How to transfer photos and videos from smart phone to computer?

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The title pretty well says it all.

I have photos and videos on my phone, some shot myself, others sent to me on Whats App.

How can I get them onto my desk top?

Tony
 
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You could connect the phone to the computer physically with a USB cable, or use an storage app, something like dropbox. I use the latter, free and ok!
 
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Hi Tony,

As blighty has commented, many easy ways, that's if it's not a poxy iphone. With and android phone at least you should have access to most of the file system via usb, so as mentioned.

Options
1) Connect phone via usb cable to laptop, wait for additional drive to appear in file explorer browse to Camera folder which is sometimes DCIM and copy photos from here, note WhatsApp pics are in download or local whatsapp folder.
2) If the phone has an internal micro storage option, copy files onto microSD, pull out microSD plug into SD adapter card, plug into SD card slot on laptop copy across. - I set this up for my wife so all photos videos automatically store on microSD.
3) EX Filexplorer app if you have a NAS or USB drive on your home network you can push the photos and videos from your phone onto any home network device.
4) Mail them to yourself, lengthy laborious task
5) DropBox or similar
6) Get friend over who knows what to do, tea n cake job done.
 
Use Airdroid, if it's an Android phone you have. If it's not, unlucky! Once set up, you use the normal internet browser on your computer and go to what looks like a website - the website is presented to you from the phone over local Wifi. You can see your messages, back up, transfer files etc. It's a brilliant app. You can use it to transfer to other phones too

Nozzle
 
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Thanks all for those suggestions.

I cannot use the sd card because the access place on one phone is broken and the sd card seems to have failed on the other.

I have downloaded the Airdroid but it is frightening what it is able to do with my phone!

But will try it and see.

An ex-friend had some app on his phone which transferred his pictures automatically to his laptop but he did not know what it was or why.

Is there a danger that my phone will transfer pictures to any laptop without my approval?

That could be embarrassing!

Thanks

Tony
 
Hi Tony,

As blighty has commented, many easy ways, that's if it's not a poxy iphone. With and android phone at least you should have access to most of the file system via usb, so as mentioned.

Options
1) Connect phone via usb cable to laptop, wait for additional drive to appear in file explorer browse to Camera folder which is sometimes DCIM and copy photos from here, note WhatsApp pics are in download or local whatsapp folder.
2) If the phone has an internal micro storage option, copy files onto microSD, pull out microSD plug into SD adapter card, plug into SD card slot on laptop copy across. - I set this up for my wife so all photos videos automatically store on microSD.
3) EX Filexplorer app if you have a NAS or USB drive on your home network you can push the photos and videos from your phone onto any home network device.
4) Mail them to yourself, lengthy laborious task
5) DropBox or similar
6) Get friend over who knows what to do, tea n cake job done.
Just as easy on an iphone, also have icloud so all my pics are automatically uploaded to my mac wirelessly , including whats app pics,you also have the old fashioned method of a usb transfer.
 
also have icloud so all my pics are automatically uploaded to my mac

Or indeed anyone elses computer if a hacker takes some interest in grabbing your personal details. The same is true of any cloud service, be that an iService, or a googService.

Nozzle
 
But will the Airdroid also send my pics to other computers without my approval?
 
If you want to be sure it will not, you can use point-to-point Wifi with your 3G/4G connection turned off. Seems far fetched though. This software has a great reputation, see the reviews

Nozzle
 
I am always a little sceptical about reviews!

Sometimes from teenagers who want to share their pics with the whole world! I don't!

I have a Cannon printer which is infuriating! It randomly shows pictures from my computer to anyone passing by the screen!

I have managed to mostly turn that off but it still does so apparently randomly a few times a week!

Don't want others seeing some of my pics!
 
I don't understand why people think if you connect an iphone to a computer you can't mount it. It mounts fine as long as you don't have itunes open
 
Or indeed anyone elses computer if a hacker takes some interest in grabbing your personal details. The same is true of any cloud service, be that an iService, or a googService.

Nozzle
PC get hacked, never seen it with a mac, as they were first invented to aid hacking PC's
 
Mac is only more secure, because hackers target it less. It still has similar vulnerabilities to windows. If you want a more secure o/s then a true open source Linux is better (e.g. Mint) as you install all add-ons from a central repository, so its much harder to be fooled by a "click here to tune up your PC" trojan. When you can scam 80% of the world with a windows exe, why bother with a linux variant.
 
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