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

iPad Get Photos from iPad to Windows 10 PC

U

UnluckyXIII

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Feb 20, 2014
298
66
Hi Guys,

I'm hoping someone can help me, I've recently had a huge problem with my backup hard drives resulting in loosing all of my music collection, movies and photos. Unfortunately the movies and music are gone forever but fortunately I have all of my photos on my iPad. My problem is I can't seem to find a way to get these back from my iPad to my Windows computer.

I've tried the simple "connect via USB" but the iPad doesn't show up in the my computer section so I'm unable to extract the files manually. The windows computer does recognise the iPad and an option to import photos is offered, but unfortunately this function can only view the camera roll album and non of my other albums. I've tried moving my other photos over to the camera roll album but unfortunately its greyed out preventing this process.

I do have the option of Google Drive, as then I can move everything from the iPad to the cloud and back again to my windows pc. The only problem this is imposing is that if I move more than a handful of photos onto the Google Drive the app freezes and then crashes out after 5-10 mins. If I only had 100 or so photos I would just "man up" and do them one at a time but unfortunately I have close to 4gb of photos which puts me at a few thousand in total (I keep getting prompts that my iCloud storage is almost full :( ).

Hopefully one of you can help me :)

Thanks,
 
Say, how did these pictures get onto the iPad in the first place? Did you add them to the device using iTunes? Or are they maybe in iCloud?
 
Sync to onedrive...download onedrive to iPad and allow photo syncing...it Will do all the work for u
 
ericwn said:
Say, how did these pictures get onto the iPad in the first place? Did you add them to the device using iTunes? Or are they maybe in iCloud?
Click to expand...

Hey,

The Photos were originally put on the iPad via iTunes, they don't show on my iCloud account.

960design said:
1) Turn on Windows Computer
2) Open Chrome browser to http://icloud.com
3) Log in using your AppleId
4) Drag and drop photos to desktop

If you cannot find your photos in iCloud, turn on iCloud Photos:
Settings > iCloud > Photos = On > iCloud Photo Library = On
Click to expand...

M. Gustave said:
You can install iCloud Photos on a Windows pc. Turn it on on your iPad. Done.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately not, as soon as I go to turn on iCloud Photos I get a warning message stating that all existing photos will be removed, unless this just means they will be removed from my device and stored in the cloud.... although its a fairly risky move if I click to remove them to find it deletes them from my device but doesn't transfer them to the iCloud Photo storage... does anyone know what happens if I click remove?
 
Instead of google drive app try Gdrive app to transfer your files from ipad to Google Drive to pc. Works well for me.
 
MacDawg said:
I occasionally use an app called PhotoSync
It has Windows and Mac apps that partner with the iOS app
Works great for me when I want to move some pics manually
Click to expand...

I haven't heard of PhotoSync before so I'll take a look at it and see if it can solve my problem :)

jamesrick80 said:
Sync to onedrive...download onedrive to iPad and allow photo syncing...it Will do all the work for u
Click to expand...

Unfortunately onedrive can only see photos stored in the camera roll album and not the other albums on my iPad so it doesn't work :(

Teddek said:
Instead of google drive app try Gdrive app to transfer your files from ipad to Google Drive to pc. Works well for me.
Click to expand...

I'll have a look at this now along with the PhotoSync app and see if either of them are able to solve this problem for me

Thanks for the replies so far guys :)
 
Try FileBrowser. It can see your iPad photo library, and it can copy files to/from many cloud storage services or to any shared drives over wifi network.
 
What some might forget is that if you sync via iTunes, then iTunes copies a much smaller version of the pics from the PC onto the iOS device. That's probably done so that you could have your favourite picture albums with you, to enjoy on the go, but these are not the original file size. they are much smaller.
ITunes and iPad know that the originals are located on your computer and it only deals with shrunk-down copies on the iOS device, except for any picture you download directly onto the iPad from the web or from a connected camera.
Basically anything you find in Camera Roll is original sized, anything else in other albums is a smaller copy of the original files from the PC.
That's also why iCloud won't use these files - it knows you probably have the originals somewhere.
You can try to take the small copies on the iPad and maybe you can import them into some other cloud service that again allows you to copy stuff back to your PC, but for the original files, please try to recover them from your hard drive, if possible.
Best success!
 
ericwn said:
What some might forget is that if you sync via iTunes, then iTunes copies a much smaller version of the pics from the PC onto the iOS device. That's probably done so that you could have your favourite picture albums with you, to enjoy on the go, but these are not the original file size. they are much smaller.
ITunes and iPad know that the originals are located on your computer and it only deals with shrunk-down copies on the iOS device, except for any picture you download directly onto the iPad from the web or from a connected camera.
Basically anything you find in Camera Roll is original sized, anything else in other albums is a smaller copy of the original files from the PC.
That's also why iCloud won't use these files - it knows you probably have the originals somewhere.
You can try to take the small copies on the iPad and maybe you can import them into some other cloud service that again allows you to copy stuff back to your PC, but for the original files, please try to recover them from your hard drive, if possible.
Best success!
Click to expand...

