Help How the heck do you transfer files?

File transfer works perfect. Drag and drop, my pc sees my phone as another folder or drive when I use the included usb/power cord, but not when I used a different one.

Is there something magical about the supplied cable?

hal1 said:

File transfer works perfect. Drag and drop, my pc sees my phone as another folder or drive when I use the included usb/power cord, but not when I used a different one.

Is there something magical about the supplied cable?

Click to expand...

The S3 has a standard micro USB plug, and Samsung would not be playing nice to offer some kind of proprietary micro USB without changing the actual plug itself (like iPhone's proprietary dock). So, if you're using a good quality Belkin or a USB cable from a previous smartphone that you know works, you should be okay.

That said, the *really cheap* USB cables you can purchase from Amazon for .01 (or as part of those 10+ item bundles for 5 bucks) can indeed cause problems. I purchased a set in the past to use as extra chargers and they caused the phone to either not charge or act strangely, as if they didn't provide the correct voltage from the transformer or conduct a charge at all (even though they were rated the same voltage as the one that came with my phone). Neither did they seem to work well plugged into the USB port. So cables/chargers *can be bad* even if specifically stated they are suitable for your phone. I wouldn't recommend using one of those ultra low-cost, no-name cables for your nice smartphone because they're typically substandard even as simple cables. (Not everyone has problems with these, but many do. It just depends on whether you happened to get a bad one or not -- always read the reviews before purchase).

The possibility of having a bad cable from a more reputable source exists as well, of course, (someone above even wrote how the Samsung-supplied cable didn't work properly but other cables did), but it's not as likely.

The "other" cable I'm using (which works fine) is from an old BB Storm from 3 years ago. I just leave that cable plugged into my USB port and use it for my S3 and for my backup hard drive, and it works okay with both. Using the Samsung-provided cable does not change how it works with my phone at all.

The reason the Cellular Reps (Verizon, ATT, etc) will tell you to use the Samsung cable is because, for all intents and purposes, those cables should be good. They can't rely on any given customer to necessarily use a good cable, and they've learned this. Then, if the phone still doesn't work correctly and has to be replaced, at least it wasn't due to some knock-off cable that doesn't really function properly.

Hope this helps -- I realize YMMV depending on the situation.

Just wanted to add - after reading this I decided I should test mine to see if it works since I'm getting to the end of my 14 day window. I used the Samsung usb wire - plugged it in and it popped right up in my computer. I was able to drag and drop with no problems.

I had downloaded and installed the usb drivers from Samsung when I originally ordered the phone. I tried it with my old razr usb wire and it worked fine too.

it's probably your cable , what i have found not all cables are the same , some will work fine to power your unit but useless for file transfer ... i had a similar situation and the cable was the key .... make sure you get a usb cable that is a data transfer cable .... the cable that came with my galaxy s2 does not work ,,, extra charger i bout that came with DATA transfer/powercord (usb) works just fine

OK, after facing similar problem, I have called the store I bought my Samsung Ace 2, and the sale lady gave me this solution and it worked perfectly:

1) Unplug everything.
2) Go to your phone 'setting' -> 'wireless and network' -> 'usb utilities' then press the button 'connect storage to PC' THEN plug in the cable to the phone & computer. Then you will see android logo and it will say USB connected. Then your computer will detect the driver. You will have to repeat these steps every time you mount your usb driver.

Hope this helps. I haven't seen any solution on any forum sofar. If it works for you, please report back too.

hmmm... I guess most important is to plug in the cable when it asks you to, and not to plug it in first... you might have to find in your phone the right command to do this.. if I get the answer for you, will post back.. good luck..

Anthony2816 said:

darkestred, I just tried the drivers on my work computer (old XP 32-bit machine). They installed okay, but when I plugged in my S3 it showed some hopeful pop-ups about MTP, but then gave up with "Cannot Install this Hardware"..."There was a problem installing this hardware: SAMSUNG Mobile MTP Device...An error occurred during the installation of the device. The required section was not found in the INF."

I'll try it again on my more up-to-date Windows 7 computer at home tonight.

Click to expand...

Try this.

Automatically get recommended drivers and updates for your hardware

Anthony2816 said:

Okay, since I just got a brand new laptop, I did a fresh install of Windows 7 SP1 on it, and plugged in my S3 with the Samsung-supplied USB cable.

