Avast anti-theft update issues - not enough space (untrue)

[John-H]

Hi,

I can't upgrade my Avast antitheft. When I try it says:

"Could not write to /system directory (there is not enough space available on the /system partition of your device (1 MiB free, 7 MiB required). Free up some space by deleting unused (e.g. audio) files from the /system partition using a root file manager). ..."

But... when I use Titanium backup to report space it says:

Internal 2.01 GB (1.29 GB free)
DB data 133 MB (118 MB free)
SD card 6.20 GB (1.18 GB free)
Ext SD card 32 GB 16.1 GB free)

My /system folder is only 269 MB and most of that is the app folder containing apk files (126 MB). There are no audio files there as far as I know - they are on ext_SD.

So there is plenty of room - why won't it install? I've read that there was a bug but that was a year ago and was to have been fixed in the next upgrade.

I'm using Android 2.2.1 based custom ROM onto which I installed antitheft originally and successfully. I've just uninstalled it and now it won't re-install.

[John-H]

No way could I re-instal anti theft from a fresh download. I eventually had to restore a recent  phone backup image from ROM manager. So now it works but I'm back to the same problem - it won't upgrade, claiming not enough space, when clearly there is.

Has anyone managed to fix this?

[REDACTED]

I realize this is an old topic but I am responding to it because it comes up on Google searches.  For anyone who is getting the "not enough space on /system" error when trying to install Avast Anti-theft, it is likely true.  As of Android 5.1.1 there was not enough space left in /system, possibly because Google added bloatware.  Ccarefully deleting some unnecessary items using Titanium backup or manually will free up enough space:

****I take no responsibility for this information and any action you take is at your own risk****

Here is what I uninstalled using Titanium Backup (with root of course...):
- Google Fit (icon is some sort of multi-colored heart)
- Google Hindi Input
- Google Pinyin Input
- Google Korean Input
- iWnn IME

While I did not uninstall these, my research indicates you could also uninstall Email and Exchange Services (NOT Gmail!!!) if you don't use them.

There are likely many more things you can delete such as unused ringtones.  Really you could delete all but one and copy them into a media folder on your SD card and just point to them, no sense in them taking up limited real estate in /system.  This space limitation was at best very short-sided of Google, at worst intentional to discourage rooting.

I hope this works for you.

Re: not enough space available on /system