Nokia 6500 classic – deleting lots of SMS messages
I’ve been having a problem recently with my phone – a nokia 6500 classic. Bascially, when I bought the phone I quickly found out that the memory capacity is rather large. I quite enjoyed not having to empty my inbox out very often.
A good while later I have over 5000 text messages on my phone. This has really noticable complications, mainly trying to write a message when starting the phone. It took over 10 minutes for the messaging system to ready itself from a fresh switch on, which is quite annoying after a while!
When I tried to delete these messages using the Menu -> Messaging -> Delete Messages option my phone would do something rather weird and even more annoying. After a variable number of messages, usually around 30-40, it would freeze. Deleteing would not continue. If you cancel the deleting at this point the majority of the phone is fine however trying to access any messaging features doesn’t work.
Today I managed to find a solution. Instead of using the more obvious way of deleting messages I did this:
Menu -> Messaging -> Inbox -> Options -> Mark All. This returns to the inbox with a checkmark down the whole list. Now I go for Options -> Delete marked.
It did its usual on the first attempt although it stopped after about 130 messages. Plus, it returns to the inbox when if you cancel it at this point and doesn’t lock out messaging features. I tried again and within about 2 or 3 repeats I had completely cleared the inbox. The same process on the sent items box cleaned my whole phone of messages. It’s now much speedier to load.
I imagine someone will probabaly experience a similar problem (found someone with the slide version via google) so I hope this post will save a bit of stress.
I really need to do this. As you know I have the same phone and I have currently 8078 messages in the inbox and 6324 in the sent items. I never switch it off any more cos it takes about 40 minutes to ready itself for accessing/sending messages once I switch it back on!!
I think my first phoine had a capacity of about 130 messages….
thankyou soooooooo much!
Oh my god i have same problem i have over 7 thousand bloody text messages in my inbox an about the same in my sent box it is driving me round the twist trying to delete them is like pulling teeth!!! i actually want to scream!!!! it takes about 30 to 40 mins to load up when i turn on the phone!!! i am now waiting for it to load as i am typing this then i am going to try that tip
AAAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH it is still crashing after 40 odd texts!!!!
Oh dear! That is quite a lot of messages though. I’m sure if you persevere you’ll get there!
@Scott
i managed to delete quite a few but it still does the crashing thing an i still have thousands!!! i wonder if i took in the shop they could do it for me!!! i dont want them reading my texts tho lol
i managed to delete 990 at once witch is the most it has done so farthen it crashed.sometimes it will do 150 then crash sometimes 40 odd then crash!!! but 990 is progress if i manage to do it i am deleteing every bloody text i ever get from then on!!!
the fone is the bane of my life hahaha
woooooooo hooooooooooo i have cleared my inbox!!!! i have just gotta do the same with my sent box now only another 6 thousand to go haha!!!!
thanks sooooo much for putting this on here i was gonna buy a new phone cos of it x
i am now soooo pleased i have deleted all my inbox an all my sent items took me 3 days to do it!!! my fone is now alot faster!!!
thanks so much
@Keeley
Yay!
Knew it would work in the end. It’s such a terrible design flaw which I’m sure could be easily fixed. Least it’s sorted
@Scott
its like a different phone now!!!! woop woop!!!!
i dont get the point in having such a big memory if its gonna make it do that its pretty pointless an very annoying!!!!!
thanks again x x x
i am having the same problem i think, it said i had no memory left for messages so tried to delete them now my phone just wont work, i dont know what i can do it just freezes on the start up page when you can click menu and go to and names, but it wont let me click them, so does anybody have a solution for me please?
I think you might have to take that one to a store, sounds like it needs some serious help.
@Braden
keep trying it will work eventually!!! it took me 3 full days of deleting
My phone deleted my 11k+ inbox messages by itself – I didn’t tell it to but actually I’m rather pleased as it saves me a job!
I have the same issue, but the marking messages method works well for me.
If it’s taken you 3 days to delete about 5000 messages it may be quicker to factory reset the phone and then setup all of your options again!
I’m having this problem but with the Nokia 5610 and it used to freeze up at like 200 or so, and then 40, but now its at around 10-15! HELP?!
Have you tried the method above? Not sure whether it’ll be the same in a different phone.
Thanks ! helped a lot.
i have the same problem but instead of 4000 i have 20000 loll, im gonna try this method its just soooooo slow atm
20000? Wow, good luck!
I’m trying your method ‘cos when I tried to delete the folder it used to freeze after 10 messages!! Let’s hope it works. Thanks for posting this up.
Just trying your method now, best i had the old way was 74 deleted before locking up. Just tried this now, and already up to 400 and still going. I have a different model, but this still works for me.
How funny to find this after all this time. I have been moving (mark all, Move marked) the contents of my inbox into various folders about a 1000 at a time for about 18 months now. It makes it easier to manage them, and the phone is unstable when the inbox and the sent items gets over 1000 I find. Start up times are horrible when you get large numbers (I had 12,000 the other day – it took an hour, and three crashes)
I like to save my messages, so I export a folder when I get a chance using PC-Suite, and then delete the contents of the folder. Mark them all and hit delete, and just leave it in the background. When you delete lots (800 or so) it might create a few text messages that are made up of 10 or so just deleted messages, which is always quite funny.
Here is my question though. I get told that the thing is full. But when I look on PC suite I have 800K out of the total 900+K available. Why is it telling me the thing is full?
A lovely thing to hold that 6500c. But the memory management sucks big time.
I just had a similar problem, ended up restoring the factory settings on the phone then restore using PC suite to a backup I made a few weeks ago….and of course i unchecked the messages to be restored!
So just make a back up using PC suite and take it from there
thanks a lot for this!!!! my 7210 supernova finally works like its new again!