I have lots of pics in the gallery of my smartphone.
I have a laptop with Windows 7 home premium .
I have an android smartphone — Xiaomi Redmi 6A
I plug the cell phone into a usb port on the laptop, a message pops up asking me if I want to import pictures, etc. It doesn’t work.–it says there is nothing on the phone.
In “my computer” I see icons for C: D: and also Redmi6A.
If I click on C: of course I see the contents of disk C.
But if I click on Redmi6A, I get a new window that opens up , totally empty.
Apparently, my laptop can’t read the contents of the phone.
Can anybody help me?
First, make sure the phone is unlocked. I’m not sure if an Android phone is totally not accessible if locked (keyboard/screen lock) but it definitely is something to check with an iPhone.
You probably need a USB driver. Google your phone model and USB driver. But I have no idea if the many sources that come up on a search are trustworthy.
That phone supports MicroSD cards. If less annoying solutions fail, copy the photos to a MicroSD card, put the MicroSD card in your laptop. If it doesn’t have a MicroSD or SD slot you can get a USB reader dirt cheap.
On my Android phone, the phone will assume it’s only been plugged into the computer to recharge. To transfer files, there’s an option on the pull-down menu from the notification that the phone’s charging. Is that the problem here?
There are often two modes for a device like this. One is the “full fledged” mode where the phone is recognized as a phone and suitable operations can be performed (in theory). The other sets up a simple USB storage-like connection.
It sounds like you are using the first type of connection and perhaps the second type will work better. Try to uninstall the software that is popping up when you plug the phone in.
Drivers can be an issue. Verify you have the right ones.
One all-too-common problem with USB devices is that if you plug in the device the first time without the right software installed, the wrong stuff gets installed. Even then installing the right software sometimes doesn’t fix things. And it is a surprisingly painful thing to fix this, if at all.
The connection type may be managed by your phone, so be sure to check there, too. On my phone, as a security feature, I have to open a control panel and tell it to allow file transfer via USB, otherwise it will only use the USB to charge the battery.
You can also get Google Drive on your PC if you have a gmail address. Activate the Sync feature in Drive and your phone, and your Drive page will populate with the pictures you took. Much handier than using cables.
This is the easiest method. And once the initial sync is completed, you can view all your pix via your computer and easily share them as well. Plus, any new picture you take with your phone can easily be synced up to your Google Drive as well.
The above are talking about MTP vs PTP. Individual phones might not make it easy to access that option–on my current phone, it is in the hidden-by-default “developer options” menu. But one of these pages might help.
