iPhone Major difference between iPhoto file size across devices

[laudern]

On my ipad the iPhoto size is 1.06gb. On my iPhone it is 8.8gb. Both devices are set to optimise local storage and keep hi res files in the cloud. How in the world can I sort this out??

 

[BigBlur]

Key word is optimize local storage. With this turned on, the size will never be the same across your devices. It's optimizing your storage. Either your iPad has less storage available than your iPhone; or you've looked at more pictures on your iPhone, causing it to download the full hi res version for those. This is normal and is nothing to worry about.

If you really wanted them to be the same size across your devices, then turn off optimize storage (assuming you have enough space).

 

[laudern]

Key word is optimize local storage. With this turned on, the size will never be the same across your devices. It's optimizing your storage. Either your iPad has less storage available than your iPhone; or you've looked at more pictures on your iPhone, causing it to download the full hi res version for those. This is normal and is nothing to worry about.

If you really wanted them to be the same size across your devices, then turn off optimize storage (assuming you have enough space).

You are probably spot on. The ipad is 32gb and the iPhone is 64gb. Both have similar apps installed and the 64gb iPhone has a lot more free spare. I was wondering if the iPhoto was inflating the file size to help decrease the free space available. And I'm hoping as my free space decreases on the phone, so will the iPhoto file size.

 

[systemBuilder]

Be aware that many simple file systems allocate storage in fixed sizes "blocks". If the block size is 256KB, a 1K photo will take all 256KB, wasting 99.6% of the storage! The "block" size (the smallest chunk of flash that can be allocated) is a function of the flash drive, but also can be something set by the file system according to design limits in the file system itself (i.e. if the file system has 16-bit block numbers then a 4GB phone will have a block size of 4GB / 64K = 64K, whereas the same file system on a 128GB phone will have a block size of 128GB / 64K = 2MB !!) So that could also be contributing to the disparity in your storage size(s).

In your case the storage size is 2x larger on the iphone vs. ipad, so this might account for a factor of two smaller in storage size on ipad (1GB -> 2GB). As you said though it's 1GB vs 8GB. As bigblur said, the "optimize" feature is probably caching photos on your ipad. Since there isn't much storage on your ipad, it's probably throwing away more photos (caching fewer photos) to save on storage. If you download a huge game on your ipad you might find a few days later that your photos are taking 500MB, becaue a "cache eviction" policy has thrown away the less-looked-at photos.