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iPhone warning
Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 12:37 pm
by The Phoenix
Fellow iPhone users, let me tell you my tale of woe.
I had a wonderful macbook as my primary computer, and it was syncing to my iPhone, and all was wonderful.
I was taking pictures, downloading pictures to my macbook, even pulling pictures from my digital camcorder to my macbook.
Then one day for no good reason, my macbook's hard drive died (less than 3 months after purchase). The Apple store sent it in for servicing, and I had it back in three days flat - they rock.
The data on the macbook was gone. But it didn't worry me, as I had 400+ pictures on my iPhone, in the photo library.
I tried syncing through iTunes on the rebuilt macbook. No go - iTunes sync is for *current* pictures, not old pictures. I tried several shareware packages that let you transfer the photos (supposedly). None of them did as they claimed. One pulled up an empty list of pictures (like iTunes), one wouldn't even connect to the iPhone, and another would crash in transferring a single picture (even when choosing a different picture).
I called Apple tech support, hopeful that they could provide a solution. No joy. Apple officially states that the iPhoto *library* is one-way. Can't retrieve them.
I even finally jailbroke my phone in frustration, hoping I could get them off *that* way, but to do so, I had to reset the phone firmware.
Backup often, and do not rely upon the iPhone photo library as a retreivable storage area.
Apple, you do a lot right, but this one is just wrong.
Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 12:55 pm
by RobertGonzalez
Can you Bluetooth extract them?
Re: iPhone warning
Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 2:07 pm
by pickle
<Apple Fanboy>
Apple wrote:iPhoto *library* is one-way. Can't retrieve them.
Dude I feel your pain, but ... you were told.
</Apple Fanboy>
Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 3:37 pm
by Benjamin
I can pull music off my iPod. I'm sure there is a way.
Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 5:29 pm
by RobertGonzalez
I just remembered something... when I connect my iPhone to my computer in Windows I always get prompted with a dialog asking which application I want to use to copy my images from my phone to my computer.
Can you connect your iPhone to a Windows machine and see if you can get them that way?
Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 8:01 pm
by swiftouch
I wish I still had that link to the article on cnet(i believe) that broke down all the components of an ipod and put their cost at abt. $270. That being said, who knows if that included bulk discount that apple undoubtedly gets.
When the phone came out I absolutely couldn't believe someone would actually pay $600 for a phone. There are two things about the iphone that would be a show-stopper for me that I couldn't take. The first being the fact that you get "face-butter on the screen every time it's put up to your face. (who the hell thought that through. obviously they didn't.)
After owning an ipod and going through the same maddening ordeal that this poor guy went through with my itunes songs, there is no WAY on this earth I would drop money on an overpriced iphone or ipod. There are many many alternatives.
Why the hell would they program multimedia content to be "one-way" in the first place?? Why wouldn't they put technology on the phone that makes it two-way???
You can get even more juicy tid-bits at john lech johansens blog where he's outlined many of the features of why the iphone sucks.
All this and that's not to mention the paltry 8 gig they put on the phone. Who are they trying to impress??? 8 gig is like owning that old-school sony camera that used floppies. Another slap in the face if you ask me.
And on top of that, they give you NOTHING to expand the phones internal storage. How easy it would have been to install a SD/CF, etc card slot onto the phone!!!?? My sony ericsson has one.
So why why why would anyone buy something so overpriced and un-functional!? Macs track record has always been this way. They have always been control freaks and "form heavy." The same reason why today they suck as bad as they always have.
Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 11:05 pm
by Kieran Huggins
That's so Apple. I'm reminded of
that video where the guy talks about retrieving a file he deleted.
"YOU IDIOT, YOU OWN A MAC. YOUR FILE IS F***ING GONE" (Norton Utilities, from the video)
I do feel your pain though, I don't mean to make light of you losing your photos. That truly does suck

Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2007 11:26 pm
by RobertGonzalez
Try connecting it to a windows machine. It will ask you what program you want to edit the photos in. Pick something, or pick viewer or what ever it is, then copy them. I did that on my laptop (which is my primary device) and at work (which is a secondary device and I do not sync to it).
Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 6:27 am
by The Phoenix
Everah wrote:Can you Bluetooth extract them?
the iPhone limits Bluetooth to headsets - no file transfer. Not kidding at all.
Everah wrote:Can you connect your iPhone to a Windows machine and see if you can get them that way?
I did, and it doesn't. It accesses the current roll, just like iTunes did. Only current pictures, not library pictures.
Swiftouch wrote:The first being the fact that you get "face-butter on the screen every time it's put up to your face.
Its surprisingly not bad. I dunno if they have some kind of futuristic, glass-with-teflon, freaky technology, but its never really been an issue with mine. Perhaps I'm shockingly free of face-butter?
Swiftouch wrote:All this and that's not to mention the paltry 8 gig they put on the phone. Who are they trying to impress??? 8 gig is like owning that old-school sony camera that used floppies. Another slap in the face if you ask me.
I have the 4gig model, and it doesn't bother me at all. I set it to sync recent played songs, and in several months, with several video clips on it, I never come close to my limit. I just make sure to delete movies when I'm done, and only sync recent songs, and I'm golden.
Kieran Huggins wrote:I do feel your pain though, I don't mean to make light of you losing your photos. That truly does suck
Yeah, it does. But as a result, I did take the time to jailbreak my phone, and ssh-ing from my phone? Pretty hot. Plus there are some AWESOME games for it. The Blackjack game is amazing.
There is an incredibly odd post-script to this story. I had a picture set as my Wallpaper on my iPhone prior to this weird series of events. Despite a firmware restore, jailbreaking, and multiple wipe-sync's, that Wallpaper is still set. Its not listed in the Wallpaper display, and - AND - if you go onto the filesystem, it is nowhere to be found. It is utterly bizarre.
It exists in magic land. Its a picture of me & my daughter, so I'm tempted to claim the picture was too cute for even Apple's poor design choice to destroy.
Cute for the win.
Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 10:37 am
by RobertGonzalez
You know what, I forgot about that. It does not allow access to the library, only to the current photo list.
I know it is a pain, but perhaps you can text/email them to yourself?
Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 5:40 pm
by Kieran Huggins
emailing shrinks them
I have an app on mine that can push your photos to flickr...
That being said, have you considered Flickr? It's a great photo backup service, if nothing else!
Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 9:17 pm
by gregwhitworth
Ah the iPhone - another service not yet fully functional in Alaska. Maybe in another few years.
--
Greg
Posted: Sat Oct 20, 2007 3:37 am
by Kieran Huggins
Do like we Canadians do - crack it and use it with any GSM carrier. I use a 7-11 prepaid account, works like a charm
