Sounds like you two have had plenty of rough experiences. I hope you'll find happiness in the things that are good now.
As for sports, have you tried pool swimming (or water running)? Might take some getting used to, but since you are practically weightless when floating in the water, many people with issues find it good for their body.
I have seen this theory floated a few times. The problem is that reading uncompressed files from disk can often be slower than reading less data and decompressing it on the fly efficiently. Would be interesting to see actual studies of this for common game data.
170 GB is insane. Publishers should really get punished for making larger than average deliveries. Most of that size usage usually comes from poor optimization.
Thanks for all the information.
It looks like Samsung with SamFW and CSC change is a viable option without rooting.