When is a factory reset not a factory reset?

[ms960]

My Droid was running slow, and there were a few things I wanted to clear up that I thought a factory reset would take care of.

For example, in my Gallery, there were a ton (300+) photos that I couldn't find anywhere on the phone. No anywhere on the SD card, not in my Gmail account, no where. Thinking they might be living in a cache or something, I did a factory reset (twice), and reformatted the SD card.

After the reset and logging into the phone, they're back. Or, they never left. I thought a factory reset was to make the phone look like it did coming out of the box, with no personal stuff on it?

Is there a really for-sure factory reset, above and beyond the reset? How come I have photos in the Gallery that I can't find anywhere on the phone?

Would greatly appreciate some help!

Thanks.

 

[droidman101]

Gallery is in /sdcard/DCIM

 

[ms960]

Gallery is in /sdcard/DCIM

/sdcard/DCIM is empty.

 

[DF Smod]

Do you have a Picassa Account, if so the pictures are probably tied to your Account

 

[LtKen]

They must have been somewhere else on the SD card... Factory resets dont kill pictures stored on the card, and the phone doesnt store pics anywhere but the card.


Did you pull the card and look that way? Sometimes the mount status of the card will impact how Root Explorer and ASTRO see files on the card.

 

[droidman101]

Do you have a Picassa Account, if so the pictures are probably tied to your Account

Or facebook sync, etc. Factory reset wipes /data(where apps and most of their data are held) but large files are usually stored on /sdcard

 

[droidman101]

Ok, if you have astro, go to /sdcard/ and tell it to search for *jpg*
That should direct you to the photos

 

[ms960]

Do you have a Picassa Account, if so the pictures are probably tied to your Account

Jeez, that's it. I shouldn't ask, but shouldn't I have a choice as to whether I want to see my photos from Picassa on my phone?

 

[droidman101]

There might be an option in picasa or something

 

[DF Smod]

I don't have Picassa but check in phone settings/accounts and sync and see if the option to turn off sync is available