Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

uid15

Suspended
Original poster
Mar 9, 2015
1,186
637
Hey guys :) - I hope you're all having a lovely weekend.

So, being of an engineering persuasion, and as an ultra-mega hardcore geek, I wanted to get ALL my Lumia 640 XL photos and videos transferred to the SD card on my 2nd gen Moto G, *WITHOUT* any faffing, WiFI, PC involved, etc. Here is how I did it - SO simple:


~~~ THIS WAS ONLY TESTED ON MY 2ND GEN MOTO G (XT1068, ROOTED) ~~~

!! IT IS IMPERATIVE THAT THE ADAPTER BELOW IS PLUGGED INTO THE MOTO G, AND NOT THE LUMIA - THE MOTO G (OR OTHER ANDROID) IS ACTING IN "HOST" MODE, AND THE ADAPTOR CONTAINS AN EXTRA PIN TO SET THIS UP !!

1/ Connect an OTG adapter to the micro USB port on the Moto G - here is one, below:

419mezIXpuL._SY395_.jpg



2/ Plug a normal micro USB cable into your Lumia (mine is a 640 XL, LTE), and plug the other end into the full size USB socket on the adaptor you plugged into the Moto G (or other Android device).

3/ Wait around 1 min or so, and see if the Moto G (or other Android) gallery app displays the following (I am using 4.4.4, and the latest gallery app from Google)

Screenshot_2015-06-21-01-21-54.png
Screenshot_2015-06-21-01-22-05.png


Screenshot_2015-06-21-01-22-19.png


4/ Press "Import" on the Moto G - it will copy ALL the media to the internal memory of the Moto G.


You may want to know why I do this, and the answer is simple - my Lumia 640 XL takes FAR superior photos to the Moto G - it has a 13MP Zeiss camera, but the Facebook upload on the 640 XL (and ALL Lumias I've owned) *always* fails, and since Outlook heavily compresses my full res JPEGs to attach them (~ 300-400KB), I use the Moto G to upload ALL my stills.

I hope this helps someone :)

Take care.
 
Last edited:

MRU

macrumors Penryn
Aug 23, 2005
25,370
8,952
a better place
That all sounds like a lot more faff than auto backing up photos to onedrive to me...

Install onedrive on your other devices and hey presto - there are your photos if you want access to them.
 

uid15

Suspended
Original poster
Mar 9, 2015
1,186
637
That all sounds like a lot more faff than auto backing up photos to onedrive to me...

Install onedrive on your other devices and hey presto - there are your photos if you want access to them.

You know, we don't all want to use OneDrive, as great as it is, people like choice. :)

You say "a lot of faff", it's ONE button press, and I can guarantee you that OneDrive is more than that. As I stated *clearly* - this is for me to upload my photos to FB - something A LOT of people do, and also... it uses ZERO bandwith transferring over MTP, and it imports ALL media within a few mins. The cloud is all well and good - I use it A LOT, but just because cloud solutions exist, that doesn't mean they are the best solution for everything. What do you think micro SD cards are for, if not for storing files locally?

What if you want to show your media and:

1/ You run out of bandwidth?

2/ You have no signal?

3/ OneDrive/other cloud goes offline? (it happens).

Cloud backup is superb - cloud backup dependancy is not.
 
Last edited:

MRU

macrumors Penryn
Aug 23, 2005
25,370
8,952
a better place
But if your worried about things like that why wouldn't you backup to your computer? In which case surely it's just as easy to plug in the usb cable and sync / copy contents to it.

Storing photos on a windows phone and Moto G without a cloud solution is not really backing up.

What happens if you break both devices ?

Also buying an OTG cable for a lot of us - is a lot of faff. I'd have to order one off eBay or Amazon and wait for it when every other solution is free and available right now.

Likewise your asserting that you have to be dependent on cloud backup - I'm not. In saying when you are in a wifi area, your device auto backups and you can then using your computer and the onedrive app on it have all your photos auto downloaded to it. Thereby they would be stored locally on your computer too. If they pull the server - you still have your photos.

Transferring between two mobile devices via OTG seems redundant if the main objective is to simply backup.
 

uid15

Suspended
Original poster
Mar 9, 2015
1,186
637
But if your worried about things like that why wouldn't you backup to your computer? In which case surely it's just as easy to plug in the usb cable and sync / copy contents to it.

Storing photos on a windows phone and Moto G without a cloud solution is not really backing up.

What happens if you break both devices ?

Also buying an OTG cable for a lot of us - is a lot of faff. I'd have to order one off eBay or Amazon and wait for it when every other solution is free and available right now.

Likewise your asserting that you have to be dependent on cloud backup - I'm not. In saying when you are in a wifi area, your device auto backups and you can then using your computer and the onedrive app on it have all your photos auto downloaded to it. Thereby they would be stored locally on your computer too. If they pull the server - you still have your photos.

Transferring between two mobile devices via OTG seems redundant if the main objective is to simply backup.

Do whatever works best for YOU - this works best FOR ME. You may wish to re-read the LAST statement in my OP, and educate yourself as to why I do this; it's crystal clear, in plain text.

Cheerio.
 
Last edited:
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.