Recently I tried to snap a picture while using my BlackBerry® smartphone and a new message was displayed that I hadn’t seen before. I had ignored the reminder my BlackBerry® Bold™ 9900 smartphone displayed when there was only space for 25 pictures left, and now my removable microSD® 8 GB card was full. However, my BlackBerry smartphone had my back – I quickly changed my camera settings so that pictures saved to the internal storage. I was then able to continue and take the photo.
I had two options at this point: Move pictures I’ve taken on my BlackBerry smartphone to a computer, or upgrade to a larger microSD media card. Jump ahead a few days and I’m ready to install my new 32 GB microSD card. Since I have data on my old 8 GB microSD card, here’s an overview of how to move this information to a new, larger microSD card.
A Few Things to Consider
- Notifications for when you are running low on free space can be slightly different depending on which version of BlackBerry® Device Software you are currently using. To learn more about how your smartphone notifies you when it is running low on space, consult the user guide for your device.
- Something else you should be aware of is that some models of BlackBerry smartphones do not have an internal storage option. To find out if your BlackBerry smartphone has this feature, jump to www.blackberry.com/smartphones and click on your device.
- Part of this process requires using the BlackBerry smartphone as a USB mass storage device. If you have never used the mass storage mode for your device check out our blog post about using your BlackBerry smartphone as a USB drive.
- You also may need to have the BlackBerry Desktop Software for PC installed depending on what OS your computer is using. We won’t be using BlackBerry Desktop Software for the media card swap, but it does have the necessary software your computer needs to recognize the BlackBerry smartphone if it is not recognized by your computer. If you do not have the BlackBerry Desktop for PC software installed, you can download it from the BlackBerry Desktop Software page.
- Another important thing to keep in mind is if your BlackBerry smartphone has the built-in storage feature and a removable microSD card, each one will show as a different drive when you connect your BlackBerry smartphone to your computer. If you see more than one drive, the microSD card will always be labeled as “BlackBerry2”.
Note: To find out what microSD cards are supported by your smartphone, check out BlackBerry Knowledge Base Article KB05461 – MicroSD card sizes supported by the BlackBerry Device Software, which can be found in the BlackBerry Technical Solution Center.
Alright, with the above being said, here’s how to move data from one microSD card to another!
1. Connect your BlackBerry smartphone to the computer, then click “Start” and select “My Computer”.
2. Under Devices with Removable Storage, locate the BlackBerry USB drive for the microSD card. If you see more than one BlackBerry drive, the microSD card will always labeled as “BlackBerry2”:
3. Right click on “BlackBerry2” and select “Copy”.
4. Choose the location on the computer where you want to copy the data, for example, your Desktop then right click and select “Paste”.
5. When the copy process is completed, disconnect your BlackBerry smartphone from the PC.
6. Remove the old microSD card from your BlackBerry smartphone and install the new microSD card. For assistance inserting a microSD card, check out the documentation for your smartphone.
7. Your BlackBerry smartphone will recognize that a new microSD card has been inserted. Because this is a new media card and we know it contains no previous data, choose “Yes” to format the microSD card.
Note: If this is not a new microSD card, any old data on the microSD card will be lost if you select “Yes” when prompted to format the microSD Card. Please ensure that any old data is backed up prior to formatting the microSD card.
8. Connect your BlackBerry smartphone to the computer, then click “Start” and choose “My Computer”.
9. Open the folder you copied to your computer during step 4. Inside the folder, right click on the folder labeled “BlackBerry” and select “Copy”.
10. Under Devices with Removable Storage, locate the BlackBerry USB drive for the microSD card and open it. As mentioned in Step 2, the microSD card may be displayed as “BlackBerry2”.
11. Right click on the open window and choose “Paste”. A message may appear indicating that the folder already exists; choose “Yes to All” will overwrite the existing folders with the data we copied from your old microSD card.
You have now swapped your data to a larger card, so go out and take more pictures!
Got a question or comment? Make sure you leave a comment and let us know!