Monday, October 5, 2009

Howto transfer photos from Android G1 to computer via USB

I'm not sure why it was so hard to to figure this one out. I wanted to transfer photos from my Android G1 to my linux laptop. Basically, you follow the following steps, many of which are from, http://forums.t-mobile.com/tmbl/board/message?board.id=AndroidFAQs&message.id=74:

  1. Plug in USB cable to connect the phone and laptop
  2. On the phone, go the notifications (drag down the top of the screen). There should be a 'USB connected' notification. Click on it.
  3. Click on 'Mount'
  4. On my Ubuntu desktop, under 'Places', a new option now shows up titled '1.0 GB Media'. That is the connection to the Android phone.
  5. For me, the option to open 'F-Spot' photo tool popped up. I declined and used the built in file browser. In either case, the photos are located in the folder dcim/Camera.
  6. When finished manipulating the files, unmount the volume:
    1. Go to Places -> '1.0 GB Media' and opening up the file browser
    2. Go to File and select 'Unmount Volume'
    3. On the phone, go to the notifications pull down again and click on 'Turn off USB storage' and click on 'Turn Off'

  7. Unplug USB cable from phone and computer.

18 comments:

  1. Thanks for posting this. I've Hero and the same steps worked, except that the directory is DCIM/100MEDIA

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  2. And I'm using the nexus one and it's the same :) thanks for posting that!

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  3. thx,,, for the life of me i couldnt figure this out!!!

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  4. Your advice is so great. I followed your suggestion and have my photos transferred successfully. Cheers from Singapore!

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  5. Great job! Thanks to you I got my pictures on my copm from my vacation in Poland.

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  6. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  7. Thanks for posting this! Your instructions popped up in my Google search, and it was exactly what I needed. Yay!

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  8. I have a Samsung Moment phone and cant get the pictures off. I'm stuck on step 2 -- there is not a "USB connected" notification, even though it is plugged in and shows it's charging. Any suggestions?

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  9. Josh you are a rock star. Thank you for the post!!

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  10. Thanks. I had to go to settings-Connect to PC-Default connection type and then change the default to disk drive. I was then able to access the phone's file system.

    HTC Smart Phone
    Ubuntu 10.4

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  11. Thanks a lot! The steps are a bit different on Windows XP I guess, but knowing that I should look in the DCIM folder was a huge timesaver :-)

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  12. Thank you! I've been looking all over my droid trying to find the pictures! :)

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  13. Thanks, something have chanced, but got it to work.

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  14. I have tried this and various permutation of how-to, but CANNOT get my phone to show as USB device on my computer. It does not recognize the device, even with Mass Storage "ON" and Mount selected.
    I have once before taken images off my Android's DCIM folder, -but for the life of me I cannot figure it out again. I really need to, -I am getting a lot of images on the Android and they are essentially worthless to me if I cannot get them into my computer...

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  15. thanks a lot. I was about to go to bestbuy and buy a cable to do that. I thought that the one that came with my phone was just to charge it with my pc. You just saved me money and time my friend

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  16. I have an evo4g i have my phone set on disk drive and connected to my laptop, now how do i transfer my pics and how do i retrieve them on the laptop?

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  17. This was very helpful, thank you :-)

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