My wife's iPhone 7+ (iOS 15.8) got completely filled up, and now essentially no apps work. At this point, a lot of the storage is related to photos or messages, but it also looks like half of the storage is also filled with system files.
The first thing we tried doing is deleting photos which we know are backed up elsewhere. However, the photos won't delete. I tried connecting the iPhone to my laptop as a drive and deleting them that way -- that just generates an error message.
Initially tried working with the local Genius bar who basically recommended getting enough iCloud storage to sync the phone, backing up the phone and doing a factory reset to clear out the system files. Did that, but after sitting several days plugged in and connected to wi-fi almost nothing new is in iCloud.
Tried using iTunes to force an iCloud backup -- just gets an error message.
Tried using iTunes to backup to my laptop -- it won't do that because the C: drive doesn't have enough space. Lots of space on the D: drive and I made a link so iTunes should backup to the D: drive, but it still refuses to do another local backup.
Tried using a 3rd party data recovery tool (Do Your Data Recovery for iPhone 5.1) which won't make a connection to the phone over USB.
Tried manually copying some of the recent photos (since the last backup) to my laptop, but they come across as 0 kb files.
Went back to the Genius bar who basically said that the phone is too full to do anything and I'm basically out of luck.
Anyone with any other thoughts at how to clear out some space so the phone will start working? Even though the phone is old, it's just fine from a hardware standpoint, just full.
Bill
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