Only 5GB of storage on 32GB Glow21?

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Renate

Do people actually use UMS? (That's when it says: "Your Nook is connected over USB and you can't do a single thing with it now")

1. Calibre uses this, so Calibre users have to use it too

2. Joe/Jill Schmoe (me, for example) has no idea how to use anything besides what the device does out of the box, which is UMS

[ready2read]

Originally Posted by Renate

I had 128GB on my Glow 7.8". It's trivial to add to the new Glow '21. You just have to solder a bit.

Wow what skills you have.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Renate

Do people actually use UMS? (That's when it says: "Your Nook is connected over USB and you can't do a single thing with it now").

I do. I like Nooks, even with their limitations, I use them as is out of the box. And since I use Calibre to sideload, I would be using UMS.

B&N pulled the same crap with the Glowlight 3, then they put out a firmware update that swapped the two partitions. Maybe they'll do the same with the 4.

5GB is plenty of space, really. But I wish they at least gave users 8 or 10. 8GB was the standard before the latest wave of readers.

Now that I think of it, how much free space does a Clara have out of the box? I forget how much of the 8GB is taken up by the system.

[JSWolf]

Ever since I bought a Nook ST, I vowed never to buy another nook. The firmware is lousy and the partitioning games are ridiculous.

[Renate]

Originally Posted by Renate

It's trivial to add to the new Glow '21. You just have to solder a bit.

The photo is my Glow2 with 32GB added.

This is my Glow '21:

C:\>dir g:
 Volume in drive G is NOOK
 Volume Serial Number is 1234-5678

 Directory of G:\

01/13/2022  19:28    <DIR>          Android
01/13/2022  19:28    <DIR>          .adobe-digital-editions
               0 File(s)              0 bytes
               2 Dir(s)  17,171,333,120 bytes free

Happy now? The easiest way to do this involves deleting everything that you've sideloaded with UMS (not apps, not B&N books).

# cd /storage/emulated/0/.mass
# rm backingFile.img
# busybox dd if=/dev/zero of=backingFile.img bs=1 count=0 seek=16384M
# sync
# busybox mkfs.vfat -n NOOK backingFile.img
# sync
# reboot

16384M is 16 GB. I prefer:

               2 Dir(s)      16,509,440 bytes free

[Renate]

If it's any consolation, B&N had originally planned for only 1 GB of sideload space.
They commented that out in the script and changed it to 5 GB.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Renate

If it's any consolation, B&N had originally planned for only 1 GB of sideload space.
They commented that out in the script and changed it to 5 GB.

1GB, 5GB either way it's measly and stupid.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Renate

If it's any consolation, B&N had originally planned for only 1 GB of sideload space.
They commented that out in the script and changed it to 5 GB.

1GB: They might as well say 'We don't want these to sell.'

[Joliet Jake]

I am saddened to hear this. I used to own a Nook Simple Touch (two actually, both bought used) in Canada (you can't buy B&N books online in Canada). Needless to say, all of my books were sideloaded.

I never noticed any partition issues. I guess I hadn't loaded enough books yet. Is there a "hack" to expand the sideloaded portion?

[Renate]

Originally Posted by Joliet Jake

Is there a "hack" to expand the sideloaded portion?

Yes, that's what I posted at the top. The particulars are for the new Glow '21. The situation exists (I think, I'll check later) on all Glows.

(I may have confused everybody by discussing two unrelated things in that post: 1) adding an extras SD card for storage 2) reallocating sideload space on a Glow without any additional SD card.)

I don't understand the level of indignation on this. People are all getting burnt up by the single number "5GB" without anyone actually running into a problem. The only people who will ever be affected by this are users sophisticated enough to own over 5GB of books but too naive to either quit using UMS or reallocating the spsd. In any case, storing 5GB of anything on a filesystem that hearkens back to MS-DOS is questionable in this millenium.