Unfortunately the hard drive is totally goosed, I've had it hooked up for hours using recovery software which was unsuccessful. I've had the IT department at work also review the drive and come back with the same result after leaving it for hours them selves :(

Even if the photos are of lesser quality than the originals I'll just be happy to export them from my iPad back to my computer.
 
Sorry to hear but best success with the recovery from the iPad then!
 
UnluckyXIII said:
Hey,

The Photos were originally put on the iPad via iTunes, they don't show on my iCloud account.





Unfortunately not, as soon as I go to turn on iCloud Photos I get a warning message stating that all existing photos will be removed, unless this just means they will be removed from my device and stored in the cloud.... although its a fairly risky move if I click to remove them to find it deletes them from my device but doesn't transfer them to the iCloud Photo storage... does anyone know what happens if I click remove?
Click to expand...
Right, in that case you would have had to turn on iCloud photos prior to your hard drive failure. If you turn on iCloud Photos now, they will be deleted from your device.

So here is the the round about way to get them:
Tap Select > select all the photos you would like to save > then tap the box with the up arrow ( top left ) > Tap on iCloud Photo Sharing > add your email.

Check your email, approve, see your photos. Import ( right click ) them to your computer.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: bensisko
If the iPad is like my iPhone you need to unlock the device and hit the "Allow device access" pop-up button on the iPad after you connect it to your computer. Within Windows Explorer the iPad should show up as a camera device with a "DCIM" folder and then subfolders for photos.

Does that not work for you? Have you tried a different USB port? Tried installing the iCloud Control Panel first? (you shouldn't need to as I get photos at work all the time without that installed)

Also yeah, Filebrowser should be able to see your photos and can connect to network shares, so you could copy/paste that way.

Either two seem like the better method than trying to upload all of your photos to the cloud, but that will also do the job.
 
phillyboy82 said:
If the iPad is like my iPhone you need to unlock the device and hit the allow button on the dialogue that pops up after you connect it to your computer. It will show up as a camera device with a "DCIM" folder and then subfolders for photos.
Click to expand...

The DCIM folder only contains photos that are in the camera roll. OP has explained that the pictures they are trying to recover were synced from iTunes, so they are not in the camera roll.
 
I just tested this with my iPad connected to my work machine via USB and it showed up as a camera as I expected it would.
[doublepost=1472675144][/doublepost]
Night Spring said:
The DCIM folder only contains photos that are in the camera roll. OP has explained that the pictures they are trying to recover were synced from iTunes, so they are not in the camera roll.
Click to expand...

Don't they get dumped to the photos app from iTunes which are available within the same DCIM folder structure? Am I off base?
 
phillyboy82 said:
Don't they go to the photos app?
Click to expand...

They go in the photos app, but not in the camera roll. This may be hard to grasp if you've never synced photos from iTunes. The process creates separate albums in the photo app that is distinct from the camera roll.
 
Not misunderstanding, but I think it holds more than what you allude to.

For example I have downloaded photos using iCloud sharing from my phone to my iPad, and those show up within the DCIM sub-folders when I check in Windows Explorer. Those are not ones I took that are in my "camera roll".

I also have a folder called "Screenshots" and "etc" on my iPad, and all of those are there as well. I'm just surprised that a folder created within the photos app by iTunes doesn't get shown when I have all of these other photos that were not taken by a camera that show up in my DCIM sub-folders.
[doublepost=1472675767][/doublepost]In the end I'll take your word for it, as I have not done an iTunes photo sync in years :)
 
Yeah, pictures downloaded to your iPad, and screenshots are in your "camera roll" even though they were not taken with the iPad camera.
[doublepost=1472677339][/doublepost]
phillyboy82 said:
I'm just surprised that a folder created within the photos app by iTunes doesn't get shown
Click to expand...

I think the way Apple thinks of it is that the "camera roll" contains all pictures not originating from your computer. Photos synced through iTunes are already on your computer, so there's no need to copy them back to your computer, so they are not placed in the camera roll. Yes, in this case, the OP wants to copy them back, but only because the hard drive got trashed. Under normal circumstances, synced photos don't need to be copied out of the iPad.
 
  • Like
Reactions: phillyboy82
UnluckyXIII said:
Hi Guys,

I'm hoping someone can help me, I've recently had a huge problem with my backup hard drives resulting in loosing all of my music collection, movies and photos. Unfortunately the movies and music are gone forever but fortunately I have all of my photos on my iPad. My problem is I can't seem to find a way to get these back from my iPad to my Windows computer.

Possible but pricey solution?

< http://www.hammacher.com/Product/87849?promo=search >
Click to expand...
 
Do you have a friend with a Mac? You could sync the photos to the Photos app on the Mac then drag the photos out of the Photos app onto a thumb drive.
 
bensisko said:
Do you have a friend with a Mac? You could sync the photos to the Photos app on the Mac then drag the photos out of the Photos app onto a thumb drive.
Click to expand...

I doubt that will work, because the photos are not in the camera roll, so Photos wouldn't see them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back