SD card Internal storage problem

[Papou]

I set up a 128 GB micro sd card as internal storage using Activity Launcher. The phone shows the extra storage but shows only the same amount as free as before the card was set up! Now the camera does not work and I can't save files to the gallery. I thought that it might be the card, but replacing it with another card does not help. I can see the SD card but can't use the camera or save to the card.

Help! Please!

Redmi Note 8
MIUI Global 11.0.8

 

[KeBKR]

I don't know the Activity Launcher but when looking at it in the Play Store I can't see how you can use this app to format a SD Card as internal memory?
Did you format the second SD-Card also as internal memory or have you just replaced it?
Because your phone shows the same amount of memory as before I can only think of two possibilities: the SD Card is not formatted or it is broken.

When you eject the SD Card and reset the Camera app to its default is it still not working?

(See this link for instructions: https://miui.blog/any-devices/steps-enable-adoptable-storage-miui-11-phones)

 

[Papou]

Those are the instructions I followed. I could not see the "Use for extra phone storage" option so used the "Activity Launcher" method at the end. I did format the card as instructed. The card was new and was checked once removed, it is OK.

I noticed that the error messages I got seemed to be about permissions to write to the card. Searching the internet returned a number of hits from MIUI 10 & 11 users with the same problem as me.

I was looking for a "get out" without having to factory reset the phone. I decided that I needed to 'move on' so did the reset this morning. The SD card is again visible and functioning as external storage. All the apps which were failing now work again.

 

[blt2B]

@Papou thanks for the hit, would you be able to explain what the magic you did to make it work ?
I got the same problem with a 64 or 256GB Sandisk SD card…
the process works with Activity Launcher and after the reboot I can see 64 or 256GB (depending of the SD card used) total space but System storage is taking 40GB (for the 64GB SD card) or 233GB (for the 256GB SD Card) and only 20GB are free…
I have contacted Mi and they want me to send the phone back but it seems useless and only standard procedure, I am sure I will waste my time…many thanks!

 

[Papou]

Sorry to say but I found no magic. I simply did a factory reset and a reformat of the SD card as external storage. The phone now sees and uses the SD card as external storage. I did not repeat the Activity Launcher 'experiment', I decided I can live with external storage.

I see no reason to return your phone to Mi. As many people are reporting the same issue, the problem seems not to be in the hardware but in the firmware/Activity Launcher combination. This should be easy for Mi to reproduce and follow up.