I’ve found dramatic differences in the USB file transfer from android between different versions of windoze.
XP was really bad and unreliable. Win7-64 is much better, win10 better still.
Often it is best to just extract an SD card and put it into a reader. Don’t use the phone USB cable.
yesterday when I tried it at home via 5G, it was lightening fast
Very unlikely to be 4G v 5G.
not without debugging/reverse-engineering the whole operating system.
A bit of a tangent but various vendors have been caught in the past doing “excessive” telemetry, because it is easy enough to see the data over wifi – even if encrypted you get an idea something fishy is being done.
We should be grateful for continuous telemetry; it is what shows traffic jams on google maps 
arj1 wrote:
If it becomes a really slow copy, then I’d suggest contacting the support – you don’t want to spend a month copying the data back just to realise that the phone you’ve got is somehow defective. Or that there is a parameter that would make the copy a hundred times faster.
That is exactly what I do and what the problem is.
arj1 wrote:
I would usually sync all the contacts etc with Google (they have access to it anyway, if they wanted to snoop on you), and for other files I would would either save a copy on some cloud storage or save it on a memory card. For the new phone I’d sync the data back from either Google and/or other cloud providers and then for the rest of the data I’d use the memory card as well.
That was done like this with contacts e.t.c. just by signing into google it downloaded all of it right away. What did not work is everything on the SD card.
I now find I have other problems however and have to find out if I need a new sim card for this phone, which is 5G. The internet with the existing one is also very slow, via WIFI it’s ok. Funnily, yesterday when I tried it at home via 5G, it was lightening fast. Need to contact my service provider.
Peter wrote:
I don’t understand why avoiding google is worth the effort.
@Peter, that is precisely why I’m saying that I do sync my contacts – if there is a targeted investigation, your data will be extracted anyway, so it is pointless to not sync it. But some people would not do it as they say the privacy is exposed. Well, it is exposed when you start using your phone anyway – Google actually DID produce the software, so they can do as they please, and being an IT experienced guy and a realist I always assume that the moment I start using some software (Android in this case) I would not be able to say if my data was siphoned or not without debugging/reverse-engineering the whole operating system.
Hence – just sync it.
I don’t understand why avoiding google is worth the effort.
Your phone compromises your privacy only via your activity.
Google uses telemetry (Apple does too) but doesn’t know what it cannot get. For example it cannot get the phone’s number. That is why Iphones have to ask you what your number is, for the I-message feature to work. The phone number is held in the telco’s database; not in the SIM card or in the phone.
So all that google or apple are getting is some phone’s location. It’s like you run a share portfolio on some fantasy investment website. It doesn’t know who you are.
If you do not access any website then your privacy is greatly enhanced but then you have spent 3 or 4 digits on a pocket camera which does email and messaging
Messaging is also vulnerable to telemetry but I doubt google do that; it would be a scandal. The telcos store SMSs instead, for years or longer.
There is much more of course, like if you use your FB login to login to other sites (which most people do) you are uploading your Contacts to all those sites.
@Mooney_Driver, I would usually sync all the contacts etc with Google (they have access to it anyway, if they wanted to snoop on you), and for other files I would would either save a copy on some cloud storage or save it on a memory card. For the new phone I’d sync the data back from either Google and/or other cloud providers and then for the rest of the data I’d use the memory card as well.
If you cannot use the memory card, then I’d just connect it via USB so the phone is pressent as a USB storage device (there should be a driver) and copy/paste the directories, just gradually, group by group. If it becomes a really slow copy, then I’d suggest contacting the support – you don’t want to spend a month copying the data back just to realise that the phone you’ve got is somehow defective. Or that there is a parameter that would make the copy a hundred times faster.
I admit to knowing little about the technology. But I do download and upload a lot of photographs and videos.
Downloading from the internet onto the PC is not a great problem. I get sent a lot of videos via SMASH.
Uploading edited videos to the net to send to another piece of equipment via the internet is a nightmare. It takes 4 times as long as the download. It also drops out often. Software such as Smash cannot cope with this as it doesn’t store the information uploaded before the drop out and so you have to start again.
Google Drive on the other hand does store the information so you just reconnect and it uploads from the point of drop out. A 30minute video of decent quality can take 2 or 3 days on many internet networks whereas all the original material can be downloaded to your computer in an hour or so.
Outside of systems like Apple’s or Bluetooth etc
which are good if you have the matching equipment.
If I shoot on a phone or dslr with wi fi I up load it to the Google Drive 15gb free. I then download to my Macbook and directly onto my external storage discs. I tend to convert the images at this point.
To get photos and videos back onto my phone or someone elses I again go via Google drive.
You can set the system to do it overnight and reconnect automatically when the network drops out. I try when possible, other than for final edits to try to keep the files being uploaded as small as possible only possibly uploading 5 images instead of 10 at a time.
Uploading and downloading is much quicker on my old Samsung phone using 4g than through my home router. This might of course change when I finally get fibre optic connections. I will wait and see.
But by then maybe the 5g network will be more advanced in this area by then and that might be quicker again. The theory being that air is quicker than fibre because there are less gates to open..But what do I know? Sales brochures always look on the optimistic side.
As soon as I have done what I set out to do I delete everything from Google Drive to give me the space for next time.
Ultranomad wrote:
Yes, I have a Blackview BV9800 Pro with a thermal camera. It also has a barometric sensor (useful for air navigation) and is ruggedised to MIL-STD-810G standard and IP68/IP69K rated (can even be used for underwater photography). Doesn’t support 5G, though. For a price of 320 USD, it’s a fantastic deal, and it’s the third Blackview phone I bought (two for me, one for my mum).
