Help Transfer pictures to PC

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

Hi - I am new to smart phones but I am not completely naive about PCs.

I have a Moto G3 running marshmellow and I would like to transfer pictures to my PC. The pictures (a couple of hundred in 4 different albums) are stored on a micro sd card. I have installed the Motorola device manager on my Windows 10 PC. When I connect my phone to the PC via USB I am given 4 options. When I try either transfer files (MTP) or photo transfer (PTP) my PC recognizes the device, but none of the pictures are in any folder I can find. I have taken the micro sd out of my phone and installed it on my PC directly and the pictures are all there -- this is how I loaded the pictures on to my PC. Obviously it is not very practical to have to remove the micro sd card from my phone every time I want to save some pictures to my PC.

Any ideas as to what could be going wrong?

PS - One thing I could do was move a ringtone from my PC to the Moto G3 ringtone folder -- this worked fine.

Thom · Jan 22, 2016

Welcome to Android Forums.

What program are you using on the PC to access the files on the phone? Windows Explorer?

... Thom

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

Thom said:
Welcome to Android Forums.

What program are you using on the PC to access the files on the phone? Windows Explorer?

... Thom

Windows explorer

Thom · Jan 22, 2016

With phone connected and media device selected on the phone ... does Windows show an icon for Portable Devices?

When you open it can you locate the folder with pictures (/DCIM perhaps /Pictures perhaps)?

... Thom

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

The PC shows Moto 3G -- when I open this folder 2 more folders are visible -- Internal Storage and an SD card. When I open the SD card there are only 2 folders, one named Download and the other System Volume Information. There are no other folders. There is one picture in the Download folder -- this is an image that was sent to me in an email.

By the way, I installed the Motorola Device Software on a different PC (running Windows 7) and it is exactly the same situation.

Thom · Jan 22, 2016

Look in internal storage.

The naming of SD cards over the years has been an ongoing source of confusion in Android.

... Thom

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

In internal storage there are a number of folders including Pictures and DCIM -- but they are empty

Thom · Jan 22, 2016

/camera perhaps? The camera app name perhaps?

It varies from app to app.

... Thom

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

Not in Camera -- I checked all folders -- nothing.

Thom · Jan 22, 2016

Can you find them with a File Explorer app running on the phone?

I have had that problem with some hones in the past. If it is the case you could try power off/power on the phone. Some indexes are built at that time.

... Thom

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

I can view the pictures just fine on the phone using Gallery. I don't have any file explorer app installed. I'll try powering on and off. I'll post the results later -- at the moment I have to attend to other matters.

Thom -- I appreciate your efforts.

The other thing I thought I'd try later on when I have some time is to reformat the SD card to my device. I mainly only had the pictures on the SD card so now that I have them on my PC (via physically removing the card) I don't mind giving reformatting a shot. Do you think that has any chance of working?

Thom · Jan 22, 2016

I don't know what you are trying to do with "reformatting".

To really find get a feeling for what is happening with your folders and files on your phone try one of there ...

X-plore File Manager – manipulate device and cloud folders and files
ES File Explorer File Manager – manipulate device and cloud folders and files – ES Global
ES File Explorer/Manager Pro – manipulate device and cloud folders and files – ES Global

If you choose ES do not access the cloud with it. They send cloud accounts/passwords back to their location in China.

... Thom

Marty48 · Jan 22, 2016

_pk_ said:
Hi - I am new to smart phones but I am not completely naive about PCs.

I have a Moto G3 running marshmellow and I would like to transfer pictures to my PC. The pictures (a couple of hundred in 4 different albums) are stored on a micro sd card. I have installed the Motorola device manager on my Windows 10 PC. When I connect my phone to the PC via USB I am given 4 options. When I try either transfer files (MTP) or photo transfer (PTP) my PC recognizes the device, but none of the pictures are in any folder I can find. I have taken the micro sd out of my phone and installed it on my PC directly and the pictures are all there -- this is how I loaded the pictures on to my PC. Obviously it is not very practical to have to remove the micro sd card from my phone every time I want to save some pictures to my PC.

Any ideas as to what could be going wrong?

PS - One thing I could do was move a ringtone from my PC to the Moto G3 ringtone folder -- this worked fine.

I connect my G3 to the PC using the usb cable and look for the DCIM folder. All of my photos are there. Since you have two cards (internal storage and SD card) there are most likely two DCIM folders. As suggested you can ES File Explorer and search for DCIM. You could also try searching for a typical image file. On my G3 the photo file names are in this format: IMG_20151221_082240724 Notice that the first numbers are the year, month, day. The remaining numbers are the time of day. In this example the photo was shot on 12-21-2015 at 08:22. So try your search for IMG_2015 or IMG_2016 and see what ES discovers and where it is. Good luck.

Thom · Jan 22, 2016

Also ... re-booting the phone may be needed ... re-booting the PC may be needed.

... Thom

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

Hi Marty - As I mentioned in a previous post I have a DCIM folder in internal storage with nothing in it. On my SD card there is no DCIM folder.

Hi Thom -

I installed X Plore. In X plore, my SD card shows many more folders including Pictures (they are all there sorted by album). How does this help me solve my issue?

riggerman0421 · Jan 22, 2016

Disconnect your phone from the pc, go to settings-apps, press the 3 dot menu button and select show system apps. Scroll to external storage, and clear data from the storage tab, do the same thing for media storage. Reboot your phone then connect to your pc, you should be able to see all the folders on your sd card.

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

Hi Riggerman - I can't find what you are suggesting.

When I go to Settings --> Device --> Storage & USB, I can select my SD card but the only options provided when I select the 3 dots are Grid View and Settings. I select settings and all I get is Eject, Format or Format as internal

_pk_ · Jan 22, 2016

Hi Riggerman - I found what you were suggesting and cleared the data in both external storage and media storage.

IT WORKED.

Much thanks

riggerman0421 · Jan 23, 2016

Glad I could help, this has actually been posted a few times on other forums. Just trying to pass it along.

peter prewett · Feb 17, 2016

Deleting files as above did not work.
Rebooted computer and Moto g3.
It shows the portable device in W7/64bit but clicking nothing.
It did earlier download photos but where did they go now just says no new ones.
Peter

acejavelin · Feb 17, 2016

peter prewett said:
Deleting files as above did not work.
Rebooted computer and Moto g3.
It shows the portable device in W7/64bit but clicking nothing.
It did earlier download photos but where did they go now just says no new ones.
Peter

You must toggle to MPT mode on the phone each time you connect, grab the pull down and where it says something like USB Charging click to change, tap it and select MPT. Due to security changes in Android with Marshmallow, this setting does not "stick" and must be changed each time the device is connected.

Help Transfer pictures to PC

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