Hi I am a newbie....
I have a thunderbolt and would like to upload my contacts, pictures etc..to my HP laptop. When I plugged my USB cord from my phone to the HP computer, nothing happened. Please help and remember I am a newbie so make it simple.
well, here's your likely problem:
look at the following 2 possibilities:
1) your phone is automatically set to "charge" when it detects a usb cable inserted. this can be changed by tapping the "disk drive" option that appears on the phone screen when you connect the usb cable from the computer into the phone.
OR
you can change the option to 'disk drive' by doing the following:home screen>menu>settings>connect to PC>default connection type>Disk Drive
and make sure that "ask me" is check-marked to ensure you can toggle easily while connected to the PC.
(**note: you will not be prompted to choose one of those options when you connect the phone to a wall outlet for charging)
2)your computer might not have the correct Drivers to communicate with your phone. just like your printer/fax needs drivers to communicate with the computer, so does your phone. The computer should prompt you within several minutes to install drivers & explore your phone. please let us know if your phone isn't recognized by the computer.
after you change the option to 'disk drive', it may take a few moments for the pc to recognize the phone. if nothing happens, disconnect the cable & re-insert it into the phone. you should hear a 'pop' noise (assuming Windows pc) and "found new hardware...installing new hardware...new hardware is installed & ready to use" bubbles in your task bar @ the bottom of your computer screen.
also, just consider this:
are you signed into the Thunderbolt with a google account?
if yes--your contacts are likely saved in your google account which is accessible via the internet. you can view these contacts by logging into your gmail account at
www.gmail.com, then clicking "contacts" in the 'Gmail' dropdown above your folder list (inbox, sent, trash).
you can then download the contact list as a .csv file, which can be readable/imported by a laptop.
this is also how you could transfer contacts from an iphone to a gmail account--just reversing steps (save iphone contacts as .csv file, upload to google, sync google account to phone, view contacts on phone).