Android - Unable to update apps on SD Card

I've had my HTC Desire for over a year now and, among the many bugs and annoyances that seem to be sneaking their way in to my daily phone-using experience, the most annoying is the recent inability to update any apps I have on my SD Card. Due to the diminutive size of the Desire's internal storage, ALL of my apps are on the SD Card, making this quite a large problem.

My solution up until now has been to move the offending apps back to the phone, update them, and then move them back to the SD Card.

Fortunately, Nick Damoulakis has a better idea.

Summarised below just in case the original becomes unavailable in the future.

• Connect your phone to your PC


• When the connection is detected by the phone, it may ask you if you wish to switch to USB storage. Say yes.


• From your PC, go to the phone's drive (that should have just appeared in Explorer) and navigate to /sdcard/.android_secure/.


• Find the file called smdl2tmp1.asec and delete it


• Disconnect the phone


• Done!!

Thanks a lot Nick, this has saved me a massive amount of time and hair.