Got the USB confirmation beeps, and Windows attempted to install drivers, with this result:

USB Composite Device -- Ready to use
CDC Serial -- No driver found
SCH-I535 -- Ready to use
SAMSUNG_Android-SCHI535 -- No driver found

S3 didn't show up as a drive.

Unplugged S3 and installed the drivers linked to by darkestred above (irritatingly, the package also tries to install three items of bloatware, making me wonder if they're really from Samsung).

Plugged S3 in again, and got this result:

USB Composite Device -- Ready to use
CDC Serial -- Ready to use
SCH-I535 -- Ready to use
SAMSUNG_Android-SCHI535 -- Finished; restart required

S3 didn't show up as a drive, so rebooted the laptop. Plugged the S3 back in...USB noises from both laptop and phone...but still no drives showing up.

I checked Device Manager with the S3 plugged in: No errors shown. The following entries were found:

Portable Devices
SCH-I535
SAMSUNG Android Phone
SAMSUNG Android ADB Interface
Universal Serial Bus controllers
SAMSUNG Mobile USB Composite Device

Turning my attention to the S3, the Notification Bar shows that it's connected as a Media Device (MTP). USB debugging is checked, but the above connections are unchanged even with USB debugging unchecked.

And still doesn't show up as a drive...or drives, since I have also have a 32 GB card plugged into the S3.

Sigh.

Click to expand...

Plug the phone into the computer. Pull down the status bar on the phone, USB Mode, MTP.

Anthony2816 said:

darkestred, I just tried the drivers on my work computer (old XP 32-bit machine). They installed okay, but when I plugged in my S3 it showed some hopeful pop-ups about MTP, but then gave up with "Cannot Install this Hardware"..."There was a problem installing this hardware: SAMSUNG Mobile MTP Device...An error occurred during the installation of the device. The required section was not found in the INF."

I'll try it again on my more up-to-date Windows 7 computer at home tonight.

Click to expand...

Install/update Windows Media Player to version 11

MTP DEVICE INSTALLATION FAILURE - Microsoft Community

I have a Galaxy SIII and had trouble connecting to it via USB on one of my Windows XP computers.

I would recieve an error message:

"There was a problem installing this hardware: SAMSUNG Mobile MTP Device...An error occurred during the installation of the device. The required section was not found in the INF."

I found that installing windows media player 11 on the problem computer allowed me to connect to the phone.

HTH!
Bryan.

I have two laptops.Both run win 7. Win 7 has the worst usb handling of any os so far unless 8 is worse yet. I probably won't find out for myself. One computer reads the S3 like any other external drive. The Toshiba Satellite has the usb drivers but was able to see the S3 once and never after. There is a samsung app that will manage files between the phone and laptop. It's called Kies or something like that. It doesn't look like any file manager I've used before. I find it a bit counter intuitive and avoid it. Indeed it seems easier to get them both running and networked but here comes the dust in the face: win7 has all this permission garbage that usually gets in the way. Even with all users having administrator rank. Anyway you can go to the samsung web site and d/l the file manager for what its worth. You might also pull the sd card out and plug it into your machine. That way you can move things in your sd card as well as to it. I'm not at all clear on what's the best apps for doing that. You might try Samsung on the phone and see what they're saying about why the usb drivers don't work in your computer. Could you confirm that you're having this issue with a win 7 device? BTW I have media player 13. Maybe it's a bad luck distro?

I'll just leave this here....

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.sand.airdroid

I was having the same problem, but with W8. I used the cable that came with the phone the best I could get was access to the Video, Music and Photo folder. I swapped out the cable with one from my camera and all of a sudden the computer recognized the device and I could look at all the files on the phone. There is something different with one of those cable, because plugging the original cable back in and I go back to only seeing the three folders and I do not get the connection notification on the phone.

Anthony2816 said:

When I hooked my Samsung Fascinate to my Windows 7 computer, the SD card immediately appeared just like any flash drive in My Computer, allowing to easily transfer files back and forth between computer and phone. With the S3, it doesn't work...can't access the internal 16 GB at all. Just got off a one hour phone call with Verizon tech, and he also couldn't figure it out. Ended up giving me Samsung tech's phone numbers to call tomorrow.

I can't believe I'm the only one with this issue...how is everyone else moving things like MP3 collections to their phone?

I tried installing the Samsung Kies application to my computer, but it freezes the computer at the end of the setup...

Click to expand...

Why did you go through all of this?

What about a simple file transfer app.
I don't even connect to my computer anymore.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.estrongs.android.pop