Hi,

Just got my first BB (8100) and have noticed that it's using 50MB of the default 64MB storage. As far as I'm aware it's only got a week's worth of emails (about 200), 50-ish contacts and one picture I took while messing about. I therefore have a couple of questions:

1) Is there any way to determine what's using up the storage? I intend to get a microSD card but I'm a bit anal about housekeeping.

2) I get a lot of attachments (Word docs, spreadsheets, etc). My understanding is that attachments aren't downloaded until they're specifically requested - is that correct? And if I download an attachment is it stored locally for future reference, or is it re-downloaded each time it's opened? In the former case, can I remove the attachment from the BB to free up space without also removing it from my Exchange inbox?

Any enlightenment will be gratefully received!

Thanks
Wombat

Wombat, welcome to the Forums.

1. Yes... read here:
How do I free up memory on my device? - BlackBerryFAQ.com
Additional information on memory leaks on the 8100 - BlackBerryFAQ.com
Why is my BlackBerry losing its call logs or message logs? - BlackBerryFAQ.com
Get your Media Card soon, you need one. There is a great thread of sellers and hot prices in the Media Section of this forum, in the Sticky Note at the top of that section.

2. That is correct, attachments to email are not downloaded until requested. To store the attachment on your BB is done in various ways, according to your choice. You can save the email, which you can then open the attachment at your request (as long as you don't delete the email from your mail server where the attachment too is stored); or you can use third party applications such s BeamBerry, which will store the attachment on their servers or on your Media Card and then open and render the images of the DOC or PDF files when you need.

Good luck.

That's excellent; thank you very much

To clarify my understanding of the 'save' command: if I download an attachment without explicitly saving the email, the attachment is cached but not saved locally. If I save the email, the attachment is saved locally until I delete it. Is that about right?

That's probably a stupid question, but I'm trying to get my head around what sits on my Exchange server and what gets persisted to the BB.

Thanks again,
Wombat

I won't say emphatically that will be the case. You could save the email, then delete the email from your server, and attempt to open the email and the attachment and get the message "unable to open" or whatever. You might want to test it yourself and see.

I would advise if you have critical documents that must be referenced later, to save that attachment off to the Media Card, etc., and check out one of the document viewers such as BeamBerry or Repligo.

That makes sense - I'll have a play around and see what happens.

Thank you once again!

Cheers
Wombat