How can I transfer my contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M?

[Coach88]

Contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M

Somehow my Galaxy S4 decided it didn't recognize my Sim Card anymore... I was able to find a temporary fix in the forums that let me use my phone long enough to do a backup using Kies3 before my S4 got dementia and didn't recognize my Sim card again :-(
I went to the store where I bought it, she replaced the Sim card and the phone still didn't see it. She asked if I did a back up, I said yes and she offered to send it out for repairs under warranty and gave me a Samsung GT-I5500M for a loaner. Now I have a series of problems:

1. SD card defective
   I kinda panicked when she took my SD card from my S4, put it in the replacement GT-I5500M, and told me that my card was defective. That's what the phone display said. However, when I got home and connected the phone to my computer as a media device, I could see it on my PC and even browse the files. I guess since I originally had the card in a Blackberry before the S4, the GT didn't recognize it...
2. Recover Backup
   I thought I could access my contacts from my S4 through the Kies3 backup. My mistake... it looks like Kies3 doesn't recognize the GT and Kies doesn't see the backup from the S4!!

Can someone out there offer any advice?

Thanks

 

[B. Diddy]

Re: Contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M

Welcome to Android Central! So the replacement phone couldn't read the old SD? When you plugged the replacement phone into your computer, are you sure the computer was reading what was on the external SD card, or was it just the Internal Storage you were seeing?

In Settings>Storage, does the phone show that an SD card is inserted? I would unmount the card from there, remove it, then insert it into your PC. If the PC can read it, back up that data to the hard drive. Then try reformatting the card, preferably in the phone. Once reformatted, copy all of the data back to it.

When you backed up your original S4 with Kies, are you sure everything backed up successfully? Were all of your contacts only stored on the Phone Account, and not your Google account? I usually strongly recommend that people associate their contacts with their Google account, because then if something happens to the phone, your contacts are all intact in the cloud.

 

[Coach88]

Re: Contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M

I'll try backing up the MicroSD on my Computer and re-formatting the card like you suggested.

I guess I fell victim of the "it'll never happen to me syndrome" and didn't save all my contacts to Google account... My bad! Some were saved there but a lot were on the phone.

When I did the backup, it seem like most of the info backed up successfully. However, I remember a couple of items that had a message or icon indicating that it didn't backup.

 

[B. Diddy]

Re: Contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M

Is your old S4 still functional? If your contacts were stored to the Phone account, I'm not sure if that means they were stored to the SIM. If you can use the S4, go to the People/Contacts app and see if you can display contacts from the Phone Account. If they're still there, export them to the SD card, if you can (it'll export as either a .csv or .vcf file), then move the SD card to your computer and transfer that file to the hard drive. Now import that file into Google Contacts on the web.

 

[Coach88]

Re: Contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M

My S4 is gone for repairs... I'll restore the backup file from kies3 and see what I get back! In the meantime, i'm working on reviving my Blackberry to see if I can't transfer those contacts to the GT that i'm using temporarily. Even better, If I can reboot the blackberry, i'll probably use that.

 

[B. Diddy]

Re: Contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M

If the Blackberry is still alive you can see here how to export the contacts from the BB and import them into Google. Look under the "Importing Contacts" section: http://forums.androidcentral.com/ge...tting-started-android-2014-a.html#post3707512

 

[Coach88]

Re: Contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M

Still no luck with the BB... If I can get it going, i'll let you know how I made out with the link. Thanks B. Diddy

 

[Coach88]

Re: Contacts from S4 to GT-I5500M

The loaner phone I received had no data access. So after the store informed me that my warranty on the S4 was void because of a cracked screen, I protested a bit and informed them that it's a well documented fact that the S4 are having issues with the device not recognizing the SIM card (thanks androidcentral). The store manager agreed to work a little harder on the case since I refused to pay 390$ for a new phone. In the meantime I insisted that they give me another S4 they had in their loaner box. With that phone, I was able to transfer my contacts from the back up file of my own device....

On a side note... funny thing happened less than 24hrs from getting the new replacement S4.... it couldn't detect the SIM card!!! Same issue i had with mine! And the screen isn't even CRACKED! I was able to get it going again by following instructions from a different thread. It did it a couple more times throughout the day but I can live with that temporarily. Shame on Samsung for not acknowledging this issue and attempting to sell more phones by declaring warranties Void for issues that are totally unrelated! Hopefully this will be resolved shortly

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