Wow, looks very attractive. Too bad there doesn’t seem to be a Google-free Android OS for it, like LineageOS or so.
Peter wrote:
What version of Windows are you using?
On that PC Win 10.
Peter wrote:
One can do part-copy of config data between phones e.g. you can use Nova Backup to save and restore your desktop layout, and that is damn useful for setting up a new phone because you don’t waste hours re-doing the old app layout from your memory.Then you go to the app shop and download all the apps you want and their icons will appear in the right places.
With Samsung and Smart Switch, if I remember right, everything came over. I just connected the phones with a cable and let it run for a couple of hours and everything from the old phone was copied to the point where the new phone was totally ready to use. Also most apps did not even require a new log in.
ShareMe from Xiaomi is different. It copies the APK files over and asks you to install them, which means you have to open that possibility (install from unknown sources). It also copies pics and docs from the internal memory but for some reason can not see the SD card on the Samsung, so it does not copy from there.
Peter wrote:
Usually I get ones which can take a flash card although with say a 256GB phone you won’t need that unless storing loads of movies on it.
As I said, that is no longer available on any of the newer phones. Not sure which one was the last which had SD cards but it was either the Note 20 or 21. The S22 and S23 series as well as most of the 20/21 series have no SD cards anymore.
Peter wrote:
Camera apps tend to be stupid-committee-crippled to not work with external cards for certain data e.g. if you shoot RAW (as I always do) you are likely to find that the RAW file will not be saved on external storage.
I used to have all pics saved on the SD cards without any issue. When my Note 4 threw it’s mainboard, I simply took out the card and put it in the replacement phone, done. When I got the Note 8, I crossloaded everything with SmartSwitch, which took everything from the Note 4 and set the Note 8 up so I could take it and use it as the old phone was. That is what I’d expect from newer phones too. I am told that this still works if i would buy a new Samsung and connect it to the Note 8.
Peter wrote:
they can be repaired – around £150 for a screen or a new battery.
If I have time, i usually wait until I go to Bulgaria, where I have a very good phone guy who repairs everything. For some of the older phones I order the replacement parts from Ali Express beforehand, they are dirt cheap there. I now bought a new original Oled display for the Note 8 and a battery there for £60 including postage. I’ll have my guy change it when I am there in July. Which means that I’ll probably stay with the Note 8 and use the 10T pro as backup…
Thanks for all the inputs here.
It’s not the problem for me at the moment that I don’t have backups. I regularly copy the data down to PC.
Currently the problem is, that I don’t succeed to copy the data back from the PC onto the new phone. It starts copying but you can see how it uploads file by file (extremely slow) and then eventually stops altogether. I don’t know what this is, never had it like this. Will have to try with a different PC and see if it would do the job there. In any case, 128 GB is way too small as I can see now, after just restoring 1 year of data, only 30 GB are left. So eventually I will need to bite the bullet and get a 1 TB phone or something like that.
With older phones which had an SD card slot, this was never an issue, even if copying did not work, I simply transferred the data onto a new SD card on the PC and stuck it into the new phone. But all the new ones don’t have SD cards anymore. I think the last ones to have them were the S20 series, the others only rely on internal memory, which is a major bummer in my view.
my main problem is that I do need basically my whole photo archive of the last several yearss available on the phone with me, as I do no longer use PC’s while on travel, only the phone with a 2nd one as backup. So what I will need to do is to massively clean those archives up to make the sizes managable. Currently, there are about 60 k pictures on the Note 8.
I found that with the new “freedom” to have a camera with you all the time, picture archives tend to get out of control in a matter of days. With the cam, copying and organizing pics into meaningful folders was a normal ops but since I have capable phone cams, numbers of pics explode while organizing them becomes next to impossible. Maybe a good wake up call to finally get that task done.
Apart from the memory issues, the 10T Pro is amazing. The cams are a good step forward from my Samsung Note 8 and so is the screen and battery life. Experiencing 5G is also neat, download speed where I live makes a huge difference and also the connection is much better. I have huge problems with the 3 and 4 G connection where I live but 5G works flawlessly and very fast indeed. And all that for a fraction of the price of an S22 or S23.
I had great experiences with Xiaomi from day one: When my wife’s S2 gave out after less than a year, I got her a Redmi 3S from Ali Express, when nobody knew Xiaomi at all. It came with a lovely metal casing and after 12 years still runs fine and gets updated by Xiaomi! She has long since moved up to a Samsung S10Lite which also works flawlessly and has been the best Samsung phone we’ve ever had, but the 3S is still in use while in Bulgaria. My daughter uses a Redmi Note 4 which also works flawlessly since I got it 2nd hand. My former backup phone is a Redmi Note 8 which also worked fine. If it was not for the transfer problems and the fact that almost all my home electronics are Samsung which I can control only via Samsung phones, I think I would move to Xiaomi without any hesitation.
Peter wrote:
I don’t change a phone until it gets totally smashed, or the battery is gone, but they can be repaired – around £150 for a screen or a new battery. If I change mine, I will go for one with an optical zoom; it is pretty useful. There are even some oddball models with a thermal camera, which is really handy for stuff I do. @ultranomad may have one.
Yes, I have a Blackview BV9800 Pro with a thermal camera. It also has a barometric sensor (useful for air navigation) and is ruggedised to MIL-STD-810G standard and IP68/IP69K rated (can even be used for underwater photography). Doesn’t support 5G, though. For a price of 320 USD, it’s a fantastic deal, and it’s the third Blackview phone I bought (two for me, one for my mum).
Regarding phone change, I also keep them as long as possible, and all my phone data are regularly copied to the PC, so no Android-to-Android migration is necessary. I’m a bit of a stickler for paperwork privacy freak, so I never back up anything to the Google account or any other cloud services.
