Suddenly unable to view files on iPhone through Explorer?

SBGURU is the closest to an answer I can see in this thread.

Im not using a Mac nor iPhoto. I have vista 64.

I've never needed it in the past. The phone simply doesn't show up as a digital camera anymore and I can not browse the file system on the phone anymore.

I have tried uninstalling and letting it reinstall the driver. In fact it uninstalls it every time I disconnect. But that still does not work.

Someone above said it should pull the files off during a sync. But it does not. During sync it only pulls the files from the computer onto the phone, if there are any new ones.

How do I get it to pull the files from the phone onto the computer during a sync?

Davy Jones wrote:
Photo and video importing does not take place within iTunes. iTunes does not even need to be installed to do this.

So its not possible to move files from the phone onto a computer using iTunes iPhone sync? That seems like an insanely huge design flaw. Most people don't even know about browsing files using windows explorer. How do most people get files off their iphone?

Sorry to ask the obvious, but is there something in the camera roll to be imported?

Well yes. About 40 photos and some videos that I have taken with the phone. After all, thats why they put a camera on the phone in the first place - i cant imagine they have no automated method for exporting the photos?

Did the iPhone disapear from explorer after installing any new software?

Valid question. But I plugged this phone into two other computers that don't even have itunes on them, and neither of them are showing this phone in the windows explorer screen. It absolutely did used to appear just like your screen cap showing the little iphone icon, on my main computer. It simply stopped working on my main computer, and does not work on the two other computers. This is why I assumed Apple did something in one of the iphone updates.

Something is definitely different. I used to plug the phone into the USB and within 2 seconds it would identify the phone as a digital camera. I'd even get a windows popup asking me if I want to browse the files, or import to photoshop, etc. None of that happens now.

All it does is this: in the bottom right corner, a little white rectangular icon appears with a green bubble that bounces around, while it says "installing device driver software". This message bubble slowly fades and disappears. The green bubble continues to bounce around the icon. When I double click the icon i get a poup in the bottom right corner of my monitor saying : "Digital Still Camera" and "Searching for preconfigured driver folders". After about 1 minute, a second gray icon appears next to the first icon. It looks like a computer tower or something. It has a green checkmark circle on it. The phone then vibrates twice as if its just connecting to the computer for the first time. The 2nd icon disappears, while the first remains, with the green circle bouncing all around it. This repeats and repeats with no progress made.

Does it appear as an 'imaging device' in device manager, or as an autoplay device? Anything listed under 'other devices'?

Device manager shows a "Digital Still Camera"
Under Imaging Devices I just have my standard "sony Visual Communication Camera", nothing else
There is nothing under "Universal Serial Bus Controllers"
I dont have an "Other Devices" in my device manager list.
I dont see it on your screen cap either.

As far as I can tell form my Iphone (3.1.2) nothing has changed with the updates. I can still browse the file system, also, as soon I connect it to PC (Vista 32) "Autorun" runs and from there I can import my Pics and videos (exactly as they are on the iphone). Other digital photo applications runs as well and ask to import photos and videos. Finally Itunes run as well.

The only time that I had a similar problem like yours is when I used a non Apple IPhone cable (yes it says works with Iphone), sometiems connects and others does not, and when it does it is too slow for anything. Waste of money. I had to uninstall Itunes, reboot my pc, reinstall Itunes and use original cable. All is fine now.

Hope this helps.

Just to be extra clear. I don't use Windows Explorer to browse the file system. The device does appear under "Portable Devices" but I can only browse the pictures. Whether you were able to browse the file system from Windows explorer, then I don't know. Haven't noticed before, as I always used 3rd party for file system browsing.

Tonight I couldn't even get iPhone to show up in iTunes.

I had to uninstall not only itunes, but quicktime, apple mobile device, apple software support, bonjour, and for good measure, safari as well. This fixed the first issue. Uninstalling iTunes alone did not, I had to uninstall everything.

However now the original problem remains. I now see nothing in "Imaging Devices" at all. I see nothing under "Portable Devices" at all. It does correctly show the Apple Mobile Device in the USB list, however it doesn't show the iPhone in windows explorer and there is no Autorun popup when I first connect it. I am using the white cable that came with the device.

Sigh...

I don't use PC but I do know that by removing all Apple items you have removed the drivers that allowed it to show up as a device

You're misreading. I got everything back after deleting everything and reinstalling iTunes. You can not get these drivers back by just uninstalling iTunes. I tried that. As per the Apple web site you must manually uninstall everything, even Bonjour. That worked. As I stated immediately above, I can now see the phone in iTunes. I am not able to browse the files with the windows function.

have you tried restore?

I do not wish to lose all my contacts, photos, and videos, so no. The entire purpose of this process is to get the video currently on my phone - onto my computer. Formatting my phone, or reverting to a previous backup where I wont have any phone numbers added in the last 6 months, isn't an option.

I asked this question above and nobody has replied: How do you get files OFF THE IPHONE and onto your computer, using iTunes. And if the answer is "You can't" then I am floored....

Try this utility. It is free for 14 days.
http://diskaid.en.softonic.com/download

Message was edited by: jamalaya