That blasted MTP mode - now what!?

[etnpnys]

Ahhh the good 'ol days of Gingerbread. You know, when you plugged your phone in to your PC/file server/home server/media center and told it to import your photos that it just found on the newly plugged-in "USB drive." Remember those days? Good times.

Now, Goog has forced the removal of USB mode and everything goes by MTP mode now. Yay. Now how on Earth am I supposed to reliably import my photos?

• Windows photo import seems to pay no attention to files that it has already imported, so I get duplicates all the time. And it doesn't import .3GP videos.
• Windows Photo Gallery updates have given us a slider that makes it near impossible to have a folder created for each day that your pictures were taken
• Picasa, Google's own muthereffin program, doesn't see anything on the SD card when my phone is plugged in via MTP mode. So I have to copy everything to my hard drive first and import from there. That, in turn, doesn't retain any of the photo orientation metadata and furthermore it consistently imports my videos into the wrong folders. Better yet, Google doesn't seem to be paying any attention to the hordes of people that are complaining about my qualms here, either.
• Lightroom, as far as I can tell (haven't used it yet), uses some weird form of photo management where it organizes stuff into its own databases - and it isn't free.
• Zoner, while I have yet to use it also, isn't free.
• iPhoto isn't available on Windows.
• JetPhoto Studio is my next avenue, but I have yet to install it.

I could always use AirDroid and copy all of my photos/videos over WiFi, but transferring 1080p videos from a vacation to Hawaii is going to take longer than the trip itself. Or maybe I could use some other method that needs a problematic BusyBox installation to exist also.

Why is this so damned difficult!? Does anybody know of anything that works?

 

[Mooncatt]

I just use Windows Explorer and copy over. Nothing hard or confusing about it.

 

[etnpnys]

I just use Windows Explorer and copy over. Nothing hard or confusing about it.

Thanx for the response, and I don't want to slam your efforts, but you keep thousands of photos in the same directory with no organization?

 

[Mooncatt]

Not really. I don't keep a ton of media synced between devices, and those I do have are done on a case by case basis. I never have had need to sync that many files from different categories all at once to even warrant the use of a special import program. At most, maybe some pics for an entire event I've been to, which are dragged and dropped into one folder on my computer for said event.

 

[etnpnys]

Not really. I don't keep a ton of media synced between devices, and those I do have are done on a case by case basis. I never have had need to sync that many files from different categories all at once to even warrant the use of a special import program. At most, maybe some pics for an entire event I've been to, which are dragged and dropped into one folder on my computer for said event.

Gotcha. The Galaxy S3s that my wife and I have are the primary capture devices for our kids and everything, so I need some kind of management done for me on import. Honestly, I never imagined doing it your way until you said something...

 

[Mooncatt]

Given your situation, works in a pinch and is free.

 

[olderTechnology]

I totally agree with the original concerns and I have tried most of those options. It's a combined Google/Microsoft problem, because Microsoft provides MTP mode and yet won't provide any decent way to address it. One problem that you didn't mention in the first place is that WIndows photo import doesn't zero in on the DCIM folder. It just thinks every picture on the phone is one of your "photos". Really smart. Please reply if you find something better.

 

[etnpnys]

I totally agree with the original concerns and I have tried most of those options. It's a combined Google/Microsoft problem, because Microsoft provides MTP mode and yet won't provide any decent way to address it. One problem that you didn't mention in the first place is that WIndows photo import doesn't zero in on the DCIM folder. It just thinks every picture on the phone is one of your "photos". Really smart. Please reply if you find something better.

Haha you're absolutely right. I have qualms with all of the easy options. I used Zoner over the weekend for a few things and it seems to do everything properly, but not well. It seems a little clunky, like there are times where the program just seems like it's frozen and about to crash - but it's actually importing your stuff at that time! So far, I don't have to do anything but plug in my phone, it doesn't seem to have a problem with duplicates, it rotates things properly, and it seems to import videos to the correct folders. Again, this is only a very limited set of tests, but I really wish they would put some polish onto the program. There's also this weird "edit mode" or something that they do... For example, if you're viewing your photos and you rotate one of them because one of your previous importing methods sucked ballz and you're trying to fix it, it only rotates your view of it. It doesn't edit the data unless you are in the "edit mode" of the photo. Strange.

I also gave DoubleTwist a try this weekend because everything on their site and documentation says that it handles photos. But I couldn't find any of the options anywhere in the desktop nor the phone app.

I'll probably be keeping Zoner unless somebody can chime in with a better option.