iPad Pro How to copy all files in Photos from M1 iPad Pro 12.9 to an external drive all at once? Can we turn iPad Pro into a target disk to direct copy to Mac?

[hajime]

Hi, I have a M1 iPad Pro 12.9. I connected an external SSD to it via the USB-C port. Since my iPad is almost full, I want to move all the photos and videos to an external drive. What is the best way to do it? I see there is a Select button in Photos but it does not allow me to Select All the photos and videos files to do the copying all at once. I have to manually select hundreds of them which I might miss a few.

 

[sparksd]

It's a 3rd party solution, but I use FileBrowser Pro and it has access to both the Photo Library and attached storage. I can open the All Photos folder from FB Pro, Select All, Copy, and then paste to the attached storage (Samsung SSD in my usage). Works great.

 

[hajime]

From the App Store, I see: FileBrowserGo (free), FileBrowser - Document Manager and the more expensive FileBrowser Professional. Can the FileBrowserGo free version get the job done?

I manually selected all files (over 100) in Photos but when I clicked Save to Files, there was a long pause with a clock-like icon having "Downloading..." on top. To where are they being downloaded to? Without asking me the destination location, it gave me "Unable to Share There was an error while preparing to share. Please try again later." Tried twice but same error.

Is it possible to convert the iPad into target disk mode and connect it to a Mac directly for faster and easier file transfer?

 

[sparksd]

FileBrowserGo has a free trial but is subscription based.

Can't answer the Mac question - I don't use Macs.

 

[hajime]

FileBrowserGo has a free trial but is subscription based.

Can't answer the Mac question - I don't use Macs.

I try to stay away from those subscription based services. Another concern is that we have to give permissions to the app to access all personal files in the iPad.

I don't know why such basic Select All function is not available on iPad OS. Same for formatting disk and rejecting drive functions.

 

[brucewayne]

If you have a Mac, connect your external drive and the iPad to the Mac, then use the built in Image Capture software. You can pull off all of your images at once and save to the external SSD. Once they are there you can also use Image Capture to select and delete the Photos and Videos all at once

 

[hajime]

deleted

 

[hajime]

It is now doing the copying. Thanks for the excellent suggestion!

1. I noticed that all the filenames are in the form IMG_number.PNG, IMG_number.HEIC, IMG_number.MOV, or IMG_Mumber.AAE (not sure why AAE Sidecar showed up).
Can we change the naming convention?

2. Supposing that I do such file transfer whenever my iPad's storage is almost full, what is the best way to consolidate all these photos and videos in the external drive? Currently, I created a new temporarily folder in the external drive and copy all the files there until a better solution is found.

 

[brucewayne]

Those are the filenames for each image. Note this is also going to capture screenshots, things you saved offline etc which is why you have different formats.

You could open Photos on the Mac, change your library to a folder on the external SSD, then import all of the files into Photos and let it sort them out

 

[hajime]

Supposing that I do such file transfer four times a year. Each time I change the library to a folder on the external SSD and import all the files into Photos. Will Photos sort everything out for me automatically? Using the method you suggested, will Photos move all the files from the external SSD to the Mac's internal SSD or it keeps tracks of whether the files are from the Mac's internal SSD or from the external SSD?

I will delete the files in the iPad after the files are copied to the external drive successfully. When I do such file transfer few months later, will the iPad/Image Capture increment the filename automatically? For example, if this time the files are in the range from IMG_0001.[PNG/HEIC/MOV] to IMG_2010.[PNG/HEIC.MOV], will the software automatically starts naming the file from IMG_2011 or start naming from IMG_0001 all over again?

 

[Love-hate 🍏 relationship]

Files.app on iOS is truly a ****ing mess and a shame

 

[dynalmadman]

What am I missing here? If you have a Mac, aren’t all your photos shared between those devices? Can’t you copy them from the Mac to the external drive and then remove them from the iPad/Mac?