I tried to follow the FAQ for my problem, and some of the threads associated with it in the forum, and if I am doing it right, it is not working. I have the problem when I turn on the Sanza Fuze, the message “Not enough free space for Music DB, please free 90MB.” then it turns off and I can not do anything else. I tried to make it show up by following certain things, and even trying to format it with firmware updater and windows media player(on WMP it won’t let me click format). I connect it to the computer and the device shows up in WMP. It says I have, I believe 8MB left of free space but when I look on the two storage/removable device folders in ‘My Computer’ there is no music in any of it. I would really appreciate more help on this. Thanks.
Well, the good news is you know what the problem is and secondly, I suspect this may be the only time you’ll have it.
That you have already tried formatting the player suggests you are not worried about losing all your files and that you just want to get it working again, is that correct?
You are not able to view your files in the device folder under My Computer because you added them under a USB mode, MTP, which is not transparent through simple Windows folder browsing. Had you added them through another mode, MSC, you would be able to see them. You can read more about advantages and operations of each, both unrelated to your problem, after you find a solution.
Your objective is to release some space, say about 100 MB, by deleting some files.
First, have you removed the microSD from the external drive? If not, remove and leave aside until the issue is resolved. If your player is refreshing on attempted start-ups, this may decrease the size of the index just enough to allow you to fire up the player and to remove a few files.
You mentioned trying to format the player through Windows Media Player: you tried deleting files through WMP as well?
If that doesn’t work, have you another media application which can connect to your player in MTP mode such as MediaMonkey or Winamp? If so, give them both a try, there’s a chance one of them may allow you the deletions that WMP is not.
Failing that, you can try formatting the player with your computer:
1. Connect your player to your computer
2. Navigate back to My Computer
3. Right-click the drive which is connected to your player
4. Choose format and FAT32 and click OK
Next, download the latest firmware to your computer:
http://mp3support.sandisk.com/firmware/fuze/fuze01.01.22.zip
5. Then follow the steps as written on the first page of the latest firmware thread:
http://forums.sandisk.com/sansa/board/message?board.id=sansafuse&thread.id=9473
• Ensure your battery is > 50% full.
• Extract the .zip file into a folder on your computer.
• Once extracted, drag the file to the root directory of your Sansa Fuze.
• Disconnect the Sansa Fuze and let it begin the firmware update.
• Once it finally finishes doing its update, it will turn itself off.
• Turn the Fuze on Select your language and region preference
• Once its back to the main menu, head to “Settings” > “System Settings” > “Info”, and verify the “Version” is now 01.01.22"x".
Do you know how to extract a zip file? You should already have a program to extract the zipped firmware you just downloaded: click on the zipped file and it should open in an archive application. Click extract and take note of the destination folder. Then drag that extracted file to the root directory of your player as described above. Do not try to engage the Fuze until the update finishes as noted above, it should take under a minute if I recall rightly.
6. Fire up your player and then reformat it again with the onboard Fuze formatter.
May seem a hassle but it should go quickly if you follow the steps.
Let me know how it turns out.
Thank you very much. I formatted it on the computer and then formatted it on the Sansa Fuze itself, and it worked! Thanks again!
@shnnnatx7 wrote:
I tried to follow the FAQ for my problem, and some of the threads associated with it in the forum, and if I am doing it right, it is not working. I have the problem when I turn on the Sanza Fuze, the message “Not enough free space for Music DB, please free 90MB.” then it turns off and I can not do anything else. I tried to make it show up by following certain things, and even trying to format it with firmware updater and windows media player(on WMP it won’t let me click format). I connect it to the computer and the device shows up in WMP. It says I have, I believe 8MB left of free space but when I look on the two storage/removable device folders in ‘My Computer’ there is no music in any of it. I would really appreciate more help on this. Thanks.
Just so you know for the future, this ‘Not enough space of Music DB, please free 90MB’ message doesn’t necessarily mean what it says. From the FAQ on the subject:
Answer: Though you’d never guess, it actually means there is a corrupted file. It may be a bad file you put on or a good file corrupted by Sansa bugs.
When you see it, run Chkdsk, a Windows program for corrupted files.
It can also mean though exactly what it says; that the memory is full . . . kind of. I have found that using MTP mode requires more memory ‘head-space’ room as there are more things going on in the background when ‘managing a media player’.
I use MSC mode exclusively. The only time my player ever gets switched to MTP is when I’m using it to diagnose or re-create a problem or situation that someone here on the forum has. In MSC mode, I can use virtually 100% of the memory with no ill effects. There have been times when I have only had less than 1 MB remaining (in fact just a few kb of free space) on both the player’s internal memory and external memory card!
And this goes off without a hitch. But the second I switch the player to MTP mode, I’ll get this error msg. because it needs a certain amount of available memory to do whatever voodoo it does in MTP mode. To work around this, I have to force an MSC connection, move a few songs (or maybe just an album folder to keep it simple) from the player to the computer’s Desktop, un-plug it and let it do the database refresh thing and now of course, I won’t get that msg and it will start up normally. When the database refresh has completed, I can switch back to MSC on the player, re-connect and move the album folder back to the player’s memory, filling it back up again. Now when I un-plug it, and the database refreshes, because the player is in MSC mode, it will complete and won’t display the error.
When you have a player in MTP mode and force an MSC connection, that doesn’t actually change it on the player. As soon as you dis-connect, the player will go back to MTP mode until such time as you switch the setting on the player.
Just food for thought. 
Well, I used to use MTP to connect with my Fuze to both of my computers, (not simultaniously), until the newest firmware update, when I had to use MSC in order to get the update to work. really, I don’t see much difference between the two, until I read Tapeworm’s post. Now whenever I get another MP3 Player (not now), I’ll be sure to set it to MSC for now on.
I believe if you connect in both modes (at different times of course) and right-click and select ‘Properties’ you’ll notice the the amount of ‘free space available’ is different between the 2 modes, confirming the higher memory requirements of MTP.
MTP is not for me!
@tapeworm wrote:
I believe if you connect in both modes (at different times of course) and right-click and select ‘Properties’ you’ll notice the the amount of ‘free space available’ is different between the 2 modes, confirming the higher memory requirements of MTP.
makes sense, but what if Windows is lying? Don’t answer that, its another rhetorical question…
I believe everyone except Rhapsody users should rejoice in the unfettered freedom that is MSC, but if you choose not to, that is your prerogative(as Britney and Bobby said)
@marvin_martian wrote:
I believe everyone except Rhapsody users should rejoice in the unfettered freedom that is MSC, but if you choose not to, that is your prerogative(as Britney and Bobby said)
Please, no more celeb quotes, as it makes me want to scream into the heavens and say WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE CELEBS THAT ARE THE MOST ANNOYING PEOPLE ON THE PLANET?
