Add a Micro SD Card To A Surface Tablet:
In part 1 of this series, we covered how to free up some space on your Surface RT/2 or Surface Pro/Pro 2 by transferring the recovery partition to a removable USB drive.
In this post, we’re going to go over how to expand the available storage on your Surface by adding a Micro SD card.
This walk-through will give you a new location to store your pictures, music, or other files which, in turn, frees up space for more apps to be installed.
We’ll have to take a few extra steps after we install the hardware to make sure we’ve freed up as much space as possible but, they’re pretty easy.
OK, let’s get started…
Free up space on Surface tablets: Install the SD Card
First thing we need to do is physically install the Micro SD card. You can find instructions on how to do that HERE assuming you’re running Windows 8.1. If you’re not, you might want to update. before you go any further
After the Micro SD card is installed, all you have to do is move your existing music, picture, and video files over to new library location the Micro SD card and you’ll gain however much space they were consuming on your Surfaces’ internal hard drive.
Add Micro SD Card to Surface Tablets: Setting Default Location for Documents
While Windows 8.1 makes it pretty much “check-box easy” to set the default location for new pictures, music, and videos to the Micro SD card, the documents library is a little harder to get setup.
I don’t know why Microsoft didn’t handle documents the same way they did music, pictures, and videos because they didn’t do the sensible thing and consult me first but, they must have had some reason.
On the plus side, setting the default location for documents to the SD card is really simple, just follow these instructions:
- In desktop mode, open Windows Explorer
- Tap and hold (or right-click) the Documents library
- Select Properties
- Choose the Location tab
- Tap the Move button
- Browse to the new location on the SD card where you want your documents library to “live” and tap Select folder
- Back at the Locations tab, tap OK. You’ll get a warning like the one below.
- Tap Yes to finish the process
That’s it. your Documents library will be migrated over to the Micro SD card which will could free up a lot of space on your internal hard drive.
Technically, you could use the instructions above to set the music, picture, and video libraries as opposed to using the Default location check-boxes in PC Settings but, it isn’t as convenient.
I hope you found this updated walk-though helpful. As always, if you have questions, let me know.
Tim
