.

[horizontalrain]

I'm suffering the same problems as curmudgeon. It would be good if Vodafone road tested Marshmallow for the 6 properly.
I had an ultra7 as a loan phone and I was able to run aps from the SD card and the data speeds were fine. When my 6 came back from 'repair' it was back to the previous OS. The advice from the shop was to accept the upgrade to Marshmallow, back to a snail's pace. Ho him. Not a good advert for a Vodafone branded phone.

[hrym]

If the phone is running slowly, it may be that it would benefit from a factory reset (don't forget to back up first!).   As I mentioned before, the ability to move apps to an SD card is a core function of Android that seems to come and go - not something that Vodafone modify.

It might be worth considering formatting the card as Adopted Storage as it'll then be part of the main memory pool and the operating system will use it as required.

[horizontalrain]

Hi HYRM, many thanks for taking the time to respond.

I did do a factory reset which made no difference. Ability to move apps to the SD card can be supported by Marshmallow (eg on the Ultra7), but not on the Ultra6. The option to format the card as Adopted Storage does not exist on the Ultra6.

The problem seems to be an incompetent implementation of Marshmallow. I don't suppose that a fix will come along due to the age of the phone.

I contacted Vodafone and got nowhere, they keep saying return to the shop and send it for repair. They have cloth ears.