Edit: My Glow3 (black w/4 buttons) had a limit of 4GB.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Renate

I don't understand the level of indignation on this. People are all getting burnt up by the single number "5GB" without anyone actually running into a problem.

I think it's more an annoyance that B&N has done it again.

The Nook ST had partitioned memory, but nobody cared because it also had an SD card for storage.

Then there was the Nook Glowlight: No more SD card and partitioned to 512MB for sideloading.

The (first) Glowlight Plus: No partitioning. Victory!

The Glowlight 3: Partitioned to 1GB of sideloading. Complaints ensued. B&N quickly pushed out an update to change the partitioning.

Now there's the 4. No mention of partitioning. Marketing touts 32GB of storage. Hey, guess what? Partitioning is back!

Even the soulless black hole that is Amazon doesn't do that. It's like B&N never learn a lesson.

Partitioning alone won't keep me from buying one. If it had waterproofing, I would already have one.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I think it's more an annoyance that B&N has done it again.

The Nook ST had partitioned memory, but nobody cared because it also had an SD card for storage.

Then there was the Nook Glowlight: No more SD card and partitioned to 512MB for sideloading.

The (first) Glowlight Plus: No partitioning. Victory!

The Glowlight 3: Partitioned to 1GB of sideloading. Complaints ensued. B&N quickly pushed out an update to change the partitioning.

Now there's the 4. No mention of partitioning. Marketing touts 32GB of storage. Hey, guess what? Partitioning is back!

Even the soulless black hole that is Amazon doesn't do that. It's like B&N never learn a lesson.

Partitioning alone won't keep me from buying one. If it had waterproofing, I would already have one.

The Glowlight Plus from 2019 was not partitioned either. So it's even stranger they have done it with the Glowlight 4.

Anyway, I've sold my Glowlight Plus and am not in the market for any Nooks until they improve their software considerably. I could live with the 5GB if there were other benefits compared to Kobo and Kindle, but there aren't. Android OS is not a benefit for me, I don't want to bother with installing alternative launchers and reading apps, especially as the buttons seem not to work with those. (Nooooo clickers, please. )

[Renate]

Well, as I said, my Glow3 had 4GB allocated for spsd of which not a single byte is used.
My Glow 7.8" had 6GB allocated for spsd of which not a single byte is used.
I've borked my Glow2's so much that I can't boot them without disabling the EMMC.

Edit: Ok, I'll admit my Glow7.8 is getting a bit beat up, but it still works fine. That is unless you're dependent on a screen or something.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Renate

I don't understand the level of indignation on this. People are all getting burnt up by the single number "5GB" without anyone actually running into a problem. ...

I look at it as false advertising. On B&N's website they tout the 32 GBs of RAM in this way...

32GB memory: 29.1 GB for NOOK Store content and side-loaded content

Nothing about a 5 GB limit for side-loaded content. And, it appears, they use that jump in memory capacity as one of the reasons for a $30 jump in price from the GL3 to the GL4. The fact that they got rid of the partitioning with the GL3 and the 7.8" GL+ makes you think the memory won't be partitioned.

In comparison, my GL3 has 6.2 GB of memory available for side-loaded books, and it is advertised as an 8 GB device (not 32 GB). Although this would never affect me, it could affect those who read manga or have a huge collection of books they want to carry with them wherever they go.

I don't know of any other eInk reader seller who does this. My PocketBook HD3 (for example) advertises 16 GBs of RAM, and 14.8 GBs are available for whatever I want to put it (it can also play audio books).

It seems like B&N used to advertise the size of the side-loading partition (when they had these partitions in the past). That would be the honest thing to do with the GL4.

[Renate]

Originally Posted by Renate

My Glow3 had 4GB allocated for spsd of which not a single byte is used.
My Glow 7.8" had 6GB allocated for spsd of which not a single byte is used.

What part did you not understand? The previous two models did this. The current model does this. Why the outrage? Where are the people who have actually run into this limit?

"I bought a car and the speedometer does not go to 300 MPH!"