Upgraded from S20U memory concerns

[Organum]

I have just received my S21U 128G and immediately noticed there was no memory card slot.

This seems a definite retrograde step since videos especially eat a lot of memory. 

I spoke to Samsung who explained that since everything is backed up to the Cloud this should not be a problem. Well this is sort of true except 5G isn't available easily everywhere. 

Then I found that opening Acrobat files they just stay in memory, editing photos too and have just spent time deleting out all their files manually.

Is there a setting to prevent these saves?

I am disappointed Samsung were not more upfront about this loss of a major feature and now worry that 128G might not be enough.

[Fiona26]

I will agree the loss of the sd card was a little disappointing. To be fair to Samsung the talk of the no sd card slot and charging brick was known before the phone was even released. I purchased the 512gb knowing I was loosing the sd card slot that was in my previous phone. Again mainly used for photos. There are ways around it. I myself have a 1tb hard drive I can move my photos to. If you didn't want to use cloud there are alternatives.

[antikythera]

Yep, buyer beware as always. The specifications would have listed the MicroSD slot if it were still present. I transfer stuff to PC from my Android devices if I want to keep it long term because the PCs are backed up anyway to multiple locations.

[Pugs1957]

I am dumbfounded that you missed this. It's been discussed everywhere. This site had many posts because it was seen as controversial.

"Then I found that opening Acrobat files they just stay in memory, editing photos too and have just spent time deleting out all their files manually."

Do you mean in recent files? Android manages RAM better than Windows. Freeing up RAM in Android is unnecessary.

[Babishko]

Yes it is true that Samsung did openly advertise the fact that the S21 range would not have SD capability long before the first S21 hit the shelves Organum but you are not the only one who did not check this first and who are now disappointed. I have to echo your concerns that 128Gb may not be enough as stand alone storage so you may need to transfer files periodically to an external storage system or the cloud etc. Once you have mastered doing this you are flying again and worrying about your phones storage hopefully won't be too much of a concern for you. I went for the 512Gb version of the S21 Ultra primarily because of the dropping of the SD card capacity, and I recommend it wholeheartedly. I hope you solve your storage issue Organum and that you don't feel bad about not picking up on the lack of SD support before buying your phone. Good luck. 👍👍

[CodyH]

Thanks for letting me know didn't know it not coming with SD card on it available, that is definitely one I'll be avoiding.
(Samsung 1st no charger now this what's next to go.)

[adamlee]

You can still use SD card and get a USB C micro SD card adapter and just plug into charging port.

[ironass]

This article, from January of this year, states...

"It's worth considering the storage options before buying a Galaxy S21 smartphone, especially as there's no microSD card support this time."

It goes on to explain why Samsung removed SD card support. See...

Galaxy S21 Storage Options & Why There's No microSD Explained

https://screenrant.com/samsung-galaxy-s21-plus-ultra-storage-microsd-options-explained/

[adamlee]

Just use this. Problem solved.

[Organum]

Thanks.  The problem is that when buying on the Samsung site this was not flagged. I guess I will have to ask to swap for the higher memory model.

I only hope the camera lives up to the hype.