Kit Kat SD situation is ridiculous

[Halicon]

For those of you wondering, you SD is probably not broken. Kit Kat has the awesome feature of disabling the ability to of apps to write on your card. There should be a HUGE warning about this! So now my podcast and other things that I have on my phone have to go to my internal storage and compete with the ridiculous amount the OS takes up. This is ridiculous and Sprint better be talking to Google about how angry it's customers are about this, because I didn't spend a bunch of money for a little more weight on my phone. I spent it to gain the storage that I needed. This is intolerable and I like a lot of other customers are extremely angry about this. This should have been communicated or something if they were going to push out and update with changes that are not optional.

[Seaborg]

I just have one simple question: Why is it that Samsung, Google, and Sprint all want to pass the responsibility to the other two and not make an emergency issue of fixing an "If it isn't broke, don't fix it" issue? They are so busy fixing what works so it no longer works that I can't justify in my mind to get another Samsung product at all. It matters not a bit who did the update, if it damages an issue, FIX IT!

[Joe01880]

Can you tell me what the current version and build of kit Kat should be. I have "4.4.2" build ending in PUFNAE which was installed on my phone by a Samsung Rep. at a Best Buy store. Checking for further OTA updates I get nothing. Never did, is why I went to a BB store had a Samsung Rep do a wired install.

[SprintCare]

Joe01880,

Thanks for replying back.

That is the correct build version and android version.

If you have anymore questions, we are here.


Thank you,

George M.
Sprint Social Care Team

[tdrobinsonsr]

just wanted to share a chat that I just had with Samsung on this issue;

General Info
Chat start time	Mar 14, 2014 11:05:25 AM EST
Chat end time	Mar 14, 2014 11:39:01 AM EST
Duration (actual chatting time)	00:33:36
Operator	Noemi

Chat Transcript

info: Please wait for a Samsung Agent to respond.   info: You are now chatting with 'Noemi'. There will be a brief survey at the end of our chat to share feedback on my performance today.   info: Your Issue ID for this chat is LTK112560428313X   Noemi: Hi, thank you for contacting Samsung Technical Support. How may I help you today?   Noemi: Not to rush you, are we still connected on the chat?   Terry : Good Day, I own a SPH-l720 through sprint. Recently I recieved the KitKat 4.42 update to my phone. Since then I have not been able to write to my installed external SD card. Will Samsung issue a fix to allow it's customers to regain this access?   Noemi: Very good day to you.   Noemi: I understand that you want to write data to your external SD card on your phone, am I correct?   Terry : Yes that is correct. Before the KitKAt update that was pushed via OTA, I was able to both read and write back to the SD card. However since the update to SGS4 I am now getting an error message when attempting to do the same task.   Noemi: Thank you for the confirmation.   Noemi: I will surely help you with this.   Noemi: May I know the error message that you are getting when attempting to write to the external SD card?   Terry : The error just says that the app has failed to write to the SD card.   Noemi: Thank you for the information.   Noemi: May I ask if you, which app are you referring to?   Noemi: Not to rush you, are we still connected on the chat?   Terry : Any app that attempts to write to the SD card. If I open a Doc file within Polaris Office, if I attempt to copy something to the SD via any file manager app, I get the error. It doesn't matter what app, anything that attempts to write to any "external" SD card inserted within the phone gets the error.   Noemi: Thank you for the information.   Noemi: May I know the Baseband version on your phone?   Terry : L720vpufnae   Noemi: Thank you for the information.   Terry : Not to rush you, are we still connected on the chat?   Noemi: I have checked the details for your device, and I am sorry to inform you that the option to write to the external SD card after the 4.4.2 is not available.   Terry : So now what   Noemi: Yes, I am with you.   Noemi: When any update is performed on a device, it will bring some changes.   Terry : Does this mean that I now have a phone like the Apple iPhone, without access to the SD card which drew me to want a Samsung phone in the first place?   Terry : So basically you are telling me that the customer gets screwed with this update. Now no longer able to access (write back) any data that he/she has placed on an SD card, which is why most of us purchased the SGS4 in the first place?   Noemi: After the update there is no option to write to SD card.   Terry : So I should just abandon Samsung and migrate to a competetators phone, because you guys appear as if you don't care about your customers.   Noemi: We can only add data to SD card from My Files.   Noemi: From the Home screen, press the Apps icon. Locate and press the My Files icon. In the My Files folder, choose the file you want to modify. Touch and hold the file (a check mark will appear next to the file).  Then touch the Settings Icon in the upper right hand corner.  This will bring up the menu to choose your action.    Terry : So any money that I have spent on apps to access my data has been wasted thanks to Samsung and Google.    Noemi: Google prohibits the modification (write/delete/rename) of files in external SD Cards using 3rd party applications from Android KitKat OS.   Noemi: I sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused.   Terry : Inconvenience Caused? How about loss of contracts, business leads, and finances of which can't be recouped because no one at Samsung had the forthough to consider the customer. Again thanks Samsung for passing along crap!   Noemi: I would have surely helped you if there is any option available.   Noemi: I am sorry; I couldn't help you fix the issue over the chat. However, is there anything else I might be able to assist you with?   Terry : I am a very disappointed customer who is now considering switching to another phone due to this issue. Business lost! Have a good day   Noemi: I truly understand your concern, I would have been disappointed as well had that happened to me.   Terry : P.S. Please pass this chat along to those in customer relations so that they can understand why owners of your phones are becoming disgruntled.   Noemi: However I have no options with me to help you with the issue.

[Dj_Damjano]

You also need to understand that it is not Samsung's or Sprint's fault, you need to get a beef with Google, they implemented the SD card issue, and that was done to protect your data, even though, in my opinion, it should have been as an option to allow or not under all apps.

[RSPC]

If anyone is interested,

here is a link with more info.

Here is a link with more info: http://www.androidpolice.com/2014/02/17/external-blues-google-has-bro...

[fireguy_6364]

the tech even pointed out that it was a google decision. not Samsung or Sprint for that matter..