Fix Sansa Clip Music DB 30MB Error

This is a short article on how to fix the rather common "Not enough space for music DB. Please remove 30MB." error message on the Sansa Clip.  I only feel compelled to write this article because all the steps I found online were (surprisingly) incorrect.  My fix is done under Linux, and should work just as well in Mac - in fact I don't think this issue can readily be solved in Windows (for reasons given later).

The common solution on all the forums (for Windows) is to hastily reformat the drive as FAT32 using the Windows format disk tool in explorer.  This won't fix the error as formatting isn't the real problem with the Sansa Clip... the problem really seems to lie in the partition table.  First, the partition table that is put onto the Sansa from the factory seems to be bogus.  The firmware on the Sansa doesn't seem to mind, but even in Mass Storage mode the table comes out unrecognizeable for fdisk;  this will be a problem for Linux/Mac users to transfer music but inherently gets fixed by addressing the 30MB error which likely brought you to this page in the first place. <<Although, playing around with the table and formatting is also a cause of this error.>>

The correct solution is to plug your Sansa Clip into the computer and wait for the system to recognize it in fdisk.  Using fdisk as root you can then delete all the partition tables using 'd' as the keystroke (i.e. if the device appears as /dev/sda1 then run "sudo fdisk /dev/sda1" and type 'd' followed by the paritition number) on each partition 1,2,3, and 4.  Commit these changes with the keystroke 'w' to permanently wipe out the table. That is it. Seriously.  There is no need to make a new partition (nor subsequently format one) even though the device no longer has any partitions .  Start up your Sansa Clip with no tables and navigate to Settings and choose Format and Yes.  The firmware will make a new table and format it... and *gasp* as FAT16!!  There is no harm in FAT16, you stil get your long file names and everything works as intended.  You also now have the simple and sweet plug-and-play mass storage as advertised.